BOOM!

… well, that's according to his Twitter bio, anyway. Ebunola Adenipekun talked to the 26-year-old portrait artist who’s managed to merge his (and many others') two loves: music and art Joe doin' what he does best - paintin' masterpieces How much art do you do in a day? Today, for example. Are you an night owl, early lark… or both? I try and keep normal-ish working hours – generally I go into my studio about 9am to 6pm on weekdays and have weekends off. I do this so that I’m in line with other people and it’s easier to make social arrangements. I spend a long time on my own in my studio so I need to interact with people in the evenings to stay sane! Sometimes, when I want to accelerate progress I’ll do long stints and stay late (and become less sane), I very rarely do anything before 9am though.  Joe at Brighton There’s always been that cliché of artists starving for their craft. Have you always worked as an artist and/or had other jobs in addition...

Besides the addictive 'Ging, gi-gi-gi-gi-ging', the song wraps up messages of civil rights, equality, the poverty trap, freedom and hope...

BOOM! blog writer Ebunola Adenipekun speaks to Tanesha Westcarr, stylist extraordinaire (below) about hip-hop girls, fashion and loving your own skin… BOOM!: Hi Tanesha, let’s go. There was a story that was mentioned in all the papers, online and TV recently, about 20-year-old Claudia Aderotimi, who died after a cosmetic silicone injection went wrong. What are your thoughts, Tanesha? Tan: It’s so sad that women still feel the need to look a particular way, when there is so much us women can give beyond external features. There are so many girls who think their body isn’t good enough. Certain TV programmes and music videos give the impression that rubbing up against a rapper is a great achievement, but a woman has more to offer than that. It’s so sad that Claudia felt she had to change her body in such an extreme way, although I’m not saying whether women should get cosmetic surgery or not. But I hope that this story helps to shed some light on the media, that it...

I love this tune because it's sweet, breezy and just lovely. Q-tip and Norah should do a whole album together...pronto.

I can't think of a better way to live life than as the above title suggests... Martin Luther King once said to a group of students in 1967:   "...When you discover what you will be in your life, set out to do it as if God Almighty called you at this particular moment in history to do it. Don't just set out to do a good job. Set out to do such a good job that the living, the dead or the unborn couldn't do it any better. "If it falls on your lot to be a streetsweeper, sweep streets like Michelangelo painted pictures, sweep streets like Beethoven composed music, sweep streets like Leontyne Price sings before the Metropolitan Opera. Sweep streets like Shakespeare wrote poetry. Sweep streets so well that all the hosts of heaven and earth will have to pause and say: Here lived a great streetsweeper who swept his job well. If you can't be a pine at the top of the hill, be a shrub in the valley. Be be the best little shrub on the ...

I'm learning that the grievous times/the bad things/good things that come to an end all have lessons wrapped up in them. Those situations are like the most complex but annoying multiple layers of wrapping paper (Ever played Pass the Parcel ? Exactly! Thank you.) harbouring the gift you're itching to get to. You've got to unwrap that annoying paper i.e. experience the bad things/grief etc. before you see your gift in its full glory. For example, if: being in a not-so-great relationship and then exiting it painfully or breaking away from a well-paid but hated job brings out inner strength, becoming your own best friend, loving and valuing yourself more each day, realising how ignorant you are and have been about life and coming to the realisation that emotions are often NOT NECESSARILY YOUR BEST FRIEND, then so be it. What lessons have you learnt lately? Do let me know, below...

She would have been 32 today. Did you know: Mark Ronson's in this - as the DJ, obviously... Enjoy.