And bravo to that ... Beth Ditto. Photograph: Sarah Lee
As Beth Ditto observed recently, we're suckers for an oddball on these islands.
"It's just way more open to weirdoes. And more diverse," Beth said about the UK, as reported by WENN. "Antony And The Johnsons win awards here, and that would never happen in America - everyone's just so worried about what's the right thing to do."
Though she doesn't mention it directly, the tacit suggestion seems to be that Ditto feels embraced here in a way not quite matched back home. Maybe it's because of our geographical position as craggy outposts at the edge of Europe that we prefer to champion the loners and the rebels. Talent and beauty might be enough to make a star, but it takes an artful, aggressive individualism to be recognised as an icon.
From the wilfully weird Boy George, to the renegade Adam Ant; the posing, preening Jarvis Cocker to the misfit Morrissey - every angle of aberration as inspiration is covered and fêted. Even oddities from overseas are made to feel at home. Which is why Ditto, like Björk, that high queen of quirk, has found herself adopted and elevated to the status of legend.
Or perhaps it's that in America - a country historically drawn together from disparate elements - the focus of music as a collective force celebrates cohesiveness rather than difference. But over here, eccentricity offers an escape from the claustrophobia of island living. Navel gazers we might be, but at least, in this culture of surveillance, we recognise the importance of putting on a damn good show.
It's good to know that both home grown and visiting weirdoes find a welcome on these shores. If nothing else, it's comforting to the oddball in all of us that, funnily enough, it's the feeling of being an outsider that brings us all together.
