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James Massiah is a poet, DJ and musician from South London whose work delves into themes of ethics, mortality and sex. Imaginatively redefining the boundaries of creativity, he has garnered attention from some of the most revered cultural institutions and global brands of our time. We sat down with James on a vibrant day in Streatham Common to talk personal philosophies, being a multi-faceted creative and early road-rap influences.

What sort of environments did you grow up in?

I grew up just down the road in Mitcham, my nearest cousins to me in age lived in here in Streatham and I spent a lot of time at their house. We often went to churches in Balham, Wimbledon and Brixton. At the youth services you’d see more contemporary styles of worship involving drums and bassline grooves whereas at usual services there would be an emphasis on hymns and more traditional forms of worship. I guess I experienced both sides of it you know, people have ideas of black churches being like over the top but that wasn’t really my experience growing up and although it was predominantly black, there were definitely a diverse range of backgrounds in my church.

How was your love for poetry born?

A combination of church and school. Everyone does English in school and there are poetry modules within that which I was really drawn to at the time. You realise you can trigger different emotions in people with the words you use and you kind of start to enjoy it. As far as poetry and church, one of the youth pastors came to my house once and saw a poem I had written in school on the family notice board which he thought I should read in a service, that pretty much kicked off my career as the resident poet of the church. I ended up studying English at university, poetry wasn’t given much space in the curriculum but there was a place for it in church until I became an atheist and then there wasn’t really a place for me anymore in church.

Much of your work focuses on themes of mortality, ethics and sex, what is about such topics that you are drawn to?

I’m really into the school of thought of amoral egoism, self-determination and the idea that there’s nothing absolutely right or absolutely wrong and it’s up to each and every individual to make their own choices within the context of reality. For me there’s a lot of things I didn’t do because I thought they were wrong. For example, I didn’t get with guys or I didn’t take drugs or I didn’t even get with girls, these were things you just didn’t do because it’s wrong. Even beyond being a Christian there’s stuff that’s socially looked down upon. I try to avoid being didactic in my work, but everything an artist does has some sort of reason or philosophy behind it and so even if I’m explicitly saying to someone “don’t go church, do drugs instead” it’s in there subtly, it’s me kind of talking about what I see and talking about the lives of the people I admire and putting it all in a form that’s palatable.

Who would you say has had the biggest impact on you as a poet?

Big influences are EE Cummins; Gertrude Stein, Alice Oswald, George Orwell, Roald Dahl, Dizzee Rascal, Wiley, Kanye West, Jay Electronica, Francis and the Lights, Malcolm X, Louis Farrakhan, George Carlin, Dave Chappelle, Richard Prior, Eddie Murphy… But the person I can say who’s impacted me beyond their writing is Ayn Rand, her ideas really influenced me. Mostly through watching her interviews on the internet though one of my favourite books is Anthem by Ayn Rand, it’s almost a precursor to 1984 by Orwell, Rand wrote a lot about egoism and the idea of it being rational to do something in your own interest.

You’ve mentioned Charlie Dark as an early mentor, ‘towing the line between music and poetry’, was he influential in you branching out into music and being a DJ as well?

I met Charlie around 2008/09, he was doing the Nike Run Dem Crew in Shoreditch, I was chilling with Skinny Macho at a point in time when he was already going to all the early Boiler Room, NTS stuff and all the funky house raves in South, he was there at the centre of it all and I was sort of beside him throughout this time. I knew Charlie as a poet primarily and Skinny was my best friend who was getting into DJing so I was sort of bouncing between them as we were all in the same running club and would always end up at the same after-parties or whatever else. My dad had shown me Benjamin Zephaniah and John Cooper Clark videos so I was aware of poets that had done stuff before but I guess in a more recent time Charlie Dark was definitely a major influence.

You’ve been commissioned by Nike, Selfridges, Tate modern, The Guardian and many other big organisations, does poetry play a role in the world of modern marketing?

It definitely does. Since I’ve started doing adverts a lot more brands have seen and referenced them and people have got more work through that. In a weird way, working for these agencies and corporations has helped me develop my writing skills because I find myself thinking more about why I might be wording a sentence a certain way. The funny thing with many brands is that they approach me not because they care about my work or even know it but because of how I look and who I’m associated with and they think it’s cool to have that as part of their image too. Everyone is using everyone for everything all the time, which leads back to the whole idea of not caring about such things because I’m getting to a cheque, even if it wasn’t a cheque its more just about your life and what you want to take from the situation.

You’ve mentioned Wiley and Dizzee Rascal as influences and in previous interviews have mentioned being a fan of early road rap, how does your work intertwine with those genres and your experiences from that era?

My next project is going to be referencing all that. My last project was called Euthanasia Party and it was about a bunch of people who died in 2007, in that period of my life I saw the craziest shit and it really impacted me so Euthanasia Party served to cement that time. With my next project I want to re-create a lot of the videos, styles and characters that I saw in those early road-rap days, they were so dynamic and a lot of them now, for drugs or whatever else, are in prison or have lost their minds and have been completely forgotten. To me they were some of the most important poets, artists and filmmakers of that time. I’ll be out doing a set playing Travis Scott or whatever but in my head I’m thinking I just wanna play some Tempman! (laughs) I never do; I think I’m going to start though.

What themes will you explore in your next project and when will it be dropping?

I’m still deciding what the name will be but this next project is about someone who dies in the future and the idea that someone’s life can be carried on even after they’ve passed and how people immortalise them. When someone dies you put their name on a t shirt or you put their name in your bio on social media, I want to really unpack that and think about the idea of living forever and how would it be if someone’s social media profile took on a life on their own or if there was an algorithm that allowed the profile to live on. What if some young gangster who died had this Facebook profile that kept updating itself even after they’ve gone almost like a second consciousness? I feel like one of those rappers in interviews always pushing back my projects but I feel like it has to be this year, it’s got to be this year man. Do you know what? I want it to be done by the end of the month actually… actually, I might do it this weekend fuck it!

http://www.jamesmassiah.com/

https://www.instagram.com/jamesmassiah/

Interview: Nicholas Borghesi

Portraits: Jake Ranford & Joseph McDermott

Our friend, critically acclaimed music video director Daniel Brereton has photographed a selection of our vintage Missoni photographed in the wilds of his native Lake District.

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Photography: Daniel Brereton

Model: Barnaby Pearson

New editorial shoot by the hugely talented Tom Emmerson showcasing vintage Stone Island pieces that will be available to purchase over the coming weeks.

Photography: Tom Emmerson

Models: Archie Willett-Claridge & Tiwa Akinjide

Paninaro, the influential subculture that inspired 80’s Italian teens to dress head to toe in the latest European designer labels combined with classic American styling. It has always been difficult for us non Italian speakers to find exact details of the style so when we met Fabio recently who was an enthusiastic teen Paninaro in the 1980’s we knew we had to share his version of events and love for the style.

What is the history of Paninaro? How did it start?

It all started in the early 80s in Milan. The “Paninaro Culture and Style” evolved from AC Milan football hooligans back in those days. The hooligans changed their style from wearing tracksuit tops and trainers (copying their role model the English) to suntanned, good-looking and well dressed; and so their wardrobe to Armani, Timberland and bomber jackets, which they wore in reverse (the orange side) to go to football matches. The idea behind this change, was to deceive the police and blend in with the crowd without detection. They would meet up in front of a sandwich bar called “Al Panino” (translated. “at the sandwich’s”) in Piazza Liberty, often on Saturdays before football matches. Like so often in the history of subcultures, it was a journalist to appoint these guys “Paninari”, which means “sandwich enthusiasts/eaters“.

The younger “Paninari” got to like the style more than the football and they started to cultivate the idea to dress expensively, to have an impeccable appearance and create an image of success and prosperity. They developed their own visual language and they started adding new brands to their look to distinguish themselves from the rest, becoming the new generation of Italy’s subculture. The PANINARO as we know it was born. The meeting place changed to Piazza San Babila in front of Burghy, a fastfood restaurant similar to McDonald’s.

From that “birthplace” the Paninaro culture and style spread out to all of Italy and later some European countries. A comic called Paninaro and a magazine called Wild Boys appeared in every newsstand in Italy and the Pet Shop Boys made a song entitled Paninaro. The Paninaro’s time was from 83-89.

Were there rivalries between the original Paninari and the younger new comers?

In the early phase of the Paninaro, the Paninari were often organized in groups, with a “leader”, who was named “grangallo” (which means big cock, but meaning the animal). That was inherited from their hooligan origins. This “leader“ had two jobs, to always have the best impeccable look, so the others had to try hard to look better and organising the activities for the group.

After some time, there were different groups in different corners of Milano; the group in piazza San Babila, the group in piazza Duomo and so on. As one can imagine, some of the groups were in heavy competition amongst each other and were also fighting each other from time to time. In the later period of the Paninaro, when it was at it’s peak, there were a lot of these groups all over Italy, the fights stopped a little and the competition limited itself foremost to the style!

The Paninaro’s other antagonists from the beginning were the punks, the goths and the metallari (heavy metal listeners). Those fights never stopped but that’s another story.

How did you discover Paninaro style and at what age?

To begin with, I live in Switzerland and I was born in Switzerland from Italian parents. Going back to Italy for vacation at least twice a year I got infected with the Paninaro virus when I was 13/14-years-old. My stays in Italy nourished the desire to follow and to live that culture. I was buying the comic Paninaro and the magazine Wild Boys, taking them back to Switzerland and sharing them with a very small group of Paninari (all with Italian background) in my home town Basel.

What were the must have items of clothing to define yourself as Paninaro?

The one piece which distinguished a Paninaro in the very first days is probably the colourful Moncler down jacket. Then brands like Best Company, Burlington socks, El Charro, Stone Island, C.P. Company, Boneville, Timberland, Americanino, Henry Lloyd, Avirex, Ray-Ban sunglasses, Invicta backbags, Uniform, Schott, Millet, Nike, Levi’s, Naj Oleari (mostly for girls), Armani Jeans and Durango boots were essentials. Later the spectrum got bigger, brands like Lacoste, Vans, Converse All Star, Valentino, Les Copains, Trussardi, American System, By American, Chevignon, New Balance, Energie, early Diesel pieces, Mistral, Ocean Pacific or Paraboot shoes were added. Unfortunately nowadays, many of these brands only exist in hidden wardrobes or online shops like yours.

What were the main influences that defined the style?

Mainly the idea of being free (sky’s the limit), successful and wealthy which came over from the U.S. this nourished the image of the Paninaro. Pop music filled with fun, hope and colour, U.S. movies, like Top Gun, Rambo or Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, in which money is never a question, strength is limitless and everything always works out for the hero.

How long did the style last for?

By 1989 all Italian teenagers were Paninari. Like every subculture, as soon as it starts to become mainstream it dissolves, disappears and a new subculture replaces the old one. The very first Paninari, who were adults by that time, changed due to their lives and work. All big fashion houses started producing affordable collections. It was nothing special anymore to wear a Best Company jumper or Timberland, everybody else had the same, even the parents started wearing these brands. The next generation was forced to find a new way to distinguish themselves from the rest so the Paninaro culture and the style died in the early 90s. By the early 90s the Paninaro look was out and forgotten by the next generation. The love and memory of the true Paninari never extinguished though.

What labels and styles did people move on to after Paninaro?

During the last period, the very first Paninari, especially those from Milano, started adopting more and more high fashion brands like YSL, Louis Vuitton or Versace to distinguish themselves from the rest of Italy. Their claim was the heritage of what they had started. On the one hand wearing something not everybody could afford on the other hand dictating what style meant to be real. That lasted only for a short period. The young generation was influenced by new trends, one of those was techno music and so the fashion that came along with it; Australian tracksuit tops, Levi’s jeans and Nike shoes.

Why do you think it was so popular?

In the 80s Italy had come out of very stressful years, the 70’s were economically bad for many Italians and this decade was politically turbulent and unstable; bomb attacks by communist terrorists, many changes in the government, corruption, only to name some problems. In the 80s the economy changed to the better, you had more opportunities in life and the world seemed to be yours. This attitude was reflected in the music and movies. I guess the youth back then followed that stream and ended up in consuming, unconcerned with the future, having fun and hedonism. The U.S. was sending those vibes over. I guess those were the reasons which made a subculture like the Paninaro possible and why it became so popular.

Did the style crossover into many other countries?

Frankly I don’t know. What I know is that some cities in Switzerland, mainly the Italian speaking ones, had Paninari groups. In my town, which is the farthest from the Italian border, we were 8 pals following and cultivating the Paninaro culture and style. Those into Paninaro culture and style had Italian backgrounds for sure. I guess there were other groups in other countries but since they never appeared in any Paninaro comic nor Wild Boys magazine (those are the main references and historical proof of the Panianro culture and style), there’s no record of it. I know that Germany had a similar subculture which was called “Poppers“, derived from Pop music, before you imagine anything else less wholesome. Funnily enough, the Poppers had a similar brand code, were also influenced by pop music and the U.S. image of life. Amongst Poppers’ brands you could find were Best Company, Nike, Levi’s, Avirex or Chevignon. Brands one still finds a lot of on the second hand market in Germany. To be honest I have no idea if the Poppers had noticed or had been influenced by the Paninari. What I know for sure is that the Paninari didn’t know anything about the Poppers. Shockingly enough only very few knew that there were Paninari outside from Italy. That’s a sign of that time, innit?

Has there been a resurgence of interest in the style recently?

Yes, absolutely. The youth have rediscovered the fashion bits of the 80s lately. Suddenly a Helly Hansen jacket, a vintage Nike Air Max, a timeless Stone Island Marina t-shirt or even a Best Company jumper reappears on the screen. I guess some of the Paninari got reminded of their roots and caught back being what they were from beginning, PANINARO!!

What is the story behind the recent Paninaro meet ups in Milan?

The current fashion trends have revived the love and the memory of being a Paninaro so many Paninari started reconnecting through Facebook and in 2012 they organized the first reunion in Milano, they documented it and sent it out to all of Italy. That call woke up many Paninari so today we’re back again, looking good of course, older but still splendidly vivid!

For all Paninari who haven’t heard yet that we’re still standing and those who want to join the two annual meetings in Milano (May and November/December) get in touch!