Friday, June 10, 2011

My Perfect Weekend: Sophie Ellis-Bextor

ORIGINAL ARTICLE: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/my-perfect-weekend/8566627/My-perfect-weekend-Sophie-Ellis-Bextor.html

On Friday evenings I love to go dancing with my husband [Richard Jones, bassist with band the Feeling] and a group of our friends. We run an occasional club night at the Café de Paris in Soho called Love to Love and I usually get on the decks at some stage. It all started because I couldn’t find the perfect club night in London – one that played all the tunes I wanted to dance to – so I thought we’d better start one ourselves. It’s revived my love of dance and disco music; they sound so phenomenal belting out through big speakers. And dancing to your favourite tracks is a great way to shake off the stresses of the week.

Richard will dance with me at the beginning of the evening, when he’s in the mood, and then when he gets bored of dancing (which is always long before I do) I’ll prance around with my girlfriends. We’ll do silly, pretend-sexy moves to songs by Rihanna.

We usually get back to our home in Hammersmith quite late and if we’re very lucky our lovely nanny Claire will let us have a bit of a lie in on Saturday morning. It’s always a treat when she stays over and makes breakfast for our boys, Sonny, seven, and Kit, two – who wakes up at 6am on a good day and likes to be busy.

I recently bought him a little broom and mop so he can make himself useful. Unfortunately he took the broom and hit a cupboard door which had a glass window in it. Sadly it doesn’t have a glass window in it any more. I think he was a bit shocked.

I really love being in London at weekends – there’s always so much to do. If it’s lovely weather we’ll go for a walk down along the river with my mother (the former Blue Peter presenter Janet Ellis) who lives nearby, or meet friends at a pub for a shandy and some lunch.

We’re spoilt for choice in terms of good pubs near us: I’d recommend the Raven, the Black Lion and the Dove. Then in the afternoon I’ll wander around Portobello Market with Richard and the boys, and will invariably end up buying something tacky that nobody else wants.

Our house is so filled with kitsch objects that it looks like a bric-a-brac store. I don’t know why I’m so drawn to tatty old furniture, and wonky tapestry pictures but luckily Richard shares my enthusiasm. He once bought a bass that’s shaped like an axe. It’s mounted on the wall along with all the other tat.

In the coming weeks we’ll be escaping the city on a few Saturdays. I’m appearing at several of the smaller, less cliquey festivals including the Forest Tour 2011 with Erasure and the Cornbury Festival at the beginning of July. I’m afraid I’m not much of a camper so we’ll just go for the day.

Sometimes we’ll drive to my dad’s (Robin Bextor, the film and television producer) house in East Sussex, an hour and a half away. For for a couple of years now he’s been running a restaurant called Moonrakers in the village of Alfriston. It is ridiculously pretty around there. The back terrace of the restaurant overlooks the Tye, a big village green, and there’s a really old church called St Andrews, where Morning Has Broken was written.

The Bextor side of my family – my parents separated when I was four – are all very food motivated. We’ll sit outside in the sun with a glass of wine and order from the menu – spring lamb, fresh fish, ham hock – it’s all locally produced and very tasty.

We never go out on Saturday night. We’ll get takeaway fish ’n’ chips and eat it on our knees in front of some silly Saturday night television such as You’ve Been Framed. I’m sorry but I enjoy watching people fall over.

Richard and I will have friends over for a barbecue on Sunday. We’ve got loads of toys out in the garden – we’re like big kids really. There’s ping pong, a climbing frame and a trampoline. We’ve even got one of those amusement arcade slot machines where you put a coin in and it almost pushes all the other coins off a ledge. My birthday present last year was an inflatable hot tub so I guess that will be getting a second airing this summer.

On Sunday evening I’ll get on with all the admin waiting for me inside. I’ve recently started my own record label called EBGB’s and am enjoying being the boss lady. I think this is something we’ll see more acts doing in the future – Mumford & Sons made their album on their own label, then licensed it to Island. You have to sell a lot fewer albums to make a living when you do it this way.

My fourth album Making a Scene came out earlier this month so I’ve also been doing promotion work for that. It’s great fun although tiring at times; particularly when you’re doing interviews and all the questions are, “Oh, you must be tired?!” and “Aw, do you miss your kids”.

I try my hardest not to read reviews. I’ll have a look if my friends say it’s a good one. But even then I tend only to take on board the disapproving bits. If I get 4 out of 5, I’ll think, “Ah, it could’ve been 5 out of 5, where did I go wrong?”

I’ve been so focused on getting this latest album out to the people who want to buy it that I’d forgotten that there would be critics going, “Well we don’t know if we actually want to own it, but we’re going to tell you what we think of it anyway”.

I never manage to get to bed early on Sunday night but this doesn’t matter as I don’t know one level of exhaustion from another. I don’t dread the arrival of Monday, because I love doing what I do. But I will go to the gym first thing to work off all those fish ’n’ chips.

In short

Herbal tea or stiff drink?
If it’s past six o’clock, a caipiroska

Do you believe in the spirit world?
I like the influence of the macabre but I don’t believe in ghosts

What’s your favourite restaurant – apart from you father’s?
The bar on the beach at Santa Maria di Castellabate in southern Italy

Your inspiration?
Julie Andrews. I grew up watching The Sound of Music

Last music you bought?
Metronomy’s new album

How do you relax?
I jump around, play with the kids or go dancing

What irritates you most?
Bad manners

If you could live in another era when would it be?
The Fifties

What would you eat for your last supper?
Fish ’n’ chips with as much mayo and ketchup as I wanted

My favourite things
London
Music
Food
Bright colours
Spring

Sophie launched Evian’s new Let’s Baby Dance campaign: a new advert and a new global online app to make the world’s longest user-generated music video. www.facebook.com/evianUK

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