What do you get when you ask a comedian to tell you his best joke? “I don’t have a best joke, but I like the one where I tried chatting up a girl with the utmost respect and she looked at me up and down and called me a 'Wasteman'. In my defence I said to her 'Sorry darling you’ve got me all confused. I wasn’t chatting you up, I was looking for London Zoo and since you look like a koala bear...you can take me there.”

Eddie Kadi, the first black UK comedian to headline at the O2 Arena, promises a night full of laughter for all the friends and family. Encouraging people to buy tickets by the 10s, Eddie believes that not only is it the best medicine, but laughter is an experience to be shared fronting the “Have you got your 10?” campaign for the show.

Renown for his clean wit, the 27-year-old says this is important to him as it attracts a unique audience. He adds: “I love the fact that I can have a mother, her five-year-old son and her 60-year-old mother all sitting down comfortably enjoying the same material. I used to be careful about what I said on stage due to my mother being in the audience, so I do tend to look at things from the audiences’ point of view, that way everyone is included.”

So how does he come up with this refreshingly, controversy free material? “Initially I used to go on stage and pretty much freestyle. As my career progressed I started to be a bit more observant and I would always note things down and then elaborate on my bullet points. I tend to find that the more I tell a joke on stage, the more ideas I get for that joke. I’m inspired by my friends and family mainly.”

This is not the first time the comic will appear at the O2: his performance at the 2,000-capacity IndigO2 sold out twice. “It was always the plan to move onto bigger venues. The IndigO2 was an amazing experience, but I’m part of a team who always think a lot bigger, so this was part of the next big step.”

Eddie, who is inspired by Michael McIntyre, Lee Evans, Bernie Mac and Katt Williams, says he does not feel any more pressure to do well at the main arena because he loves performing. So, if you haven’t been to any of his shows expect theatrics, dance and music. You can also expect to play a part in the show. 

If he wasn’t doing comedy, Eddie tells Krystal he would be working in TV production off the back of his university degree in Media Technology from Kingston University. Here he was elected president of the African-Caribbean Society (ACS) and hosted his first comedy show, which heightened his passion for entertaining people. 
 
This has been a good year for Eddie and was made better by his recent trip to DR Congo. The comedian was born there in 1983 and moved to the UK at the age of eight. “I haven’t been back to Congo for 18 years so seeing friends and family was a shock, as everyone looked different. I couldn’t recognise certain parts of the area where I grew up.

“It gave me a whole new motive to become a person that will have the ability to make life a little easier for those back home, especially the children, because I could have been one of them, if God hadn’t given me a better life in the UK.”
 
An Audience with Eddie Kadi September 4 at the O2 Arena

by Melissa Allison-Forbes

Nineteen eighty-nine. Teenagers Serena Gorringe and Poppy Carlisle are on trial as the only witnesses to a tragedy that threatens to blight their lives. Dubbed ‘The Ice Cream Girls’ by the press, the girls are dragged through the law courts. While a media storm rages, the jury listen intently as both girls deny the charges against them. But is one of them lying about what really happened?

If you are gripped by this and want to read something other than the average woman’s fiction, then pick up a copy of ‘The Ice Cream Girls’. Dorothy Koomson’s powerful and controversial new novel will make you wonder if you can ever truly know the people you love. "It’s not a fluffy story. It deals with lots of dark issues," says the Koomson.

As the author of six best-selling novels, Koomson says her writing methods can sometimes horrify people. "Different authors write books in order: chapter one, then chapter two, three and so on. I don’t do that and that horrifies so many people.

“I just do what comes into my head then I sit down and plot what needs to happen. It can be hard to do it like this sometimes because it can take longer to write a book as you think you know where you are going with it then something else happens. Then you have to re-write and re-evaluate where it’s going."

Koomson, who grew up in south-east London, wrote her first novel ‘There’s A Thin Line Between Love And Hate’ at the tender age of 13. She wrote a chapter every night, then passed it around to her fellow pupils every morning. Her passion for writing grew as time went on and she got her big break as a published novelist with ‘The Cupid Effect’.

"It was fantastic when I first saw my book on the shelf," Koomson tells Krystal. "Before I was published I used to go into bookstores and have a look at where my book would be”. In 2006, her third novel, ‘My Best Friend’s Girl’ was published selling nearly 90,000 copies within its first few weeks on sale. Six weeks later, it was selected for the Richard & Judy Summer Reads Book Club and went on to sell over 500,000 copies.

Koomson is not only passionate about writing; she loves reading books too and thinks it’s important for everyone to read. "Reading is a new way of experiencing the world and to find out about things you wouldn’t normally find out about. You can get that on TV…but when you are reading you have to conjure up the images in your mind. That’s why books aren’t always good as a film."

Koomson also thinks that it’s important for there to be more black British writers. "It seems most black writers are based in America. I think it’s really hard to get published as a black author so you need to write what you love." In the past Dorothy was accused of being a black author who did not write about a black experience.

She also received emails from some who questioned why the black characters in her books didn’t have a lot of black friends. "I write books about people…I try to talk about what it’s like to be a black woman in an everyday situation."

Koomson says she writes what she loves and advises budding writers to do the same. She also says to those who wish to pursue a career as an author to read lots of books, be positive and believe in your writing.

Koomson is also a journalist and is currently involved in a project to raise money for the children whose lives were devastated by the earthquake in Haiti at the start of the year. The project, an eBook, called No Man & Other Stories to Help Haiti contains stories from some of top writers including Alexander McCall Smith, Nina Bell and Shari Low.

‘The Ice Cream Girls’ is available now in paperback

by Melissa Allison-Forbes

Martina, Sharlene, and Sacha are young, soulful and talented. Energetic, exciting and enthusiastic is how they describe themselves, and collectively they make up girl group, Divine Unity.

The girls, who have been singing together for over 10 years, were known as Martina and co, Sharlene and co or Sasha and co, but settled on Divine Unity (DU) as it came from the Bible and they felt it described them best. Together they say they can achieve anything and their unity and friendship is evident throughout the interview.

Although they describe their music as pop/soulful, religion is very important to the south Londoners. Martina, 23, says: “We were brought up in Church so we all have soulful voices, but we are pop…We have a positive message to portray in our songs because what we believe about is God. God is love so we portray that in our songs. We also talk about real life.” 

DU write their own music and are passionate about writing collectively and individually. They tell Krystal magazine that they are all different song writers who can be inspired to write songs whilst walking to work. All three have day jobs, but hope that in five years they will be established as artists and songwriters in the music industry. They are inspired by a variety of artists, from a spectrum of genres, including Marvin Sapp, Lauren Hill, Beyonce, Dean Martin, Frank Sinatra, Motown, and 80s/90s pop.

They are not just a girl group. They are also involved with the national, celebrity endorsed confidence campaign, Body Gossip. They hope that the positive message conveyed in their lyrics, along with their edgy, yet not overtly sexual image, will promote self-esteem in young women and prove that glamour and self-respect can go hand-in-hand. 

They want to tell others to love and embrace themselves and to be comfortable. 25-year-old Sasha says: “Another reason we like this campaign is we have always said that we want to be role models and I think that there is such a lack of that in the media, and the music industry in particular, and we want to be that. We want to fill that gap and give out that message of embrace who you are and love yourself.

“…A lot of the times when people feel bad about themselves it’s because they compare themselves to other people. You do not need to compare yourself to anyone. You have been made beautifully, wonderfully, you do not need to compare yourself to anyone else. You are fantastic as you are.” Sharlene, 24, adds: “That’s what we are about. We so want young people to love themselves and think that they are beautiful so when we found out about this, we wanted to be a part of it.”

They also have a message for other young women who want fulfill their dream. “One of the nucleuses for Divine Unity is hard work,” says Sharlene. “Anything worth having in life, you have to make sacrifices for it…the guy who has the £150,000 job he didn’t just get there…laziness isn’t going to work. Find your strength within. Get a passion for what you are doing.” Sasha agrees and says: “Don’t settle for being mediocre and just ok. Always think how can I better this and what can I do to improve.”

They have been spreading their positive message by performing at gigs and touring around London, and they recently won the Cordless Show People’s Vote. They are hoping to get an extended play (EP) out at the end of summer and have plans to launch an album next year. With big plans in the pipeline, where do the girls see themselves in five years? Sharlene says: “I would love for us to have at least two albums, maybe three…touring, meeting fans and to be making money.”

by Melissa Allison-Forbes

It’s a common story. Two people fall in love and decide to get married, but what should be the most thrilling, romantic and fulfilling day of their lives turns into a near disaster – well before the first guests have arrived and even before the dress and the cake have been ordered.  

Ugly Betty star America Ferrera and Oscar winning actor Forest Whitaker star in the new film Our Family Wedding, where two cultures clash as the parents – or more precisely the fathers of the happy couple- come to blows over practically everything. Will the overbearing dads (played by Whitaker and Carlos Mencia) put their differences aside to plan the wedding of their son and daughter in less than two weeks?

Twenty-five-year-old America plays Lucia, an intelligent and highly attractive young woman from a close-knit family with Mexican roots. She is getting married to Marcus, an African American young doctor, played by Lance Gross.  

Marcus and Lucia have kept their relationship a secret. They are hoping for a lovely wedding, before setting off on life’s adventures. But when they announce their plans to   their families, they quickly discover love is not enough to guarantee a perfect wedding day.

“I was really excited to play Lucia who is a woman of her generation,” says Ferrera. “She is independent and strong and knows what she wants in life. But like many girls she has a dilemma that I think is universal. No matter how far you travel or how independent or successful you become, the second you’re around your family it all goes away and you revert to being twelve years old again.

“It is about pleasing the family and playing your role inside the family. For me this was a journey about a woman having the courage to say ‘this is who I am and this is who I’m going to choose to be and I can’t keep playing this role who want me to fulfill.’ So I thought that was exciting.”

Regina King (star of Enemy Of The State and Miss Congeniality 2), who plays a lawyer and very close friend of Whitaker’s Brad Boyd, said that the film is timely as it shows how we can have personal judgments without even knowing it.

Regina said: “I think a lot of us don’t realise we even have prejudices, we just think ‘oh my god I love everyone,’ and then all of a sudden parents say:  ‘you’re marrying who? You are dating who?

“…It shows how we are often confronted with some personal judgments that we didn’t even know we had. Ultimately though, the film is about the journeys of these individuals. It is a great story told from a comedic perspective. There are also moments in this movie that are really heartfelt and you believe at the core that these two fathers love their children.” 

Our Family Wedding is released June 18

Ben Chijioke greets me wearing thick-rimmed glasses, jeans, a blue jumper and matching trainers. He orders a coke on the rocks and tells me he’s become an uncle. Would you think I am describing a UK rapper?

Ty, as he’s better known, is not a mainstream artist and he is happy not to be if that means he doesn’t have to compromise himself and his music just to have number one single. He doesn’t want to be the guy who is not allowed to commend, big up or include his culture in his music. He wants to represent those of us who go to work, love music and love to do the normal stuff.

Born and bred in south London, to Nigerian parents, Ty has worked with Estelle, Scratch Perverts, Talib Kweli, Black Twang and Arrested Development, but insists that he does not have a favourite as each person he’s worked with to create music was a journey.

Over the last decade, Ty released four albums with his latest album, ‘Special Kind of Fool’ being described as a continuation. He says: “Every album is another step in establishing the blue print for the Ty brand and what I think is missing in terms of black music, in terms of being proud of the term black music and making it.”

Ty believes that the black music industry in the UK has changed. He tells Krystal: “It use to be a bit braver. You used to be able to make music that would astound the modern day English housewife, but now we have really conformed. We make anything that we think is going to sell to everybody.

“We want to say nothing culturally, we don’t want to alienate anybody so we alienate ourselves, rubbish and really water down the output just to please a pop fan base that does not respect our culture, or our music or where we come from.

“To me that’s a ticking time bomb …we are actually dumbing down a little bit too fast and it will have dire consequences to the long-term survival of British black expression. Yes we’ll sell more records, yes we’ll move up in the corporate world, but it will have dire implications to expressing and documenting a moment in time.”

“…I have had enough of not saying nothing. I can see if I don’t then no one else will. You’re not going to get these words from Dizzee, respectfully.” The inauguration of Obama, last year, saw Dizzee Rascal appear on BBC’s Newsnight to talk about how he thought Obama's win might affect politics in the UK. However, Ty was originally approached but turned it down because he felt the BBC never treat artists/MCs like they’re experts at anything.

He also didn’t understand that why, on one of the most significant days in black history, a British rapper would be asked talk. “Where’s the polarity in that?” he asks. “With Gaza and Israel you don’t bring rappers to come and speak about that, you bring experts, so why aren’t you bringing experts to talk about Obama?” He felt a rapper talking about such a significant event would invalidate it as being a serious issue, and he did not want a part in that.

Ty is philosophical and revolutionary in his thinking and very passionate when he talks about the state of the black British music scene. He tells Krystal that he often gets told from the younger generation that he’s been around too long and needs to move aside and allow the new artists to come through. Unfazed by this, he is happy to be doing what he loves.

Music has allowed him to do many things such as travel the world and meet new people. Something that he insists Krystal readers should do. “If you were born in the UK, consider the option that you can live anywhere else. Don’t stay here because of the nightclubs on the weekends, or because your friends are here. Have a life.

“…And to anyone raising children right now, make sure they go home and home is not here. This is part of your home but it’s not your complete home. Make sure your children go back to where it’s harder…We have a new kidulthood of children and what a lot of them are lacking is tradition and they actually believe that this is it. These estates, these knife gun wars, this is it…there’s more to it.” He also advises those of you that have a dream to pursue it and that education is important.

by Melissa Allison-Forbes