Spinning Plates with Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Episode 68: Karen Elson

Episode Date: June 13, 2022

Karen Elson is a supermodel and singer-songwriter. We were born in the same year and I’ve admired her from afar for a long time, so it’s great to have got to actually speak to her via zoom at her home in Nashville. Karen has a son and daughter with her ex, The White Stripes frontman Jack White. Karen was born in Manchester but by the age of 16 she was travelling the world as a model. We talk about the treatment of young girls in the industry when she was young, how that’s changing, and about how she’d like to see that change further. She tells me about her love of Nashville and how she strives to be just a normal mum to her kids, after seeing how privileged children she met as a model, were often not happy.  In 2020 she published new autobiography Red Flame, and in lockdown she released an EP called Radio Redhead, in which she sang some of her favourite covers as well as her own songs. A lockdown pastime we also have in common!Spinning Plates is produced by Claire Jones. Post-production is by Richard Jones.  Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Sophia Lispector and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 years, so I spin a few plates myself. Being a mother can be the most amazing thing, but can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions. I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. Welcome to Spinning Plates. Good day to you. Gonna have to be a little hasty with chatting to you at this point

because I am packing to go camping. I'm taking my primary school's malls on their big school... I can't speak. I can't speak. Their big school camping trip. And there's going to be 50 families. It's not organized by the school it's

organized by the parents and i'm packing and i don't know if i don't know how you guys feel about camping but from my point of view i've done it a few times and i'm always there's always a part where i'm like why am i leaving my house made of bricks with all the things in it I need and then trying to remember everything I used for 48 hours and take all the essential versions of it just so I can wake up outdoors? I could just literally go in the garden at like 6am and I'd get that same experience. But here I find myself and I'm going to forget something. That is a certainty.

And I'm just trying to remember every single thing we might need. And I've made life easy for myself. You're going to judge me here. I'm not even bringing a tent. I've hired a bell tent, which I've never done before. I promise it's not my usual style. But Richard's only coming for the first night and then it's just me and the kids for the second night,

and then I've got a gig on the same day that I have to leave. So I just pictured myself trying to come home with the... Let's imagine it's rainy, and I'm trying to get myself home, and I'm trying to pack up a tent on my own, and the kids are... I don't know. I just thought, this is horrible and stressful. So instead, yeah, I've been a bit soft on myself, and I've got a tent, that's good, so I don't need to worry about bedding, but I'm just bound to get this a bit wrong, aren't I?

Anyway, I'm sure you don't want to know about that, I spoke to Karen Elson, and Karen Elson is someone I've been following on Instagram for ages so sometimes when I ask people to talk to me for a podcast I'm totally cool if they say no I can take it but I'm always a bit shy about the ask with Karen it took me ages to pluck up the courage to send a little message saying I'd love to speak you. And she was really great and got back to me straight away and was really up for it, which was lovely. Because I've always thought she was so intriguing. I saw her in real life once.

And obviously I wouldn't automatically talk about the way that all my podcast guests look, but given that Karen is a model, it feels appropriate to say that she was I thought mesmerically beautiful and kind of luminous and I saw her across she was staying in a hotel I was staying at this was years ago now and I thought wow yes she looks lovely and then I really love her music she's got a very very beautiful voice she does lovely singer-songwriter gentle gentle, sort of old-folky music. It's really pretty. And I've always just thought she was very intriguing, especially given that she grew up just outside of Manchester

and then ends up now raising her kids in Nashville. I thought, wow, that's a very different life. So yes, we had a lovely, lovely chat about lots and lots of things. She also released a book called the red flame which is an autobiography and it's it's really exciting because she's a lot more open and honest than you might imagine she would be as in that she she's quite open about her criticisms of some of the experiences she's had as a model which is no surprise that she's had those experiences it's just really refreshing that she was open about talking about them because sometimes there's a bit of a i don't know a bit of a closed club about you know the way

that those things are handled back behind the scenes so I really applaud that uh she now has two kids and uh yeah I spoke to her very very recently on what looked like a beautiful sunny day in Nashville and I think I think I haven't to her while I'm chatting, but on the Zoom, it almost looked like a painting. She was there at the front of the screen with her famous red hair and then in the background, this very beautiful green room with a little guitar slung on the sofa, which looked very artful. So yeah, it kind of looked like a really lovely place to be. And I think I was particularly feeling that,

given it was a really drizzly day in my hometown in London. But anywho, here's Karen Karen here's me having a chat and I'm gonna get back to uh I've realized I'm slightly sort of got made myself a bit hot and sweaty just trying to get all this camping stuff what is the point I guess if it all goes horribly wrong we can just drive up we can be home within a couple of hours all right see you on the other side it's a real pleasure to talk to you and um i it's funny because i do all my bookings for for guests myself at the podcast and you know it sometimes takes me a little while to pluck up courage to just chuck out messages out into the ether so thank you very much for applying because I uh I'm so glad you did like I said I've been a fan for a long time and when I saw your message it was it was I was glad oh how lovely for me that is really lovely because I um I think you're brilliant and I when I've been looking

through things that it's nice because there's some really nice parallels as well. Not just that we were born in the same year, but we also both took to doing music during lockdown with your Radio Redhead. I was doing something here called Kitchen Disco, which was a sort of, I don't know what it was. Oh, amazing. Chaotic Instagram live posts. But I loved your Radio Redhead and then you've released it now. So that must be nice to have that out in the world. but I loved your Radio Redhead and then you've released it now so that must be nice to have that out in the world yeah so I made um you know I think doing that it reminded me of being a sort of teenager again I mean I'm sure you can relate lockdown for me was the first time since

I was 16 that I'd been in any place longer than maybe four months or so. And even after having kids, I was flying with my two little ones like a couple of months after they were born, going places. And it was the first time in my adult life that I had time to sort of sit down and think. And I sort of rediscovered sides of myself that have become dormant just from the hectic nature of life and being a mom and having a career that I remembered that I was just a big music fan and like a big teenager still in my room listening to songs and learning how to play them and then I put it on Instagram but it

was a very innocent thing and it kind of reminded me of what I love especially about music is that I'm just a big music fan. That's it. I'm just, I mean, I think it's part of being British as well, how much music is so important to our childhoods, especially during the times we grew up in. I think we were really lucky to live in an era where just there was so much good music, you know, so much great music.

The bands meant everything. And again, it just reminded me of that younger part of myself. And I was really happy to rediscover that. And that was the positive out of this horrible nightmare we've all been through with COVID, that the one positive out of it was I got to rediscover sort of these really innocent sides of myself. Yeah. And I think it sounds like the way

music was for you during that time was very similar to me and that obviously it's part of your day job you know you've made it part of what you do and what you put out there right but actually when it came to recording and putting things out during the lockdown it was much more coming from a much more innocent sort of spiritual place of just that I actually just really need to do this for me and it's a really good tonic and connecting you to a version of yourself from years back and the sort of happy memories that go along with that absolutely and that was what it was it was just innocent you know and that even kick-started me wanting to make another record so I did the covers EP then I wrote another album recorded it which just

basically came out but it was all within the same vein of capturing that innocence you know that sort of not overthinking what music's power is you know just trying to capture that that that essence of what good music does which it just makes you feel good yeah and I've never done that before I think my music tends to err on the macabre I mean I'm such a goth at heart you know I mean like Nick Cave, Robert Smith, PJ Harvey they've always been my sort of go-to's in in music but then something again during the not that I still I go towards them all the time but I needed something lighter yeah during the pandemic, and I just started listening to different music. I mean, granted, listening to Joni Mitchell's Blue,

that's a heavy album, but I don't know. I just started going down again, like that innocent thing of just listening to the music for the pleasure of it. And that kind of kick-started a whole other side of me musically where I went, oh, God, I don't need to overthink all this anymore. I'm just going to try and write a song that feels good versus sort of, oh, I need to bleed for this song. I'm so over that.

I think we've all been through so much that I can't anymore. Especially when you're in the thick of things where the news is heavy, then actually you don't want to dwell on the heavy. I mean, I'm like you, actually. When I write songs, I've quite often got a lilt towards things that are quite ghostly and haunted and these dark landscapes. So that's a great place to put all that. Because I can be quite Pollyanna in my day-to-day life,

but I definitely have that side of me that loves that. But yeah, during lockdown, it was very much more like Julie Andrews, I'd say. Totally. It was like, I need some joy here. I need... Exactly. Finding the joy, all of that.

Yeah. And that was a good reminder of doing that in hard times. You know, I think a lot of people in my life, when the lockdown, the first big one happened, I think a lot of people were my life when the lockdown, the first big one happened, I think a lot of people were like, oh my God, she doesn't know how to sit still. How is she going to handle it? And I actually was, I don't know, it was like just to have time. It reminded me, it really created a lot of shifts in my life. It created a lot of recognition that I, It created a lot of recognition that I, in general, I can err on just being busy, busy, busy all the time.

And it reminded me that that's not necessarily the healthiest thing. I said this before, that it made me realize that success in life isn't just all the outward facing stuff we think it is. It's a lot more personal. And it reminded me that, you know, quality of my personal life, quality of my relationships, that's success versus flying all around the world and being exhausted and coming home and trying to muster up a little bit of energy for my children. I was like, that's not, the balance is not there. So I really, it helped me shift the equilibrium a little bit that when things start feeling manic or when I start feeling overwhelmed I can't let that continue for too long these days whereas before that was my default running on empty I wonder if there are a couple

of other factors that might have influenced that like like being in our 40s now because that's quite significant I think you suddenly you start to weed out some of the stuff that's not working for you so well and that that thing of just like being busy for busy's sake doesn't feel as important anymore I don't think yeah and that is absolutely true I mean I think I just started reflecting on you know it's like especially within the businesses that we're in you know both with fashion music or just the world of entertainment. We're around a lot of people. And sometimes I come into contact with people who are so successful and so adored in the world, yet they're so unhappy in their lives. And they're so unfulfilled in their personal

lives, because they've never given themselves the time to have one. And I think that in my 40s has become a really big eye-opening experience where I refuse to allow that to happen to myself. You know, I mean, there's a lot of things that are in ebb and flow, obviously, but I just know far too many people who have sacrificed a lot for their career. And they ultimately get to a point in their 40s where they ask themselves, is it all worth it? Is all this worth it? And granted, I even have had those moments, absolutely. But it's given me that recognition that, yes, other things are important as well. And I think it's only when you get to your 40s, I think that you realize, like, okay, I've been climbing this mountain for years and it's okay I don't have to always be out of breath so to speak or just like I gotta I gotta keep climbing

gotta keep climbing or else what's gonna happen and maybe life yeah it will happen you know I just I just had a real perspective shift and again again, I've just seen, unfortunately, a lot of really great successful people just really slumping to big depressions in their 40s because there's just not a lot of personal fulfillment. So that is as important to me as success. you know and like I said the moment I start feeling overwhelmed for a prolonged period of time look there's granted those days where you're just busy right and you're spinning plates I love the name spinning exactly and and but then there's days where it's like okay I have to prioritize what my kids I have to prioritize my relationships too because they're not going to grow without being nurtured and again it's the balance right it's like it's such a privileged take I understand that I can put dedicate time towards my personal life but it's also a very important thing

for me as well because again I'd rather be less successful outwardly and have a happy inner life yeah you know and have great people around me and have good quality relationships than be uber uber successful and then go home to my hotel room or whatever it is and be depressed and miserable and lonely you know and I just unfortunately think this day and age we see a lot of that there's a lot of people who are really struggling with depression and mental health illness and whatnot and and you know I understand why people burn out in our business so quickly yeah so I've really been much more attuned to my own version of that when I'm burning out I've got to take a step back yeah and I guess you've got to give yourself somewhere to grow to next as well and particularly if your relationship with music is you know now it's sort of so so powerful and in such a good place um it's really important to be

able to write songs that are actually about where you're at really now and looking out with that way and it's yeah it's really healthy to be able to do that and give yourself that space and i mean i'm looking at you on your zoom and it looks almost like a painting with the background and your guitar on the sofa and the nice shades of green oh my god that's a kid's that's like my like my daughter had that when she was like nine years old and we just unearthed it it's just I don't know why it's always in there and this painting is actually um a really good friend of mine this artist called Dustin Yellen and he painted it it's a portrait of my very first boyfriend who's tragically is no longer alive unfortunately and I pulled it out of my storage space recently so I'm trying you know I'm just trying my life is just it's there's shit everywhere excuse my language well it looks very everything has meaning what's it like living in

Nashville I've never been to Nashville what's it like oh you have to come to Nashville it's incredible I mean I've got to say again during all the lockdowns I was so grateful that I was living here because I had space I had you know the weather's nice yeah yeah I mean sometimes it gets too hot for an English girl but um overwhelmingly it's it's a lot nicer than British weather. But it's lovely here and the people are lovely and the community is. And I have a great community of people in Nashville of talented artists. My boyfriend is an amazing writer slash novelist, brilliant guy. There's a lot of just inspiring people in this town.

And I think, again, sort of how people will maybe judge northern England. People tend to judge the sort of south of the United States, sort of like it's provincial and there's no culture and there's no sort of larger cultural dialogue that's going on. And I will say that Nashville, it's not like that at all. I mean, I know really engaged, interesting, fascinating people down here. It's just not as saturated as say sort of New York or LA is. It's still not as saturated as, say, sort of New York or L.A. is. It's still quite local, you know, and people. But again, people are doing things here that, you know, you wouldn't even know half the people who live here. I mean, it's like Reese Witherspoon lives here. Nicole Kidman lives here.

Sheryl Crow. There's like multiple Grammy winning producers. Brilliant and lovely people. I mean, it's,'s you know the guys who produce my record they work on Casey Musgraves all Casey's stuff Casey lives up the street from me you know I mean it's it's it's a real lovely community it's a really nice yeah that sounds great intimate group of people and there's no hierarchy you know and it's like nobody's above or be there's nobody who who puts on airs and

graces you know you could be hanging out with with reese so you could be hanging out with your gardener yeah you know what i mean you could be you could be just the the sort of lack of pretense is really refreshing in this town and and that's what I love about it, is that it's come one, come all. It's very welcoming, but it's also not pretentious in the sense that there's no sort of classism in Nashville. I mean, sure, there might be some in certain aspects and certain areas, but not in the creative community. Yeah, well, I guess also thinking about it in terms of the sort of music scene in country music it's really praised um you know the storytelling is

what the lyrics are all about and the there's with the wisdom and life experience so i guess it's also a place where it's not all just fixated on the new and the different you know evolution in that way but actually things that can just settle and so you know you might i mean I imagine in my head it's like you walk you're walking around and then you can hear someone doing like amazing singer-songwriter in like local bars I mean there's a lot of that in Nashville I mean the music scene here is wild I mean like I said when me and my ex-husband Jack moved down here I think the rock scene still I mean it wasn't as as prominent, but now it's just as big as, say, the country music scene. And there's also like a large sort of, you know, urban music community as well. I mean, music is, it is called Music City for a reason, but it's not all cowboy hats. And sort of like,

yeah, you know, I remember a few years ago in London, I went to a fun event that a friend of mine was doing. And it was sort of like a night of country music or a night of Nashville. And everyone was in their like plaid shirts and sitting on hay barrels and with cowboy boots. And I started cracking up. And my friend was like, does this feel like home? And I said, no, because Nashville isn't like this. I'm like, Nashville is not. We're not all sat on like we're not all all chewing our hay and being like, howdy.

So you're not wearing cowboy boots right now? Yes, downtown. No, no. But you go downtown and there's a strip for the tourists where it's like, woo-hoo, and there is great music everywhere. But Nashville itself, it's a huge foodie city. This is the dangerous part about this town. My God.

I mean, it is. The food here, forget it. It is the most delicious. I mean, the foodie scene in Nashville has just exploded. I mean, there's so many award-winning chefs that have come here. I mean, there's one guy who used to work at Noma, that incredible restaurant in Copenhagen, now opened a restaurant in Nashville. You know, I mean, there's so much going on here that, again, to sort of view it as,

oh, here I am, you know, just gonna play on my mandolin and sing a little, you know, just gonna play on my mandolin and sing a little you know cowgirl song that happens but it is like a fraction of the other aspects of of nashville and granted you like being in tennessee you drive 20 minutes out of town 30 minutes and you're in gorgeous countryside i mean it reminds me of england so much like rolling beautiful hills oh my god minus the weather like when it's really hot you're like it's sweltering but but it does remind me of England like such beautiful farmland and and that's where you'll find you know that kind of stuff you're looking for you know a person might be coming to Nashville being like oh yeah you know I remember recently I was flying home I always bump into people flying from sort of London to Nashville it like oh yeah you know I remember recently I was flying home I always bump into

people flying from sort of London to Nashville it's always interesting and there was this um double bass player who plays in a very famous orchestra and he was coming to Nashville for his birthday because he'd always wanted to come to Nashville and I was giving him tips on where to you know where to come and he was asking me the same things like is it is is everybody like Dolly Parton oh my god I wish although Dolly Parton though please who I mean she she is she is going she is a saint that woman is she is she is a legitimate saint what she did for COVID the money she put in for research also just how Dolly Parton I'm sorry to digress here because now I'm just going to have the She is a legitimate saint. What she did for COVID, the money she put in for research, also just how Dolly Parton, I'm sorry to digress here because now I'm just going to have the Dolly moment.

That's all right, we can go Dolly. I'm fine with that. She has found a way to never polarise anybody, to never push anybody in her fan base out, whether what you stand for, what you what you stand for what you don't stand for there is something about dolly that is so welcoming of everybody and it's so rare in this day and age that one singular person in pop culture which dolly partners transcended so many eras that she still represents just this force of good yeah in the world and and what a woman yeah what a woman and

just everything about her oh my gosh gosh she is something else yeah i know she is i saw her at glastonbury actually and it was incredible it's not quite the same as being there but yeah she's perfect yeah she is damn near perfect yeah she's amazing plus all that stuff she's done for children's literacy which is amazing oh my god you know so when my children were born any child any child born in Tennessee um gets a book every month so when my kids were little every month a book would arrive from Dolly Parton's imagination library doesn't matter if you're me doesn't matter if who you are every child would get a book I mean just that's incredible incredible what what a woman I mean what a beautiful heart yet she doesn't put

herself above anybody or below anybody you know well that leads us nicely on to your kids because what's it like to I suppose what's the same obviously there's loads of differences you can see from the surface in your own childhood to theirs but what are the same obviously there's loads of differences you can see from the surface in your own childhood to theirs but what are the some of the things that are the same so you grew up just outside of Manchester and it's just you and your sister me and my twin sister and I have two half brothers but they were a lot older than me and my twin sister so by the time my brother Tim before he went to university he lived with us until I was like four or five. And I worshipped the ground he walked on.

I mean, just absolutely did. His glamorous big brother. Oh, and just he was always willing to put up with me. Oh, so sweet. Because I was a high maintenance child, that's for sure. But I think the similarities and the differences, my God, there's a lot of differences, to be honest. I mean, I grew up in a working class family where there was, you know, just to be blunt, like there wasn't a lot, you know, the money was not easy to come by my,

both my parents worked really hard and just to get by, know and and it when I reflect now I you know I can just see how hard they work for their for their kids you know and that was primary thing but also primary thing was to put food on the table afford the heating bill those things where when I you know when I complain to the kids like oh my god yeah yeah it's with the air conditioning so it's reverse you know it's always hot here like so cold and my daughter is like mom you just don't understand it hot you know like AC you don't get it you're British you don't get it and I'm like I do not know because I grew up freezing my entire life, you know, with the heating set to 55. And if you turned it up, you were going to get a walloping, you know, because, you know, every penny was hard to come by.

And that's the difference is that my kids have, I have to be honest, you know, they have a level of privilege that I never had and that Jack never had growing up in southwest Detroit, that they go to great schools. There is an onus because, you know, I'm not saying that my school wasn't a great school, but I didn't have the opportunity to have sort of a five-star education. So that's something that's very important to me, is that the kids get a great education because a thirst for knowledge is a thirst for life and that is very important um and you know the similarities are I think that again Jack and I are both from working class backgrounds that we're not necessarily spoiling our kids you know our daughter's just turned 16 and a lot of 16 year olds are getting cars in America you know I mean she's got her learner's permit I mean it's it's just wild and you know I had a conversation with Jack and he was like I'm not ready to do that yeah I'm not ready to get her a car and I really appreciate it appreciated that

sentiment because we're trying to not raise them to be expect that things get given to them you know and I think they as children understand that you know I mean they're good kids they've got good a good head on their shoulders they're not you know my daughter hasn't been like I need a Gucci handbag that she's not that variety of 16 year old you know I mean she's she's she's really down to earth and low-key as is as is my son as well and I'm grateful for that. So I think there's similarities there that we've been able to raise them not being exposed to too much of the other side of what we do. Because I think it's hard for kids in that sense.

I mean, I've grown up around, in my late teens and early 20s, when I left Manchester and I was living, I mean, I lived in up around in my late teens and early 20s when I left Manchester and I was living. I lived in Tokyo when I was 16 years old. I lived in Paris. I was in London. I was in Italy when I was 17. I was in New York when I was 18. Those few years were really seminal. But I saw a lot and I met a lot of people and I met a lot of kids of quote-unquote famous people and I got good

insight into the idea that oh okay you know a lot of these kids are really sad and they don't have a lot of parenting and it's two o'clock in the morning and we're out at a nightclub and we're 17 years old and or 18 and you've got to go to high school tomorrow where's your mother yelling at you telling you to come home and do your homework and I think I saw that a lot of doors get opened for in a very sort of sycophantic way for children of certain famous people and I think because they're young you don't know any better you just want people to like you so of course it it's very that has always been very troubling to me because I just see it sets these kids up for they've seen everything by the time they've turned

18 they've seen as much privilege as a person can get through their parents through being exposed to it in their lives so I put a real big onus on just being like a normal mom you know and being him being a normal dad and that is our relationship we are parents and sure i go off and do these fun fabulous things but and they'll occasionally come and you know visit their dad on tour or you know they're coming with me to new york when the summertime hits when i'm doing some things there but they know me waking up at six o'clock in the morning, dragging them out of bed and making them breakfast and having a normal life. I think that is very, very important because even I saw it being young. You know, it's really easy to get seduced by what you think is the fabulous life.

And like I said, it's fabulous fabulous but there's also a lot of pain in there too definitely it's a lot it can stunt people in their growth but sometimes I suppose do you have a now that you look at your daughter at the age you were when you started doing all those trips does it change the way you saw 16 year old you does it make you think oh my goodness that's actually yeah I was so young I was so I mean and and she is probably far more mature than I was at 16 I mean Scarlett is a very mature like wise deep person she's far more mature and could handle the world far better than I did but I was out there alone I mean I was such a young 16 year old as well and zero life experience at all so really plunged into the deep end with

tokyo and paris and milan yeah yeah and it's interesting seeing my daughter at 16 because it is you know at times it's like you know she wants freedom and i'm like ah when i was 16 blah blah blah that you that i can't project all that overly on her but i also also, you know, and it's a different world. They have social media now, which I never had. And that adds a whole other layer. You know, there's the occasional, I mean, my kids both have private Instagram accounts and then, you know, occasionally be it a fan of mine or a fan of their dad's,

like kind of keep trying to like intrude in their worlds and it takes them from being just 16 14 15 16 and takes them into having to navigate like oh this crazy person keeps sending me messages or you know me and jack finding out like oh my god there are there are fans who are taking screen grabs of my daughter's instagram page somehow they've got to follow her and they're they're doing weird shit excuse my language they're doing weird things intrusive and invasive stuff that to a 16 year old is like anxiety inducing so having to teach them like hey don't feed the trolls block anybody if you don't know them although they've they've

they seem to say something creepy block them I'm sure they've got good instincts for it though I think I'm like www.block.com I'm like that is that is my new mantra if someone is intrusive invasive crosses a line far too much I'm like goodbye we're good yeah yeah I don't have the energy for that anymore no and I think probably the kids don't either I think for them that muscle just is something they grew up having to flex I think they don't I think you know but again people can be intrusive and they are still 16 and young you know it's like when people start following or trying to follow them and they know that they're the only motive is to let's see what this kid is up to and it's it's it's hard for them but they're they're again I think because

we've raised them or tried to again being in Nashville has been great whether it's if we lived in London for instance and I love London and it's one of my favorite cities in the world but knowing my job in fashion and knowing that there is probably multiple things every night of the week that I need to you know to go to the fabulous fans fashion dinner I would be more pulled in my life and again that's just me knowing me because I have a hard time saying no to people that's why it's living in Nashville's great because I can't jump on a plane and go to dinner, you know. But if I was in New York or in London, I'd probably be like,

okay, I'm going to go to the fashion dinner tonight. And it would be a different life. That's just the way I'm made, you know. I'm like, yeah, I have a hard time saying no. Yeah, it's good just to be grounded where you are. And actually, I was thinking another thing that you and I have in common is that we both recently published autobiographies where I'm sure a lot of people said to you as they did to me it's really honest it's wonderfully honest and you're thinking I'm like yeah I was honest but that's part of the

thing of it was really good to put stuff out there and I I loved reading the red flame it's beautiful I've recommended it to lots of people as well thank you it's really lovely Karen it's really good and I was that really means a lot to me actually because I put my heart and soul into that book yeah and I it's but it's wonderful because it really gets you from the first page and I loved how confident you are to put everything out there now because I don't know if you found this as well but when I was writing about things that happened to me good bad and ugly I found it was almost like reaching back in time to myself and being like it's okay I've put it out there now and I wondered if you felt like that too I definitely did I and it was a I'm sure you can relate to this as well. It was at times sort of anxiety inducing,

thinking, what should I share? What shouldn't I share? Am I sharing too much? Am I sharing too little? I mean, there was definitely a real balance of finding out what the right level of honesty was. But I also felt a great responsibility to just tell my story as well and not and not sugarcoat it out of fear of of retribution because the thing is in my but in my business in fashion you just say no to somebody because you've got like a previous commitment someone could be like we're not working with her again I was like forget it I only have an one opportunity to tell this story so I'm going to tell it my way and you know it's hard same with you those moments where some people were like are you sure you want to do this you're welcoming a lot of intrusion into your life and I was again I was like someone's got to tell the truth of how growing up in a certain

environment, becoming a model, the body image issues, being put on a pedestal, sort of expected to be the most sort of amiable human being and not have any identity. Because if you have an identity or you have a voice, you're not going to be successful as a model back then. I had to be whatever it was they wanted me to become. So the more malleable I was, the more easily manipulated I was, the better model I was. And I think as I've got older, I've just realized, like, you know, I can have boundaries. I can stand up for myself. If something feels uncomfortable, I am well within my rights to stand up for that. But, and I felt like it was

important as well, because so many times people put, especially models on this pedestal, and I've seen it throughout my years with other models where, again, they're being run to the bone, they're burnt out, they're struggling, yet they're on the cover of a magazine and everyone's like, oh, she's incredible. And the machine that it takes to look like that, to be like that, versus the reality for the person who is maybe at their wits end and really struggling with some serious things. And you just think the juxtaposition of the fantasy versus the reality, there's such a chasm there and there's such a void.

So I felt like it was important to demystify that a little bit and say, yeah, these are beautiful pictures. But when you see a picture of me naked, is anyone thinking, did she have a choice? Might be a fashion picture, but did I have a choice might be a fashion picture but did I have a choice a lot of the time no because I also a didn't realize I could say no and if I did say no I might be blacklisted and nobody at that time just the era I was in nobody said are you comfortable with this because it just wasn't models were not expected to have an opinion

so to to lift the veil off all of that in an effort to ultimately say to the fashion industry like hey we can do better it's a brilliant industry of incredible creatives and it's you know in many ways the people i know in fashion they're just all such good people but it just takes a viewing these women and these men as well these people as human you know and that we have thoughts and feelings and when we're standing on set if we're not underwear or if we're naked we're really vulnerable yeah and in order to front that we're not it takes a lot out of a person emotionally that's so true and actually I think I mean I had a very very very brief and very unsuccessful few months in modeling and um

it was after my first band had been dropped I'd had a record deal from 18 they were dropped by the time I was 20 and then I um I got scouted actually by someone called Ellis so I think it was someone that you'd work with as well yeah yeah um yeah so she was famous Ellis she's like in the fashion industry Ellis is like she's yeah exactly I know and I she saw me at Topshop and um and uh so I did it for a bit and I was really shocked by how bottom of the food chain models were i didn't realize they're obviously the the celebrated thing on the pages but actually on the days of the shoot you're right at the bottom and especially coming from music where it's all about

your own image and what do you want to wear how do you want to look how are you putting yourself out to suddenly have all of that totally taken away was really quite shocking to me I think and obviously you're having it from much younger much younger and then from a really long time and so how do you when you've spoken about you know your body image and anxiety and the things that have gone on while you've been doing a modeling but also from when you were really small and you know food became something that also was a way of articulating things you couldn't say and, you know, emotions were heavy and food just became the thing you could control. How do you, how do you sort of pass on a positive relationship with your kids? Because that's obviously something that would be quite a big

deal for you to make sure that they feel different now, I'd imagine. Yeah, that they, that their experience isn't similar to essentially to mine you know I think there's no easy answer for that question in a sense because look I've done a lot of work on myself and there's still even more work to do you know I mean there's every every few months I'm like oops I thought I was over this thing here it is again you know so I am a constant work in progress in in life and that is what keeps my feet on the ground you know is constantly sort of making my mental health a priority in my life because the moment I stop is the moment I'm like oh I'm starting to feel anxious again I'm starting to

look in the mirror and be like oh maybe I'm not good enough and it's like oh please you know there's also an aspect of being in my 40s though now where my patience for the sort of the narrative has gone you know and I'm relieved for that you know the moment I start going down a sort of dark rabbit hole like oh please sorry a cat oh that's like oh I can see it through the cat yeah yeah Did you see that? That's marmalade. Marmalade makes very rare appearances from time to time. And she just, she made a very, that was so funny. I knew that was going to happen. Where was I?

Children and body image, you know. So for me, again, you're so right about models, especially back in those days, being at the bottom of the food chain. And again, for me, because I was so good at being a model, I was so good at it because I was so willing to lose my power. You know, I mean, because I just never felt like I had any in the first place. So that's the thing often is that successful models, not saying all of them, but a lot of them, we've come from really difficult places. And modeling is such an escape, that we'll do anything, you know, I mean, it's like, you want me to stand naked in a field and take your fashion picture? Great. Oh, you're

going to tell me that I'm fat? All right, I won't eat because I'm not going to go back to where I came from. And it creates this terrible sort of power dynamic. And, and I have always had in me a very strong sense of right and wrong, you know, and, and up and down. And I always knew, especially when people were telling me, giving me grief about my body, I always knew that they were wrong. And I always knew what they were saying was really toxic, but I still internalized it, even though I knew it, you know, I still internalized it because I wanted to be liked. And I wanted to be accepted. And I wanted to be because my job depended on it. If I wasn't, however many pounds or size zero, I would lose work. And that is just so wild to me, you know, that over the years, I've witnessed so many models just have complicated relationships with their bodies because their job depends on it. And there is a point where you can only torture yourself

for so long. So for me, getting into therapy, regularly seeing a therapist, talking about how I feel, that's been important because then I can impart that wisdom upon my kids. You know, my daughter, again, is a 16-year-old girl. I see through her friends that, you know, sometimes some of her friends are struggling, be it with body image and whatnot, and they look up to me. You know, so then I feel a great responsibility to say, OK, image and whatnot and they look up to me you know so then I feel a great responsibility to say okay that's great that you look up to me but let me tell you about my struggle and let me tell you that what the image you see it's not worth the pain you know it's not worth the the the denial because it just it's the knock-on effect on your life is huge and I will say fashion does seem like it's changing and it does seem like finally a conversation is happening but I still go to fashion week and I still see 75 percent of the models are not in a healthy place yeah and I you know people can say oh you're discriminating

against skinny people I'm not discriminating against a person who is naturally slender I know the good yeah I think I think everybody kind of does don't they I feel like there's a sometimes when I've talked about this I've had pushback and I understand, and I don't want to be, you know, that person where it's like, well, if you're naturally skinny, you're, you have an eating disorder. I remember being a kid and I was naturally scrawny, you know, at a certain point, granted I've had eating disorders, but there was a time when I was probably like 12, 13, where I was just straight up and down. And I wanted was boobs all I wanted was to you know to be attractive and I would you know just eat at that time would eat a ton and be like oh

I need to put on weight you know but then when I became a model they were like oh actually you need to lose weight so it's just yeah it's all very confusing the messages teenagers get and and fashion has a lot to answer for I mean I've had a lot of people reach out to me over the years and say hey you know I used to have pictures of you on my wall and I would say like if I could only get as skinny as her my life will be perfect and I had no idea that you were equally torturing yourself the way I was torturing myself and I just feel these days such a big responsibility to the image I'm putting out there and the image that I am in.

It's a positive one, that there is an image of a woman who isn't self-annihilating. It's so important for all of us to see that, to see people who represent beauty in its many forms and I do think that it is changing I do feel you know my my friend that model um her name's Paloma and then there's Precious Lee and even Ashley Graham like fuck yes sorry again for swearing but these women are incredible and and beautiful gorgeous women and it's it's like that's what I want to see.

Yeah. You know, and I want to see a spectrum, you know, not just sort of glum, solemn, hungry girls on the runway. Like give them, like let these girls like have their bodies naturally be what they are. I mean, even the Victoria's Secret thing, before any Victoria's Secret show, I knew a lot of VS models back in the day.

They're all working out for three hours a day. They've all got their special meal plan of kale and salmon for months before the show. And then you do the show and it's like, I'm so happy. And I would look at the show and then you do the show and it's like I'm so happy and I would look at the show I think god damn like why are we doing this to these women like let them have like let them let them eat yeah let them eat please because then there'd be the pictures afterwards like

eating the burger and I'm like what is the message this is sending? It's so true. It's actually demented when you put it like that. You know, it's like then they're like, oh, I'm done with the VF show. Now I can eat a burger. And it's like, oh, so really what you've been doing for the past few months is stopping yourself and walking yourself to the bone just to look for this male gaze thing.

Yeah. But who wants to be the odd one out? As you say before, I think it's really such a strong as you say before i think it's really such a strong thing firstly i think it's absolutely brilliant you had the conversation honestly when i was reading some of the interviews where you talk about it i was like whooping i think it's brilliant but secondly i love the idea of you saying i always had a really clear idea it was right and wrong and i knew it was wrong at the time and i knew not to you know not to take

all of the things that you know it had a tough core of me that wasn't being affected, but I just felt like I was a people pleaser and I couldn't say it at the time. I think how brilliant to get to this point now where you think, right, now I can have those conversations. I've got nothing to lose.

I've got the experience. I know all the people I want to know from that, you know, from my experiences and life is pretty good. And those who want to work with me, work with me. Exactly. You know, and if someone thinks that I've got too many opinions, that's fine, you don't need to work with me

because I'm not the right person for you then, clearly. And I think it's knowing that. There's still a lot of work in fashion that needs to be done. I mean, there's still, it is a work in progress in the fashion industry, that's for sure. And the same in the music business, I'm sure. I mean, you know, I'm sure you've probably witnessed over the years like a sea change as well and and women having like you said earlier like you started out obviously you were are very successful artist and

maybe you're a couple of years in modeling you oh God, these women do not have a voice, period. And I would even say, even in music, I've witnessed the dialogue has changed about sort of predatory people. And across the board in entertainment, we finally, as women, finally had a chance to speak our piece. And sort of say to people, you know,

like, that's not, that's not. Well, I I think that's it I think we're being equipped with better language now to call those things out I think some of the stuff from before it was still a bit lost in the gray areas but I think we now have the and I think we just didn't have the confidence as well and I think it just that was culturally where we were at as well that that things that were permissible then aren't permissible now and and you know it's funny because I was having a conversation with somebody the other day about sort of you know how almost like the scales are tipping in another direction right now and how everyone's sort of like afraid of even saying anything it's like okay I hear you there is a sea change that's happened and people now have their voice and now we have to be equally as malleable and willing to go I will hear a

perspective that I don't necessarily agree with and doesn't mean that that person is good bad or anything in between and it's an interesting time it really is it's been I feel like the past few years have been a real wild awakening, especially as a woman. I finally, I mean, I never thought I'd see someone like Harvey Weinstein jailed. You know, I never thought that would happen. And what's even more interesting, you know, his ex-wife is an old friend of mine and I love her, you know, and it was interesting because I felt like a lot of people were trying to throw her under the bus as well. Like, oh, she must have known. I'm like, she didn love her you know and it was it was interesting because I felt like a lot of people were trying to throw her under the bus as well like oh she must have known I'm like she

didn't you know and that's with me where I stand in a different different to sort of you know maybe the cultural narratives that I hold people accountable but I'm not going to drag everybody else down with them yeah you know I do feel like at just the the era that we were at or in especially in fashion you know there's a lot of fashion photographers getting held accountable in certain ways and rightly so that there's a lot of conversation didn't everybody know and it's like you know we didn't we were just doing our job and it's the culture that's what just what happened. You don't, you don't, and you just don't. You might think, like, that guy's a little sleazy or a little pervy. I don't want to be alone with that person.

But you don't know what's happening. And I'm glad I know now because I'm definitely not putting myself in those situations ever again. But I will say, I don't know, I don't even know what tangent I'm going not putting myself in those situations ever again. But I will say, I don't know. I don't even know what tangent I'm going down here. But it's more just I'm at this place right now where I'm really trying to give people the benefit of the doubt. You know, I mean, I think there's predators and I think there's people who've done bad, bad things. It's like, goodbye, you're done.

Like, we all need to have these conversations. But I don't think people are immune to making mistakes. You know, and I think we've got to give a little, like, okay, you've made a mistake. This is how you're going to learn from it. And if you learn from it, you get a second chance. If you don't, that's on you. No, I think that's true.

Well, going back to motherhood, I wanted to ask if then it was a big deal when you decided to have a baby. I mean, I'm imagining you, did you always want to be a mother? Always. I love kids. And how did you find it when you became pregnant? Because obviously, if you're modeling, that I didn't work a lot when I was pregnant but it was also a different part of my um life I just moved to Nashville um I was really setting up my life there and it was maybe again like COVID where for a few months I got to be a homebody and really enjoy my pregnancy and and while I was traveling a fair bit while I was

pregnant because Jack was on tour at the time and doing the odd occasional shoot I felt beautiful and in fact that was a way of reclaiming my body you know it's like I felt incredibly beautiful both times I was pregnant you know granted with my son there was a hilarious thing at the very last month of my pregnancy where he was sitting like lying on one side and you know and it was blocking off a blood vessel so I had like one massive leg that was really unattractive oh my god it looked like a loaf of bread it was awful and that was like oh dear I don't know like this baby needs to be born now but um I really enjoyed my pregnancies I I again I was young I was in my 20s that that I again still quite naive and still quite young that I I absolutely

enjoyed the experience of being pregnant so much and becoming a mom. Again, it was really cathartic for me becoming a mother. It was very much sort of a strange healing process of nurturing myself and nurturing my children and recognizing that the care I give to myself is the care I give to my kids. And I have to be, you know, it is a constant reminder of taking good care of myself and never letting things in my inner world get too dark or too twisted because I want to be a good mom, you know. And my kids are great. I mean, look, every mother's biased towards her children.

We're all, what are you going to do? But I absolutely love being a mom I really really do I mean if I had my way I would have had like four or five of them well as a mother of five um the last thing I always ask well I've got loads of redheads and I wondered what what the significance of red hair is for you because it's obviously been so much part of the aesthetic you've always had I've got about I've got five kids one's blonde and the other four are all different shades of red so all the spectrum of red from sort of chestnut through to flame and oh I love that oh my god I love that so much um you, it's funny because when I was a kid, I mean, I make my hair brighter because it's all really faded these days.

But when I was younger, you know, it was like the names, ginger, you know, ginger, any kind of terrible word. And I always felt really insecure. And then when I dyed my hair like bright bright bright red and fashion started kicking off in all the right ways became my identity and it's that thing the things that when you grow up that you're so insecure about like being pale being sort of you know quote-unquote funny looking it's all the things that have served me well in my funny looking it's all the things that have served

me well in my life and it's all the things that that's the lesson isn't it that's the big lesson in all of this is that we can view ourselves as not good enough yet the things we view as our deficits actually are our strengths and and that has been the big lesson for me and again I you know I really identify with being a pale British redhead and and just again these days it works to my benefit you know always and and when I was younger it didn't but that that's the lesson right that works out you end up celebrating the things about you that when you're younger you would have wanted to blend in and then it's like actually it's kind of fabulous and that is a lesson for our kids you know is is that you know the things that we all sort of beat ourselves up about when we're younger ultimately become the things that make us who we

are and be even on a personality you know wise again my sense of right and wrong has steered me even at times I'm like why do I dig my feet in the ground and why am I so stubborn it's served me well it definitely has Karen definitely it's been a pleasure to talk to you I've been drinking thank you so much honestly such a pleasure I had to I had to. I had to. Oh, what a lovely conversation. And I really loved talking to Karen and I would love to actually meet her in real life one day and sit down and have a chat.

I think there was more we could have talked about. But I was given kind of quite a strict time frame, which is really understandable because she's got lots going on. But I realised that I kind of had her lovely chap from her office come on the line just before the end and go, right, one more question. And I was like, I've got about 10 more to ask. So I had to just pick some really random one.

Anyway, thank you to Karen for joining me. It was lovely to speak to her. And thank you to you for lending me your ears once again. And thanks to Richard for being patient with me because he's basically sat in the studio waiting for me to send over this bit of audio so that he can then pack for the camping. Ah, my life in bags. I did as well a bit of a classic. I ordered a food shop because I thought, right, I'll just get a food shop and then just shove it in the car. And I think I've really overordered because I couldn't really picture what was happening.

And I thought, what if I can't get all the camping stuff to work on the second night when I'm on my own and the kids are hungry? So I've got like all these random bits and bobs. Well, we won't starve starve that's for sure and uh I've also picked back some uh some wine and some beer so I'm gonna be fine at the end of the day as well anyway lots of love to you have a good week please wish me a dry camping spell and I will see you next month, lovely. Thank you.