Punkobit: Ari Up

Ari Up, one of the great European punks, has died, according to a website posting by her stepfather John Lydon:

"John and Nora have asked us to let everyone know that Nora's daughter Arianna (aka Ari-Up) died today (Wednesday, October 20th) after a serious illness," he wrote. "She will be sadly missed. Everyone at JohnLydon.com and PiLofficial.Com would like to pass on their heartfelt condolences to John, Nora and family. Rest in Peace."

Born Arianna Forster, Up formed the Slits when she was just 14, embarking on a couple years of astonishing dubbed-punk until they split in 1981. And sounding like this:



Roaming the world after the band broke up, Ari continued to make music - she was part of On-U Sound's New Age Steppers in the 1980s, and worked as a solo artist under the labels Baby Ari, Madussa, and Ari Up.

The Slits reformed in what felt like it might have been an ill-advised move in 2005, but you know what?



They still worked.

Ari Up was 48.

Fresh Slits

The Slits have been floating about in a reunited form for a couple of years now, so it's only with a slight feeling of trepidation that we hear they're about to release an album of new material:

"We've always wanted to do an album," [Ari] Up tells Spinner. "We just never had a chance to. Apparently we're still a revolution and we're still a threat to society. So now we got the album finally, which we've been wanting to do for a long time, but we didn't have the money to do it. We got signed to a record deal [with Narnack Records], and that's why we did the album."

This is the sort of comeback we like the sound of.