Sophie Ellis-Bextor is launching her autobiography in October. In it, the singer-songwriter reveals a rape.
Singer-songwriter Sophie Ellis-Bextor (42, “Murder On the Dancefloor”) is launching her memoir entitled “Spinning Plates” at the beginning of October. In an excerpt, she reveals that she was raped when she was 17.
“I heard myself say ‘No’ … but it made no difference”
At the time of the incident she was already part of her first band theaudience, Bextor recalls in her book. After one gig, she met an older guitarist who obviously liked her. “I was flattered,” recalls the musician. He attacked her in the then 29-year-old’s apartment. “I heard myself say ‘no’ and ‘I don’t want to’, but it made no difference.”
It was her first time, the now 42-year-old continues. “He had sex with me and I was so ashamed. … I felt stupid.” Later she also felt anger. And: “I felt dirty, but at the same time I was unsure of my own feelings because I had no other experience with which I could have compared it.”
Sophie Ellis-Bextor didn’t think about rape in the 90s
It never occurred to Ellis-Bextor that she might have been the victim of rape. In the 1990s, the crime was mainly associated with aggression. However, there was no such thing in her case. “My experience was not violent. All that happened was that I was not listened to,” explains the Briton. “Of the two people who were there, one said yes and the other no.” The person who said yes simply carried on anyway.
The “Take Me Home” interpreter cites the desire to help others – and to show them “the line between right and wrong” as the reason why she now talks about her bad childhood experience in “Spinning Plates”. Because: The older she got, “the more blatant” the man appeared to her, “who ignored me as a 17-year-old”. As a mother, she therefore teaches her “five young men” early today what it means to give one’s consent to something. With her husband Richard Jones (42), whom she married in 2005, Sophie Ellis-Bextor has five sons who were born between 2004 and 2019.
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