Neon Jungle: Cara Delevingne can join our band

Neon Jungle are hoping their busy schedules can calm down enough for them to enjoy a spot of partying with their new mate Cara Delevingne.

The Braveheart singers got to know the 21-year-old model after performing at the annual Victoria’s Secret catwalk show last November and would love to include the model as an honorary member of their band.

‘Cara is the kind of person that you meet her and you feel like you’ve known her all your life. It doesn’t feel like it’s the first time you’ve met her. She is so down to earth and warm,’ Jessica Plummer, 20, told Guilty Pleasures during an exclusive chat.

Despite Cara proving she’s something of a triple threat as a model, actress and singer, the girls wouldn’t mind drafting her in for a sing-a-long after being impressed by her YouTube cover of Klangkarussell’s Sonnentanz (Sun Don’t Shine) with Will Heard.

‘I’ve seen when she’s acted before and she looks the way she does and then to hear her voice it is like, is there anything this girl cannot do? She’s got a sweet tone to her voice. She is Cara. 

She’s doing her thing. She can be Neon Cara any time she wants! She can be the fifth Neon,’ Jessica gushed.

The band, which also includes 16-year-olds Asami Zdrenka, Shereen Cutkelvin and Amira McCarthy, also made friends with pop superstar Taylor Swift at the Victoria’s Secret event. She too proved to the girls that you should never judge someone by their celebrity persona.

‘You may have watched her and thought, “No way, she is just being sweet for the cameras”. But she is really genuinely so lovely and so down to earth,’ Jess said.

‘She popped her head in our dressing room and said, “Hi, I’m Taylor”. As if we didn’t know! 

She is so sweet and brought herself to the same level as we were. She is a normal girl. I think I can take a lesson from her to be humble and remain nice as people will be remembered for that.’

And the Londoner already has Swift’s back after the country-pop star was mocked following for embarrassing dance moves as Kendrick Lamar performed at last week’s Grammys.

‘I can’t blame Taylor for trying to dance, even if she couldn’t, because his performance was amazing,’ she told us, saying she loves it when people lose themselves to good music.

‘There was an NBA pre-party in London the other week and everyone was dancing and I remember I saw this old guy that was so off-beat and really couldn’t dance but he was giving it and he didn’t care. It makes me happy.’

[Originally published Metro, Guilty Pleasures, Monday 3 February 2014]

Neon Jungle: We’re not as much Trouble as you think

Neon Jungle may look like trouble but they insist they’ve never even been in detention.

The sassy pop quartet, consisting of Japanese-born Asami Zdrenka, Scottish girl Shereen Cutkelvin, both 16, and Londoners Amira McCarthy,17, and Jessica Plummer, 20, are hoping to emulate Little Mix in the charts –  but say don’t lump them in the same basket as The X Factor winners.

‘The only thing we really have in common is that we are four girls and we make music,’ insists Jessica after the colourful singers, signed to Sony, swung by Guilty Pleasures for a chat.

Asami is chuffed they are already in the same race as Little Mix.

‘I think we’d all take it as a compliment,’ she said of the comparisons. ‘Because, I think, their success, in quite a short period of time, has skyrocketed and if we can come anywhere close to that we would be grateful.’

But while they may look a little more bad-ass than the DNA singers, the girls promise they are well behaved.

‘We are the biggest geeks, really. People see our exterior and they paint this picture of what we’ll be like and, really, we’re the most goofiest people,’ said Jessica.

Amira confirmed: ‘I’ve never been expelled or suspended. I haven’t even had a detention before! That’s good.’

But the girls are hoping to gatecrash Little Mix’s social circle in the hope that Asami can get her hands on Harry Styles, who she fancies the pants off.

Confident Jessica revealed she too has a crush on a famous musician.

‘I’m rinsing J Cole’s album, Born Sinner, which I’m just obsessed with and so I’ve become a little bit obsessed with him. Like, I’m not joking,’ said the cheeky minx.

‘I’ve googled his age and he’s 28 so I’m thinking when I’m, like, 25, and he’s like 33, maybe something could happen?’

But she went on to say: ‘But then it could change, because last week it was Pharrell and next week it could be Snoop Dogg.’

The ladies are gearing up for the September release of their debut single, Trouble.

[Originally published Metro Guilty Pleasures 22 July 2013]