Dear Readers,
Good afternoon and welcome back to Off The Fence, a newsletter that folds down neatly into your armrest.
We hope the second day of the working week is treating you gently. As for ourselves, we are entering some truly exciting times. We have some huge investigations and stories on the way for you, many of which will be featuring in this very newsletter, and another of which is the biggest and deepest piece of reporting we’ve ever done. There has never been a better time to subscribe to the magazine, and yes, we say that a lot, but somehow it’s always true. To the nearly 700 of you who have signed up to this mail-out over the last fortnight: welcome, we promise you gold is on its way.
We’re loving all the pictures of the magazine we’ve seen coming in from our wonderful subscribers. Do keep them coming to editorial@the-fence.com for a chance to win a very nice bottle. The major transport hubs of Victoria and Stansted were sporting black and orange very nicely, the latter in full triple threat. As ever, the magazine is a true lover of nature, cheering up disgruntled cats, saluting some horses in finery and breathing in the fresh spring blossom. It was also pictured watching the latest trends and then recovering on something a little more old-fashioned. Its final act of the week was to hop over to New York and meet the one and only Patrick Radden Keefe. A good week to be sure, though a good wisteria is hard to beat.
There’s a lot to get around to this week, including exciting raids on Scientology buildings and podcasting nuns. First, however, we’ve been noticing some interesting online activity from the subject of Issue 27’s lead feature.
Colour Us Tickled
One of the pieces we’re most proud of from the latest issue is Phin Jennings’ piece on Stuart Semple. Phin started writing with us over on Capital Letter, giving us some great stories from the art world. Then, we worked on something bigger. Stuart Semple, a man who has spats with more famous artists for being ‘colour hoarders’, is somehow an ambassador for the charity Mind and, according to many former employees, was far from an ideal boss. People have loved reading it in print, and we were getting all excited for when it would go online for more eyeballs to feast on.
But it seems someone has been anticipating us and may even be keen to muddy some waters. Can you guess who? Sometimes it’s easy to get bogged down in over-description with these sorts of things, so allow us to present a series of facts, none of which bear any relation to each other whatsoever. Do not read between any of the non-existent lines that might appear in your mind.
Having been in touch with Stuart Semple in March, The Fence drives boldly ahead with its investigative work. On the 16 April, Issue 27 was launched, and what a wonderful moment that was too. On 18 April, Stuart Semple published a Substack piece called ‘On The Fence About Money and Art’. Five days later, Stuart Semple published a Substack piece called ‘On The Fence About Leaving London’. Prior to April 2026, Stuart Semple had never used the phrase ‘on the fence’ in any of his Substack articles. This newsletter, as you may know, is called Off The Fence.
In neither piece could Stuart’s opinion about either of these topics be described as ‘on the fence’. In the first, he concludes about money and art that, ‘Until we stop measuring art by the same yardstick we use to measure profit, we will never get it’. In the latter, he writes ‘To the London-centric… the very idea of not being there is backward, provincial, and lesser than… Well, I’m here to tell you it’s not’. So why the titles? We have no idea. Incidentally, search engine optimisation (SEO) is the practice of improving the visibility and overall performance of websites and web pages in search engine results pages.
Following this constellation of unconnectable dots, we present two quotes from Phin Jennings final piece on Mr Semple. ‘Working in Semple’s studio involved maintaining fake Twitter accounts to boost his posts.’ ‘Outside of Bournemouth, Semple is better known as an indefatigable publicist than an artist.’
When we put the more serious allegations to Semple, he served us with a legal letter – but our reporting bore out the veracity of our claims. If you value what we do, please do support us by becoming a subscriber today.
She Walks in Beauty
Our Instagram account really is looking tip-top at the moment, and we have even unleashed the full entry for our latest ‘146 Questions’: this time, one of the Belfast-based knob-twiddlers Bicep are in the hot seat – we’ve published all the questions Matt McBriar could answer in the allotted time, and everything he couldn’t. Would you back yourself to have escaped from the Great Fire of London in 1666?
Tsar Nicholas II
Some of you will no doubt have come across the ‘Nick, 30 Ans’ meme, which spread from French Twitter to informing UK government policy in a matter of a few years. But what do real-life Nicks of the age of 30 really think about their taxation burden? Laura Beveridge spoke to a trio of them in the latest piece from Issue 27 to go online.
Maybe the Kids Are Alright
The fates of Gen Z, let alone Gen Alpha are a source of constant anxiety and mindless moral panic from some of the country’s less interesting outlets. But all of us have a tale or two that have made us slightly nervy. Our most recent synapse-tingler was hearing tales of small children pinch-zooming books, confused by the paper’s unresponsive touch. But one of the most consistent trends cultural historians have observed is that for basically every generation (barring the one currently in its infancy) things the one below it has going, or is going, to the dogs. Well, perhaps we shouldn’t be so hasty.
The Yoof’s obsession with Subway Surfer and virality has recently coalesced around a common enemy of humanity – Scientology – in a rather brilliant fashion. The famously weird and secretive sect has seen many of its buildings, most especially its LA headquarters, raided by teenagers doing Scientology Speedruns. The goal is simple: how fast and how far can you get inside the HQ? Can anyone find Lord Xenu or indeed Shelly Miscavige, the wife of the Church’s current head, last seen in 2007?
It’s actually a rather old subgenre of YouTube content which mostly began with this man who has been a long time opponent of the cult to the point where his mere presence outside the building causes all of the hawkers to rush inside and turn on the special window tinting. If you get even a twang of sympathy watching these, we’ve put a link to Going Clear below.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHwnM_w3iuk
In our estimation, then, this is a wholly good thing. Unlike many other examples of tawdry, exploitative ‘pranking’, ‘scientology runs’ benefit from picking a target which is well-merited. On top of this, the whole thing feels perfectly designed to damage the image Scientologists are so keen on. For a long time they have attempted to pursue a dual strategy of aping respectable organisations and cultivating a sense of possible fear and backlash for those who oppose them. Neither of these narratives are well served by having a group of sweaty young ‘uns running around your offices in Jesus cosplay blaring airhorns. Indeed, the effect seems to be damaging enough in the Scientologists’ estimation to cause them to entirely remove the door handles to their building.
So perhaps the A to Z of new generations is not so bankrupt after all, they’re off their screens, making real, physical change and interacting with people face to face, if at a slightly quicker pace than we might have anticipated. Are Gen Z having terrible sex lives? Do they all think anyone over 53 is old? Are young women angrier than ever? We’re not sure, but either way, they aren’t getting on board the cruise ship to leave Teegeeack any time soon.
How Do You Know Liz Truss?
We just put Sophie Heawood’s inaugural column and the story of a memorable date with a younger man from Issue 27 online to clamorous response, with Dr David James saying ‘this is one of the best things I’ve read in a magazine for quite some time.’ It is behind the paywall now, so do sign up for a digital subscription if you would like to find out what all the fuss is about and also peruse the archive. Sophie writes, ‘He had lied about his height on the app, though unfortunately for him, I’d gained a couple of inches too, in the shiny black heels that I’d put on over sheer stockings. Even though I was at home on Gloucester Avenue and not going anywhere.’ But not going anywhere did not save the writer from several unwelcome questions, including that of what kind of wine she wanted to drink and also why Liz Truss kept texting her.
Major Winters’ Mid-Life Crisis
Many people have got rather upset with Damian Lewis’ latest album release, which finds the actor gesturing in what appears to be the Ingestre Road Estate car park while wearing a coat with no shirt and an iced-out pair of loafers. From where we’re sat, there’s something really rather wholesome about it – unlike this excruciating intervention on the Manchester City-Arsenal game from Tom Hiddleston.
Internet Alters
Podcast-laughing has now seeped into every corner of public life. As you might have already seen, one with 157,000 followers on TikTok by a group of Catholic-Dominican sisters based in Michigan that started in January has captured the imagination of the American side of TikTok and is now making the rounds here in the UK. The sisters give advice about the usual things – prayer, devotion, Christ – and also more atypical subjects – anxiety, dating, cooking – in such an appealing and apparently innocuous way that young women are being persuaded of the allure of a vocational life. Much talk abounds of the draw of joining the sisterhood, with soft-focused clips of the nuns extolling joyful living. It’s an advertisement for Catholicism only matched in success to when The Sound of Music came out. With two recording studios and a handy poster of St Francis of Assisi in front of a mic for guidance on optimum pitch levels, it’s not very clear how much time is being spent on the religious side of things. But young women in the UK are enraptured, nevertheless: ‘could I just do a year or two?’ asks one commentator. Similar musing has made its way into real life, a young friend of TF confessing, ‘I’m so close to doing it.’ This seems a bit concerning. Another says, ‘Yeah, just seems great, no job, no responsibilities, just hanging out.’ The podcast calling works in mysterious ways.
Bad Underdog
As the government continues to pickle itself in Peter Mandelson’s vetting brine, we’re reminded of another case of confused loyalty: back in Issue 20, John Phipps met the Drogheda historian bent on rehabilitating Oliver Cromwell. Phipps describes how the author of titles including, but not limited to, Cromwell Was Framed and Drogheda FC: The Story So Far ‘has been waging his lonely war for over a quarter of a century, never shrinking from his original contention and never moving from his beloved hometown. Phipps met Tom Reilly when he was in the process of putting on an exhibition of the ‘provocative historical relic’ of Cromwell’s death mask, and finds something almost charmingly quixotic in Reilly’s crusade. Reilly’s choice of subject is an unusual one, given that local placards still declare ‘CROMWELL DRANK DROGHEDA BLOOD’.
In Case You Missed It
Caity Weaver asked 555 people what the best free bread in America is.
The Guardian investigated the crypto-tycoon bankrolling Reform.
Peter Hitchens’ short-form video debut is everything you want and more.
Sharon Osbourne got herself banned from Mascara Bar.
We did feature Robbie Williams in last week’s links section, but this video of him performing Limp Bizkit’s Rollin’ in a German stadium is extraordinarily compelling.
And Finally
There is a very old-fashioned brand of British comedy which, to us, is really rather wonderful. Old relics like The Goon Show or the songs of Ivor Cutler are greatly enjoyable. Not all of this work has aged superbly of course, but that doesn’t mean a dig through the old light entertainment archives can’t produce gold. Two such nuggets were Michael Flanders and Donald Swann, who formed a musical duo around their surnames and became much like a British alternative (and precursor) to Tom Lehrer.
They have many songs worth a whimsical listen: The Gas Man Cometh, The Gnu Song, The Beadstead Men and the Hippopotamus Song. A personal favourite of ours is the truly silly Wompom Song. Part of the joy is them as a duo, two old friends, one a polio survivor, separated by the Second World War and reunited by the desire to play stupid, amusing songs for the masses.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivf4w3r-_3c
There is a rather nice short documentary about the pair, who are about as quintessentially British as we can imagine. A wonderful mixture of wit, outright silliness and rather touching self-depricating humility, which occasionally spills over into outright sincerity, as in this eulogy to closing train stations as a result of the Beeching cuts of the 1960s. As enjoyable as the watch is, no one summed up their act better than Flanders himself, so we leave you with his words.
‘I must say, wandering around things seem to have come to a pretty underpass here in England while we’ve been away. It’s small wonder to us that satire squats, hoof in mouth, under every bush. The purpose of satire, it has been rightly said, is to strip off the veneer of comforting illusion and cosy half-truth, and our job, as I see it, is to put it back again.’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cr6luwrY2dw
That is that for this week. If you’d like to speak to us about an order, please email support@the-fence.com, and if you have a pitch or a photo of the magazine, please email editorial@the-fence.com and we will attend to you there. Do buy a subscription if you’ve enjoyed this newsletter – it will make you very happy. The Daily Mail sponsored Amy Johnson’s flight to Australia.
All the best,
TF