Chill Pill clutching the Bang Throne behind enemy lines
Witness the coming together of two of London's finest poetry and Spoken Word nights. A celebratory Slam incorporating all your favourite elements from Chill Pill & Bang Said The Gun. The night will see all five poets from each night testing themselves at various word based disciplines.
Will Chill Pill overdose? Will Bang shoot themselves in the foot? The teams:
Chill Pill A laid-back club night where up-and-coming poets share the stage with some of the finest Spoken Word acts in the UK, is curated by Mr Gee (host of Radio 4’sBespoken Word and Rhyme and Reason), Raymond Antrobus, Deanna Rodger, Simon Mole and Adam Kammerling.
Bang Said the Gun "stand up poetry" that’s "not pornography but still pretty good", curated by Daniel Cockrill, Rob Auton, Peter Hayhoe, Martin Galton and Sarah Redington. www.bangsaidthegun.com BOOK £5 ADVANCE TICKETS HERE -http://sohotheatre.com/whats-on/chill-pill/
World meet Sabrina Mahfoz, Sabrina meet the world… oh’ you’ve already met? Yes that’s right Sabrina is critically acclaimed in theatre and poetry having won numerous awards for her performances such as the Old Vic New Voices TS Eliot New York Award.
Sabrina rocked the Chill Pill stage last year with her gobby, energetic, poetical monologues from a greasy, grimy world of nightclubs… no one does it quite like Mahfouz.
Hello Sabrina, first off, congratulations on all your recent success, how you finding stardom?
I am enjoying wearing sunglasses at all times, thanks. The trend of the poet doing one man/woman theatre shows is back, how does a poet know when he/she is ready to make that leap? – I mean, is there such a thing as doing it too soon?
There are some things in life you can never do too soon, like reading and writing and music. Some things should probably wait at least a while but also not too too long - like sex and drugs and solo shows. I think if someone feels like a solo show is the best way for them to say what they have to say then cool, they should do it. but it shouldn't be forced out of a feeling of 'poetry career trajectory' or whatever. If you can say what you want to say in a 2 minute poem, then just do that, a solo show isn't an essential, it's just one option. Aesthetically what’s the difference between a Spoken Word Poet performing a poem and an actor performing a monologue?
Yeh I never really was able to articulate this when people kept asking where I'd trained as an actor and I was like, no I'm just a poet performing my words, not an actor and they would raise eyebrows and nod sadly like I was delusional. There's plenty of crossover, as there is in all performance. I guess an actor performing a monologue is delivering a complete character to the audience, a snippet of that character's life they are sharing with you in that moment and if they are good, then you are there with them completely. Whilst spoken word poets also often become characters, I think that they are usually more concerned with storytelling, narrating, delivering rhythm and beauty of language and words rather than wholly embodying a character. But that is a massive generalisation and would be very interested to hear more articulate thoughts from others on this! You and Hollie Mcnish have recently used your poetry to campaign against The Sun’s page 3, how effective would you say poetry mixes with activism?
Poetry has the ability to access the most basic parts of us and also the most noble, the people we are but also the ones we want to be. That sounds wanky, but I think that's it is the only art form that can do this in such a short time and with such hard-hitting results. For one line of words to impact so much more than the sum of them should is something that can of course be used successfully for activism and has been in different ways since it existed. All of the Arab 'awakenings' over the past couple of years, really do have a poem or rap lyrics quite central to the momentum of protest which led to change. Qatar has recently jailed a poet, Mohammed al-Ajami, for writing a poem criticising the Emir (jailed for life initially, just changed to 15 years). Even at a time when Qatar are strategically trying to be seen as contributors to culture in the world, this poetry and poet was thought to be too dangerous and provocative for people to have access to. All poetry has a bit of activism in it I reckon anyway and activism is often poetical, trying to get somewhere, find something better, reach understandings.
Poetry is now being showcased on bigger stages, Deanna Rodger and myself spoke poems with Chris Redmond and the Tongue Fu band at The Royal Albert Hall last week, Edinburgh Fringe now has a Spoken Word section, Bang Said The Gun showcase poets on channel 4, Kate Tempest and George The Poet have been all over the BBC. Are these the kinds of platforms that are “validating” Spoken Word as an art form?
These platforms are of course creating a wider audience which means that the art form is known by more and more people all the time which creates a growing demand and an awareness that it is possible to think of poetry and not think of school or dead people. So that is a great thing and I really hope we can keep up the momentum which inspires a whole new generation to start writing and performing, I'm excited to be discovering new spoken word artists all the time - often through the platforms you mention. It is getting harder and harder for people to dismiss spoken word and that makes me happy. As a poet who’s been written about by newspapers, magazines, blogs across the board, (not all praise) I’d like to ask you how you respond to criticism?
After a particularly annoying article from a particularly twatty and annoying magazine I tweeted the writer and said if I saw her in Shoreditch I would bust her nose. But that was an exception and I don't endorse violence of any kind, obviously. But it was funny. Generally though I just read it and spend a little time thinking on what was said and if something is highlighted that I recognise as honest - whether good or bad - then I will try and take that on board for future. If there's been a huge misunderstanding - like I'm saying prostitution is empowering or something, which has happened, then I might punch a few cushions and then scour through the script to see if there's any big fault or if the person just probably heard what they wanted to hear, which you can't do much about. I ask all the women I interview this but… wanna dance?
Only if it's UK garage. Then, all night mate. What’s next for Sabrina Mahfouz?
I'm writing and rewriting and writing and rewriting a novel. A play for young people for The National Theatre about free speech and revolution in Egypt. New poems. A show about a chef. Doing a Channel 4 Drama thing. Anger management. You know.
Q2. Speaking of Bristol, the environment is usually the writer’s muse – you’ve even been called an “urban poet” but how does Bristol come through in your poetry? Erm, I’ve had some visceral and brilliant and terrifying and delicious experiences in Bristol, so the very fact that the city has been a back drop to all those things in my life means that it pops up a lot in my poems. Also, I’m from Yorkshire which is really far from Bristol so I’ve got a bit of a love/hate relationship with it. I hate being so far away from my family, but Bristol is definitely my home. I’ve got a poem about Severn Beach, which is sort of a weird commuter town outside the city where the Severn Bridge crosses to Wales. There’s nothing there except some houses and a factory and it’s NOT A BEACH, but I’m kind of obsessed with it.
Q3. You're a very lyrical poet; this is something I really enjoy about your work - how do your poems work as poems rather than as raps or songs? I’ve never rapped in my life. I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise. I read a lot of poetry, but also songs and songwriters have a big influence on me, especially Tom Waits, Leonard Cohen, Patti Smith, among others, so maybe that’s a thing. I think if you’re just saying words… no music or pictures or explosions…then you’ve got to kind of make the words as colourful as possible so that they fill up all the space the reader’s head. A very good friend told me recently that I write pop-song-poems. Not really sure how to take that. Q4. You've gone into theatre and from the sounds of it your show is making waves. Are you touring it? Tell us about it... I accidentally wrote a poetry musical. Right, I need to stop saying ‘poetry musical’. It makes me sound like a twat. I actually might sound like a twat anyway. I wrote this piece of poetry / play that’s got a full score on guitar. It’s sort of like a soundtrack like in a film. I’m chatting away and there’s this gorgeous music that has been written specifically to go with the words. An amazing musician called Nuala Honan wrote the music, and she plays it live with me on stage. She makes me look well cool.
It’s called ‘Folly’, and it’s about dragging your broken heart around the world and not finding yourself, or finding anything except that you’re still a grumpy English girl, even when you’re surrounded by a postcard scene. Sometimes we think it’s a confession about leaving, sometimes we think it’s a play about why we travel. Imagine what happens when a grumpy Yorkshire poet lady and a grumpy Australian musician lady get together and write about trains, planes and cheap booze. It’s that.
Yes, we’re touring it in March / April hopefully. Just in the process of trying to sort all that out at the moment. It’s not easy!
Q5. Sounds great Sally! ... but what the hell is a poet doing in theatre anyway? Shouldn’t you be stroking your chin and staring out the window somewhere? I can’t sit still for long enough to stare out of windows! I think the lines between theatre and concert venues are a bit more blurred these days. We did the debut in a theatre because we wanted to do it a bit fancy-pants, but I’ll perform anywhere anyhow really. I’m easy, poetry-wise.
Q6. We’re both published in the Burning Eye Books ‘Pamphlet Series’ and we’re both gigging poets so how do you think your work translates from stage to page and visa versa? I dunno if there’s as much of a divide as some people make out, really. Maybe it’s just about how you choose to share your work. Having said that, I’ve got some poems that I love performing, that look stupid on the page and I don’t think I’d ever put them into print!
I feel like there are some poems that are better on the page because they don’t make a bold, specific, fast impression, and they are more intended to be read and re-read and considered slowly. They’re the ones that I want to offer to people, spread carefully onto a piece of toast for them to chew at their own leisure, rather than smearing the words straight onto their face. Some poems are for shouting and smearing, some are for toast. OK?
Q7. That's beautiful...wanna dance?
Just name a time and place, Antrobus. I thought you’d never ask.
Q8. I only wanted to interview you so I could ask you that, so to wrap this up Sally, where can we hear more from you? I’ve got a website! Thanks for asking, I’ve been meaning to make one for years and I just got round to it. Have a look- www.sallyjenkinson.com
“I held my 13 Negro tales And made a backbone Swapped it for my own Stood to the wind and dared earth To spin me off its shoulders Not knowing I had soldered my pen to its core And ink planted a metaphor” – 13 Negro Tales by Inua Ellams
Nigerian born Inua Ellams is one of the most exciting poets in the UK right now. Still very young, he’s already published a book of his poetry, sold out the National Theatre with his one man show, toured all over the country and was even one of the first poets to win a Fringe First award.
His words, his passion, his achievements and his humbleness has deeply inspired me as a writer and performer.
Me and Inua are part of the same poetry collective (PiP) and we were speaking recently about whether the artists involved in our art form should call themselves poets, Spoken Word artists, writers, performers, performance poets, live literature artists or show boaty wind bags?
Q. Inua, are you a show boaty wind bag?
In my younger days, I wrote and performed things, which if I saw on stage now (with a better grasp of what this game is about) I’d consider to be hot air. Yup, I was the wind baggiest of them all. But now, I consider myself a poet and a performer. I don’t write poems for stages, and don’t see a stage as the end-goal of a poem. For me, the performance of a poem is secondary to the act of writing and creating. The label we choose to attach to what we do should come from a sort of honest, critical S.W.O.T analysis. Only then are they meaningful.
Q. How can you tell when a poem wants the stage or a poem just wants the page?
The difference between a stage poem and a page poem are as thin as line breaks. That is to say, a poem on a page fools around with visual tricks, with layout, with shapes, with word spacing etc and a poem on stage is purely audio. If with a voice you cannot recreate the tricks of a page poem, then it has no business being on stage, and would make for a poor reading / performance of the poem. – That does the poem a disservice. // Anything else should work decently on a stage, if the poem is read with enough command, intention and control.
Q. A mate of mine once said “one of the biggest influences of a writer is their environment.” How does your Nigerian heritage combine with the experience of growing up in London and how does that translate into poetry?
Nigeria itself has had little to no influence on my writing. I only discovered the power of language in Dublin at 16, 5 years after I had left Nigeria and 3 years before I would consider myself a writer. But it has created a strong sense of responsibility. Naija, holds the belief that stories, poems have to carry a message otherwise they are pointless, might as well be a large dot in the centre of a page / a black hole centre stage.
The Nigeria that exists as a shared headspace within my family has however; my father is a great story-teller, my mother is moralist. My father is quite daring and charming, my mother very respectful. These traits of theirs are tinged with their strong Nigerian backgrounds. Subsequently, I am coloured with it and it dictates what I write about, why I write about it and how I do.
Q. You write a lot. I’m jealous. Apparently writers block is a necessary part of writing quality work. Do you agree?
I don’t think I write a lot. The last poem I finished, that I am happy with, that I have shared on a stage and has been published in Journals took a whole year to write. // I do think a writer’s block is necessary though, if you liken it to climbing the steps to a waterslide, the actual slide is the pay off, the fun bits, in order to get to it, to enjoy it, you gotta climb up. Q. Your book and your one man show ‘The 14th Tale’ was funded by The Arts Council. Do the recent cuts in arts funding worry you as an artist?
YES and NO. // YES because it means that work such as mine will be difficult to create without support. NO because art will always find a way. // YES because undoubtedly a smaller amount of art works will be produced. NO because when things are created, when free time and effort are spent on it, it’s gotta be good, will be brilliant, has to be worth its while. // YES because some good artists will give this up to find 9 – 5s. NO because it is poetry, we are not exactly rolling in it anyway. // YES because we will have to think smaller and go back to the basics. NO Because we will have to think smaller and go back to the basics //
Q. You’ve achieved a lot this year. What new tricks have you learned?
“This above else: to thine own self be true.” As Ol’ Bill put it in Hamlet. There will be critics and counter critics, poet and rival poets, room to be jealous, and rooms full of jealousy. The important thing is to stick to your guns, do what makes you happy, run your own race.
Q. Lastly Inua, your book is brilliant, I’ve read it front to back many times. Plus your one-man show blew my mind, even my girlfriend really liked it and she thinks “poetry is naff!” Can I have your autograph before you get too famous for these kinds of interviews?
haha. You can get an unlimited supply of graph anytime, but it’ll cost you a gourd of Nigerian palm wine, Ghanian red red, Senegalese Jollof Rice, 3 kola nuts, a stick of pure white chalk, and the Tail of a Blue bird. - deal?
Mike Skinner is not a shit rapper; he’s a good poet. Someone needs to tell him that… However, no one needs to tell Polarbear he’s not shit.
Steven Camden aka Polarbear doesn’t like to be hyped up but many would stand by me when I say he’s one of the best writer/performer/Spoken Word artists in the UK by any standard.
If you like your wordsmiths to be humble, home grown and clean cut storytellers in flat caps I may have found you a street corner hero.
Polarbear, your last one-man show was called ‘Return’ and on the flyer it says ‘A Spoken Film’. What is ‘Spoken Film’? Are you pioneering a new genre of theatre?
I dunno. I doubt it. Not on purpose anyways. A spoken film is me speaking a screenplay; shot description, dialogue and so on. I had a story I wanted to tell and an idea of how I could do it. I sat down and with Yael crafted a screenplay for my mouth. The idea is really an extension of what I’ve been trying to do with shorter pieces for a while now. I really wanted to test how filmic I could make a story feel as an experience both to tell and to listen to. I’m touring it until Feb 2011 on and off. It’s been a brilliant process and I’ve grown as a writer and performer through it. I worked really closely with a couple of people and I’m happy with what we made. It’s feels nice to take a starting point and get a piece to be exactly what you wanted. ‘RETURN’ is that.
I want you to know, there are a lot of little Polarbear imitators out there… I saw a performer completely rip you off a few weeks ago and it hurt to watch.. what should I do when I witness such horrific crimes against creativity?
Everything is borrowed lad. I wouldn’t worry. I think when you’re just starting out at something it’s inevitable that what you’re into will be present for people to see. That’s just a development thing I think. People sometimes need a base to grow their style on. A biter is always gonna shoot themselves in the foot at some point, either directly or indirectly. I remember teachers at school saying that imitation was the best form of flattery. I guess I should be flattered. Once, then it’s just lazy.
You’re a Dad. How has fatherhood impacted you as a writer? I imagine you’ve had to have your discipline on lock?
Fatherhood just made me have less time and as a consequence of that a desire not to waste any. I can now get done in three hours what it used to take a whole day to do. In terms of discipline and my work I think it’s added some maturity maybe. I’m now a man capable of acting like a boy as oppose to the other way around. I still wake up at 4am needing to write ideas down and sometimes that can mess you up when you have dad responsibilities, but it’s like anything else, I only do what I’m excited by so if I’m excited by an idea I make time to realize it.
Seems you’ve had a pretty good career as a Spoken Word artist so far but how do you measure success if not by your capital?
I don’t really think beyond the next idea. It’s funny cos every now and then I’m around a conversation about spoken word and important artists in that world or whatever and it always strikes me that the people using the word success the most are the ones I find least interesting.
The fact is I make a living from ideas and that’s something that will never not be nuts. I’m lucky. I’ve paid dues and I deliver so I get opportunities. There are words that I’ve written that might live longer than me. Crazy. I work on a lot of writing/performance projects and have made a lot of friends. Thanks to my email inbox I know there are a couple of writers who have an interest or passion to write stuff in part due to me and that there are a few more people who believe that stories can be written by anyone who’s good at it regardless of back ground. That’s pretty cool. How do I measure success? To be honest lad I don’t know. Where I come from work is work and play is play. I get to blend the two and that’s as successful as I need to be.
I once read an interview you did a while back where you spoke about your frustration with the lack of quality in the UK ‘Spoken Word scene’ and you went on to disassociate yourself with the term “poet”… Has Spoken Word poetry moved along or are you sticking to your claws? Again I’ve gotta be annoying and say I don’t really know. I rarely go to spoken word events I’m not involved with because of time and I still have no desire to be known as a poet. It’s pretty simple to me. The form of spoken word at it’s best to me is immediate, engaging and hopefully has a lasting resonance. I just wasn’t seeing a whole lot of stuff that met all of those points. There are lots of strong artists doing it and a whole heap of absolutely crap ones (in my opinion) but none of that really enters my head when I’m writing.
I don’t consider myself to be a poet. I feel comfortable speaking work on stage to an audience so I’m cool with the spoken word label, but if I wake up tomorrow and decide to write a cookbook, then that’s what I’ll do. Has spoken word moved along? Of course it has and so have audiences. There’ll always be good and there’ll always be awful, it’s just with spoken word there’s nothing to hide behind. It’s important that individuals keep pushing themselves and their ideas. That sounded a little more political than I intended.
You are part of the OneTaste collective. Each poet in there really holds their own. Kate Tempest, David J and yourself couldn’t make a better example of how three completely different styles of writing and performance can be equally as powerful as each other. Are you three on any kind of mission as the poets in a collective dominated by musicians?
No. OneTaste is a bunch of artists who just do stuff together. Sometimes people collaborate, other times we just perform on the same night. We’re friends who make stuff. Some of us talk, some of us sing and play. I don’t see the rest of them half as much as I used to so I don’t want to speak for them, but for me it’s just a mark of quality. Justice League, although to be honest I always found Justice League to be a little bit wet, but I mean when you’re around quality you want to bring more quality and that just makes it good for anyone watching.
Musa Okwonga once said to me that the term “Spoken Word Artist” sounds apologetic. So many of us essentially do the same thing (write and perform) but market ourselves with different names e.g. poet, writer, performer, live literature artist… why can’t we all come together and figure this out… aren’t we confusing our audience or are we trying to avoid the stigma of the terms “poet” or “poetry”?
Man you think properly about this shit eh?
I don’t have these thoughts lad. I’m a writer. I can say that with confidence now. Sometimes I speak my work to an audience, but I don’t need to. I don’t have dreams about being on stage in front of screaming crowds. Used to be that I spoke stuff cos it was the quickest way to share stuff. Now I enjoy the craft. Musa’s funny. He can be the most apologetic person ever then switch and be proper hardcore. I get called all kinds of stuff from beat poet to everyday word wizard and it’s never once changed what I do. I’ll just keep doing that and let other people worry about the definitions.
Finally Polarbear, you’re an absolute legend and an inspiration to so many poets and writers out there… you’re going down in history and your imitators will die nameless. Yay!
I come from Birmingham.
Here's Polarbear at Chill Pill a few weeks ago with his poem 'The Scene' - "there's a reason they call it 'the scene', it's because it's not real"
Simon Mole calls himself a Spoken Word artist, an emcee and a Hip-Hop Theatre artist. I first met Simon in 2008 at an Apples and Snakes open mic gig. He gave me his CD and I gave it a listen. It was all UK Hip-Hop and was in the same vein as many of the UK Rappers I’d known about such as Task Force, Brain Tax, Jhest etc. Although his overall individual talent was evident; I was most interested in his lyrics. I bumped into him again in 2009 at a writing workshop with Jean Binta Breeze and we clicked. He’s one of the hungriest, raw talented Spoken Word artists I know and he’s going to blow! Trust me!
Yo Simon! You legend! Introduce yourself!
Errr… yeah… I’m Simon. I’ve got a skinhead at the moment, but I only got it done because I had to. Me and my mate Josh have been making a video for a piece I wrote called ‘the say yes think no syndrome’ and if you ever get to see it you’ll understand why I had to get the clippers out. Suffice to say, a short back and sides with a bowl cut over the ears probably isn’t a good look once the need to retain it for continuity purposes has passed…
Q. You came to Spoken Word as a UK Hip-Hop emcee; do you find you’ve become more of a Spoken Word artist these days?
Yeah I do man, definitely. It’s taken me a fair while to feel comfortable defining myself in that way, and I still sometimes feel a bit self-conscious about calling myself a poet. But basically I think it’s pretty crucial to be actively and consistently doing something if you’re going to put yourself out there as that thing – simply looking at what I’ve written and what gigs I’ve done in the last year or so it’s pretty clear to me that I’m more of a spoken word artist than an emcee right now…
That said, rap is poetry, and all genre distinctions are meaningless. Ha ha! I’m not normally one for sweeping statements like that but fuck it, labels can be helpful if you put together event listings or own a record shop but beyond that fuck em. I was at this college the other day about to start a gig/workshop thing for about 200 14 year olds and I kicked off by asking them what they thought of poetry - out of the ‘like’, ‘think it’s ok’, and ‘think it’s rubbish’ options I gave them, the vast majority went for ‘think it’s rubbish’ which was funny but kind of mad really. And then I asked them if they liked rap music and most of them did – when I told them I thought rap was poetry they all looked at me like I was a complete lunatic… I mean I’m not saying 50 cent is on some Ted Hughes shit, and to be fair that kind of mainstream rap is probably what them kids are listening to, but still I mean by broadening their idea of what might be poetry surely there’s the chance of opening the idea for them that poetry of any kind might speak to them on some level, and once you’ve done that who’s to say they won’t actually get into something they might not have otherwise…
Anyway, I digress, so yeah, I AM A POET, and now ousted as such to anyone smart enough to read your wonderful blog Ray.
Q. Your work is sharp in observation and touches the rawest nerves of our human habits – is this technique something you developed or something you naturally discovered was within your ability?
Thanks man. It’s a good time for me to hear you to say that, because lately I’ve been getting the fear a little bit that my work isn’t poetic enough whatever that means, because even though I know there’s poetry inherent in the everyday shit around us which I tend to focus on, I do wish I found myself coming up more often with those wildly poetic images that just seem to pour out of some people. But yeah, I’ve worked on my technique man, of course, so maybe I just need to hone up my ‘wildly poetic image’ abilities now! That said, I should probably also stay strong in my belief that by selecting certain details of that everyday stuff and presenting them with enough space for people to grow their own thought processes around the work, poetry that observes those tiny, important and often unnoticed details can impact in a big way too, just via a different route.
Pushing myself to develop my writing was something I was finding hard to do through music for a while, and through spoken word I started thinking a lot about sensory observational stuff and did hone that skill up intentionally I guess, off the back of a few workshops like that one you mentioned, and just thinking about what I thought was good in the writing that I liked by other people. I think I work quite visually, like quite often when I’m writing a piece I’ll have a particular place, or atmosphere or ‘feel’ associated to that place, in my mind as a kind of guide – if a line or idea doesn’t fit with the feel of that place then it doesn’t go in. Maybe kind of linked to that, I really enjoy writing using photos or film clips as kind of prompts or source material, a bit like I imagine a painter might if they want to create a realistic impression of a place, thing, person, whatever, even if they then move away from that realistic representation it’s good to have it as a foundation to start with.
I also do a lot of writing exercise man, from books and shit, sometimes to start something new off, or sometimes using little exercises I have myself for helping other people get through writing blocks in workshops, and just using them to help me get through my own blocks – it’s mad how long it took to think about doing that really, I remember Jonzi D saying to me I should think about how I approach teaching/supporting other people’s creative processes when creating my own stuff, I even plan myself little writing workshops sometimes man, with warms up and everything, I’m a proper geek for this shit, ha ha! Some people are a bit funny about exercises and that, like it should all just come to you natural in a spark of inspiration or something but I figure if you can do something you enjoy, and it will almost certainly improve your writing then surely you gonna jump on that right?! In fact, there’s one book you recommended me Ray, called ‘the practice of poetry’ which is quite a good one.
Q. I came to see your one man Spoken Word show at The Albany and you blew me away, it was genuinely amazing. Do you think one-man shows are the way forward for the Spoken Word genre?
They’re certainly the way forward for me at the moment man. I don’t know about for the genre as a whole man, I guess if everyone started doing one man shows instead of shorter pieces then maybe the market would get saturated or some shit, who knows? People should do it if they want to man, not to push the genre – if that’s your sole start point for making something I’m guessing it might not be so much fun… For me, making theatre, you know, devising new theatre that draws influences and methods from different art-forms has been something I’ve been into for years, and doing it like this is the most satisfying way of doing that for me right now. But as well as that, yeah, if some people within the spoken word ‘scene’ make some longer work, thinking more consciously about the theatrical side of it, and that then has an impact on other artists to think about their own work in a different way, or if in any way shows like say Inua Ellam’s thing being on at the national, mean that people become interested in spoken word who might not have otherwise then yeah that’s wicked. So in a way maybe it is pushing the genre so much as the genre exists at all in any concrete static way, just in terms of expanding what people think spoken word can be… But yeah, just read back your question and you didn’t even say pushing the genre at all, ah well…
Q. Where do you see yourself as a Spoken Word artist in five years?
Wow, tough question. It’s funny man because whenever I ask young people to do something like that, you know thinking about their life in five, ten years I always try to do it for myself as well at the same time to remind myself what a hard thing it is to do! I think I have an idea where I’d like to be, but the path to making a relatively stable and sustainable career as a writer is definitely an ongoing journey rather than one with a definite end point for most people.
For me, I guess to be in a position where the majority of my income comes from my own writing and performing would be amazing, mainly just because that would mean that the majority of conventional ‘work hours’ could be spent doing that type of thing, and also just because it would make me feel good. Then again I wouldn’t want to lose the education and community arts project stuff totally because I love it man. As of now, I feel genuinely lucky that I’m in a position where I’m able to make my living from a combination of writing, gigging and workshops you know what I mean? And regardless of the fact that most of my money comes from workshops really, I still manage to work it so a decent chunk of my Monday to Friday time is spent doing stuff I would actively want to do in my spare time around a ‘proper’ job if I still had one… I guess it’s good to appreciate where I am now, as well as aiming for stuff in the future you know, otherwise you can get somewhere and already be thinking about the next thing to the point that you don’t really appreciate the moment you just worked your arse off to get to. Haven’t answered that at all have I?! Q. Can you tell us about the education/community projects you are currently involved in and how you got involved in running workshops initially?
My main focus on that front in the last few months has been a project for Guys and St Thomas’s charity which has involved me working with the porters at the hospital, getting them to write poetry. It’s been an amazing project man, they’re a safe bunch as well – they do such an important job, and in some ways it’s easy for that to go unnoticed within the hospital. The main aim of the project was to celebrate that good job they already do, by giving them a voice through the poetry they write – a lot of them had never done anything like it before but we ended up with contributions from seventeen members of their team in the end, some of them were proper good too! There’s going to be an exhibition of the poems in the atrium in the hospital which we’re launching on national poetry day in October, and this dope illustrator Jess Wilson is working with the poems so they’re going to look amazing too! You can check more on their website here:
As for how I got involved in workshops, working with young people in some way has always been something I’ve done, kind of like my real job career path alongside my music and theatre stuff until they started to merge. And even way way back when I was in Brighton youth theatre as, well, a youth, we used to run workshops for other kids back then too, so it’s always been part of my creative process really if I think about it. Around the time I was at uni I did a lot of work with a drama therapist too for quite a while, which was pretty full on at points but definitely really rewarding, and taught me a lot about a lot of things. I guess I was in a position where by the time I started to think about wanting to get paid for running workshops, I’d already been doing it for ages in some way, you know, volunteering and work experience and just doing it for fun really man. The more poetry-based workshops have come along more recently, but particularly with them I really feel that breaking down how I create in order to try and give other people a route into writing for the first time has helped me grow my own writing too, in a way I might not have done otherwise… In some ways, maybe I’ve got more natural talent for teaching than writing so it can be a case of ‘teaching’ myself at points, which might sound like a kind of weird approach but it works for me!
Q. So then, would you say the educational route is the best way to find financial stability as a Spoken Word artist?
For me it certainly has been (up to the point that I am financially stable anyway!) and I think that it’s definitely a really amazing way to support yourself as an artist because you still get to do the thing that you love, well, help other people do it anyway- actually, that tiny distinction is why its so important to get the balance right man. If you just do ‘intro to hip hop’ workshops five days a week, pretty soon you’re going to be coming home not feeling like writing yourself you know? It’s a privilege to be able to run workshops for kids and get paid for it man, so it’s important to make sure your creatively satisfied yourself outside of that environment too.
Also, I guess it’s just not for some people, if you don’t like work with kids, or you get impatient if someone ‘doesn’t get it’ or you don’t like listening to slightly out of time 8 bar raps by 15 year olds then maybe not eh?!
I think for me, the way forward is targeting the type of work I try to get, like for instance this thing at guys involved a writing commission for me, and the whole thing stretched out over a few months so it afforded me a little stability as well being something that fulfilled me creatively as an artist as well an arts practitioner. I know it’s a small difference but being an artist or writer who runs education or community projects as well, is very different to being a teacher who tries to do their own shit on the side, you know what I mean? Happy to say I’m definitely in the first camp now, but I’ve had to work hard to make that transition and I’m aware that it’s a fluid thing that could change depending what work there is about.
Q. What gigs you got lined up?
I’m hosting a little homegrown festival that some good mates of mine put on in a very picturesque valley near Bath every year. It’s called Hamswell and is the friendliest a friendly little festival can be – if you’re free the weekend of 13th – 15th August and fancy some great music, workshops, local farm barbecues and some good old fashioned unhinged revelry then take a look at the website: www.hamswellfestival.com
Think I’m back at Chill Pill at the end of august too – props to you guys for that night man, definitely establishing itself nicely as a great place to try out and see new work, as well as a spot to see established artists for free, so yeah good work to y’all on that!
Also, September and October are looking exciting for me, really exciting actually – been waking up early some mornings and not being able to get back to sleep due to an excessively active ideas and plot-hatching portion of my brain! Basically, I’ve been redeveloping that spoken word show you saw at the albany in March – this time around it’s called ‘Indiana Jones and the extra chair’, I’m billing it as ‘the least dreaded family gathering of the year’ and a buffet supper will be provided inclusive of the ticket price, but I’m going to ask that in return people bring along their own memories of food-based family get-togethers…
Anyway, I’ve got the preview for it at The Freeword Centre on Friday September 17th, which is going to be free and a good chance for me to get some feedback on the material in a theatre space before doing a three night run of it in ‘the dinner room’ at a really cool traditional little pub called ‘the calthorpe arms’ on the Grays Inn Road. The dates for that are Wednesday 30th September, Thursday 31st September, and Friday1st October. Anyone interested should either hit me up on my myspace or email ticketsforthedinnerroom@yahoo.co.uk for more info…
Q. How can we access more of your work? – I just googled you and got a dead website about nothing!
Yeah, I know the website you mean and it is nothing to do with me man! I always fear people will check it out and think the cartoon of the dude in the west brom shirt, which he then takes off for some reason, is me. It’s not. I should have a website up in the not too distant future though, but a mate is putting together for me for free so it’s inevitably taking a little longer. Matthew Baker if you’re reading this, get your arse in gear man! So yeah, for now, my myspace page is the best place really – www.myspace.com/simonmole
