Cami-knickered rent boys, women-only poetry, melon slices, bad movies and Shakespeare's slut sister

[Photo courtesy of DJ (Diane) Connell]

Our usual gang was somewhat depleted last night (which meant less of a struggle to grab space), as little Tony, Emma, Toby and I took our places for "London's peerless gay literary salon" Polari. John-John had the "dreaded lurgy", our Paul was celebrating his 60th birthday in Berlin (as you do) with Jim, and Ange had some serious family matters to deal with.

Blinking in the daylight that illuminated the beautiful landmarks of the South Bank, we nevertheless looked forward (as always) to a cracking evening's entertainment. And (as always - see my earlier blog) we were not disappointed...



Hosting the show with his usual multi-costumed flair, Mr Paul Burston introduced our first reader - a newbie to Polari (although very much a regular in the audience), and her first time "reading for a mixed audience" (she is a stalwart of women-only socials hosted by Kenric lesbian group and the like) - Anny Knight.



She read for us a plethora of her short poems in a seamless stream - some personal, some emotional, most acutely observational and often very funny - but none (frustratingly) to be found anywhere on the web. We thoroughly enjoyed being taken along for the ride, however, and look forward to more when the publishers come knocking (which they surely will).



Next up was a man who Paul introduced as "actor, dancer, escort, porn star and tantric masseur - and now, author" Greg Mitchell. Whew, what a CV! Another newbie to the literary world, Mr Mitchell read from his as-yet-unpublished work, telling (a semi-autobiographical?) tale about a rather kinky punter, his preoccupation with silky underwear, the rent boy he hires to fulfil his fantasies - and a cute taxi driver who shows rather an interest in the whole fetish, much to the protagonist's delight.

Hot stuff - he must get a publisher soon! Visit Greg's blog.



Completing the entertainment for the first half, it was the long-overdue and very welcome return of the lovely Miss Sophia Blackwell - who we hadn't seen here since March 2012!

Darling of the stubbornly individual, maquillage-loving alternative lesbian world, Miss Blackwell was described by no less a luminary than Stella Duffy thus: "Some of Sophia Blackwell's poems read like Nico should be singing them to John Cale's viola, some as if Shakespeare's slut sister taught him all he knew, others are as new as the next dawn. Dirty, juicy, knowing, open - works for me.". She launched into a few of her best "performance poetry" pieces, including this rather lovely one, written for the wedding of two friends - When It Finds You:

Sophia Blackwell - When it Finds You (Word!, September 2012)

And this pithy number - Tell Me:

Sophia Blackwell - Tell Me (Word!, September 2012)

I adore her - visit Sophia's website for more.


[Photo courtesy of krysphotos]

After the break, it was the turn of our fave VG (Val) Lee to take to the stand.

A trouper of the highest order (Val has recently added stand-up comedy to her long list of achievements, that also includes a regular column in the aristo magazine The Lady), she entertained us to two of her cherished works, her first (and possibly only) entry into world of erotica A Slice of Melon, and the hilarious Shush (both of which she read for the LGBT History Month audience at Islington Waterstones in February).

Fabulously entertaining, as always - Val inevitably always has her audience in the palm of her hand. And as such, she's a difficult act to follow...



However our headliner, the utterly charming Christopher Fowler, is certainly up to that challenge. Reading some insightful pieces from his "scurrilous memoir about his career in the British film industry", Film Freak, he soon had the packed house engrossed.

Often hilariously funny (his "Pied Piper" poster for Michael Jackson understandably never saw the light of day, coming as it did in the middle of accusations of child molestation against the megastar), poignant (the sad, slow decline of the British film industry and its original home in Soho's Wardour Street - all restaurants and bars these days) and really moving (the emotions surrounding the death of Chris's partner Jim Sturgeon), the book is indeed an engrossing and unique insight into the sordid stories behind the tricky art of making movies in grim, depressed and depressing 1970s Britain.

You can listen to Mr Fowler talking about Film Freak, in conversation with reviewer Tim Haigh, in this podcast:



Read more of Mr Fowler's incredibly imaginative writing - and order a copy of the book - via his blog.


[Photo courtesy of krysphotos]

Another grand night out, loads of laughs, a lovely (and very mixed - not just in the sense to which Ms Knight refers) audience, much schmoozing and camaraderie - I love it!

Can't wait for the next one - on Wednesday 26th June 2013 - at which the UK's most famous gay soldier Lance Corporal James Wharton is our headline reader. Also announced is historical horror writer Jack Wolf. Others to be confirmed in due course, no doubt.

Polari

Deadly yoga, French lesbo schoolgirls, ketchup rebirthing and Cornwall

Yet again, Mr Paul Burston's elegant soiree Polari provided us with a brilliant evening's entertainment. "London's peerless gay literary salon" just keeps getting better and better...

Resplendent in what can best be described as "Adam Ant vs Buffalo Style" Mr B wasted no time in introducing our first reader, and regular favourite Mr Nick Field. Always funny, always engaging, Mr Field read an extract from his currently touring production The Cosmos, The Cosmetics, as well as a few of his poems - including the brilliant Yoga is a competitive sport:

Outside a gentle breeze
Floats in wind-chime trickles.
Inside the yogi draws the group together,
With elongated vowels.
Sitting on crossed legs in readiness
I’m centred, I’m relaxed,
I’m taking these mofo’s down.
As we begin rounds of sun salutes
Feel the arched majesty of my cobra.
As we move between positions,
I’m checking out the competition.
Because soon they’re going to be eating my warrior II.
And gasping at the endurance of my tree.
Why is it that at school,
I’d happily trot at the back in races,
While the PE fascist bellowed
‘Run, come on you’re being beaten by girls’.
But in the incensed softly lit yoga studio
No-one is coming close to my downward dog.

Our next reader Miss Deborah Levy was fascinating - her passion for literature led her to the work of early 20th century French female author Violete Leduc [indeed she wrote the introduction to the reprint of Leduc's best selling biography, La Bâtarde], an authoress who was compared in her day to Jean Genet for the frank depiction of her sexual escapades and immoral behaviour. And it was from Thérèse et Isabelle, Mme Leduc's scandalous and long-banned story of adolescent lesbianism, that she read a steamy extract. It was excellent, and brilliantly written - and I can understand why so many people, from Simone de Beauvoir to Miss Levy herself were entranced by her...

Completing the triple-bill for the first half was the rather cute Mr Justin Torres, a very gifted writer indeed, as the extract he read from his new novel We The Animals proved. Chilling, intriguing and convoluted in turn, this story of an evidently bizarre childhood through the eyes of an eight-year-old boy had us gripped (especially the piece where the kids, covered in ketchup and make-up after a messy food-fight, remind their unbalanced mother of them being born) - and you can read an extract on the Granta website.


l-r: Nick Field, Deborah Levy, Paul Burston, Sophia Blackwell, Patrick Gale, Justin Torres

Miss Sophia Blackwell is always a welcome sight at Polari. Possibly the most "lipstick" of "lipstick lesbians" and a lovely person to boot, she has an incredibly vivid way of storytelling, whether through her marvellous poetry or her new penchant for prose. Her first novel, After My Own Heart is just out, and from it she read us a wonderfully sleazy passage all about being a lesbian performer on a shoddy workmen's club circuit. Here's Miss B herself talking about the novel...





Star of the show was the best-selling author Mr Patrick Gale. Alongside the likes of Alan Hollinghurst and Sarah Waters, Mr Gale is one of Britain's "gay glitterati" - despite his distinctly rural lifestyle in Cornwall, which forms the backdrop for many of his novels. Not least of these is his latest A Perfectly Good Man, which has as its rather unusual theme the journey a young boy makes from unconventional childhood to the ranks of the clergy. Notwithstanding its rather "un-gay" subject matter, there is still a smattering of gay characters - and the extract he chose to read (which, bizarrely, in the timeline of the story is about the boy's early years, but in the book forms part of the closing chapter) described perfectly the obviously gay relationship of the dying uncle with his male "secretary", as seen through the heavy veil of secrecy of the boy's family. Rather excellent it was, too! You can hear Mr Gale reading an extract from A Perfectly Good Man on his website.

And so, reluctantly, we had to close proceedings - but not before a spot of shmoozing with the hallowed audience, including regulars such as Joe Storey-Scott, Alex Hopkins, Lauren Henderson/Rebecca Chance and DJ Connell (but no Val Lee, who is too busy writing her new column for The Lady these days, apparently), welcome returning Polari-ites such as Kenneth Hill and Uli Lenart from Gay's The Word bookshop, and a host of other new faces.

Another phenomenal evening!

As ever, we look forward to the next one - and April's speakers so far announced include Rose Collis, Michael Wynne, Chris Chalmers and Terry Ronald.

Polari at the Southbank

Village People, fringes, moustachioed Vatican divas

After (remarkably) about ten years since I last set foot in the place, I found myself in the Royal Vauxhall Tavern (RVT) yesterday evening (Wednesday 3 August). I'm not sure why it has been so long between visits - they have a feast of events on regularly by artists I like, including David Hoyle, Justin Bond, Myra Dubois, Marcus Reeves and the rag tag and bobtail of the Wotever World crowd, so I have no excuse.

Last night's excuse was (of course) a visit to the RVT Hot August Fringe by our favourite "peerless gay literary salon" Polari! Our host Paul Burston (looking even more svelte than last time we saw him - the man needs some pie!) had been invited to fill the hour's slot at quite short notice, so it was remarkable that he managed to assemble three of our most esteemed literati to read pieces from their contributions to the recently published Men and Women compendium.



First up was the wonderfully wacky Karen McLeod, who announced to the audience "last time I was on this stage I was dressed as a six-foot penis" - which was quite a surprise - before revisiting Never Can Say Goodbye, her tale of lesbian marital woe on the less-than-paradise honeymoon island of Barbados, that I so enjoyed last month at the launch of the book.

She was followed by one of our literary giants, the lovely Christopher Fowler. His short story Ladies and Gentlemen takes up where his prize-winning novel Paperboy left off, this time entering the heady world of teenage and early gay adulthood. It is an excellent tale, and as Mr Fowler said, a bit of a taster for the novel's forthcoming sequel. Again giving us a humorous insight into his own life, in his early days of working in the advertising industry one of his jobs was to promote an ill-fated movie...

Back at the office we were working on s film called Discoland, but by the time it went into production disco was suddenly as dead as Donna Summer's reputation, so the title was changed to "Discoland: Where The Music Never Stops", and finally, with an air of desperation, Can't Stop The Music.

When we saw the finished cut, our jaws dropped. The film had dated badly before it had even opened. It was impossible to imagine who director Nancy Walker thought she was making her magnum opus for. Walker was an old chorus girl from films like On The Town, and had filled the film with gay men and old broads, which probably reflected her life.

The wrong-headedness of this film gave a clue to the kind of dead-end in which the gay 70s now found itself. Steve Guttenburg ran around shrieking in cut-off denims, and the Village People appeared with some 8-year-old boys dressed in chaps and cock-rings. For the film's premiere, the distributors decided that we, the marketing men, should surrender our last shreds of dignity and show up in tiny short shorts and roller skates. Unfortunately the cinema has a steeply raked floor, so that when the ridicule began we found ourselves unable to move without shooting down the the front of the theatre and vanishing into the organ pit. The audience laughed with the desperation of cancer-stricken children at their last panto.

Absolutely brilliant!

Closing the triptych, and in complete contrast was the eternal fave Sophia Blackwell with her tale The Pianist's Hands - a thoughtful peek into the reminisces of a former jazz singer and her seduction by the androgynous female pianist of the title. It is a mesmerising story, and one of the few about whose characters I want to read more.

Despite the reasonably small crowd (it was the early slot), this was a sterling effort on Mr Burston's part, in trying to get good literature into what is otherwise the preserve of unconventional performers, singers and comedians. Speaking of which...



We stayed on a little while after the literati left the stage, and caught the magnificence that is Fabylicious in all his glory!

Demi-drag doyenne of twisted lyrics to popular songs, ostensibly "the only out gay man in the Vatican City", wild child, performance artist, outlandish queen - all suitable epithets for this marvellous eccentric, arriving as he did dressed in fetish mac and headgear, set off with a pink fluffy mask (and later a fetching leopardskin top and purple trousers combo). How different he was when he joined the Almondettes for Marc Almond's Varieté album launch at HMV last year.

With side-swipes at everyone from the Pope to Lady GaGa, even though this was a typically shambolic show (more or less what you expect from the RVT), it was bloody hilarious! A fine way to round off an interesting evening in South London's legendary cultural venue...

http://www.rvt.org.uk/

Nina Simone, nude Basques, tutu-wearing lesbians and Andy Bell

We had another fabulous time at "London's peerless gay literary salon" Polari goes Pop last night...

Paul Burston had advertised the special guest appearance of the fantabulosa Andy Bell of Erasure in advance, so inevitably the place was packed to the gunnels. Some people might possibly have expected him to be singing. There were many esteemed regulars there too, including Suzy Feay of the FT and Joe Storey-Scott and his lovely chums, and some irregular faces including the marvellous gay journalist (who has been described as the "skinhead Oscar Wilde") Mark Simpson.

Opening with a bang, we had our only musical artist of the night, the rather fab Norman Feather - a stalwart of the Vauxhall Tavern and Wotever World alternative gay cabaret nights - who, according to his blurb, "writes and performs jaunty songs that celebrate illness, neurosis and death". Indeed, we loved his slightly smutty songs - with titles like The Bugger and The Penis is a Ghost, how could we not? He's quite cute, too..



Mr Feather was followed by Michael Alago, a massive name in the New York music industry. He signed Nina Simone for her final albums, discovered Metallica, and has worked with a bizarre range of people, including Cyndi Lauper, Michael Feinstein and John Lydon. In 2003 he retired from music to take up photography - mainly that type of photography that occupies the hearts and minds of many of the punters of Prowler or Clone Zone. Hunky, nude, male flesh! His Rough Gods and The Brutal Truth are no doubt best sellers at both emporia.

Mr Alago's readings - involving fantasy men, lust and New York, left us panting too...



Next up was a personal favourite, the adorable Sophia Blackwell. I love her!



With her customary chirpy personality, the tutu-wearing(!) Miss B read a few of her prodigious range of pithy poems, many of which she has posted on her MySpace blog for National Poetry Writing Month in May. I particularly liked this one:

Making Mixtapes
I miss them- don't you? Those long Sunday nights
Hanging over the arm of your parents' sofa,
Itchy fingers poised for the end of the track.
A scientist, an explorer, mapping from front to back,
You'd march into that vacuum, that white-noise hiss.
A general, marshalling crashing ranks of rock stars
Serving your quest to get that single kiss.

The language of tapes was all interpretation,
Songs were the flags you hid your face behind,
Your telegraphed semaphore blurring the lines-
Fast-forwarded in a laughable falsetto whine.
Pause, skip, rewind. Tongue-tied, through the wires,
Teasing as only teenagers can be. Hear me,
Pick me. Play. Click. Go. Only connect.

Later, the parties, drunk, hogging the decks,
Your mates opening doors - right, this one next-
The floor a collage of empty, naked cases,
floating liner notes. The whisky poured,
Cards painstakingly written, cartoons drawn,
The music of your spheres a late-night forecast
Wrapping you all against the dark till dawn.

I miss them- don't you? Sure, now it's quick and clean,
No end of space, no ninety-minute calculations,
And yes, there's beauty even in downloaded data,
Your memory banks decanted in an hourglass -
There's still the thought, the careful lettering,
But no matter what, it's not a party thing,
Or a solo labour of love looped on a shoestring.

I miss that kind of love- the fan-dance of belonging,
Hard to see it go. Hard to have your own,
Those tapes as lover's gifts and nothing that'll play them,
The drift of time, and those ridiculous dates-
Mix, '96, '99, 2001 - say them. Come on. Don't grieve
For what you both believed. Play. Go. Fast-forward.
Pause. See that single crooked heart on the sleeve.

From the sublime of Miss Blackwell's "innocent" poetry to the completely unexpected - the Basque performance poet Ernesto Sarezale.

We thought he was just a bit hot at first, but no! He really did strip totally naked to complete his set of readings - ending with this one, called Average:

Ernesto Sarezale - Average (the prettiest cock)

Bizarre, but entertaining... How on earth do you follow that?!

Mr James Maker is a familiar reader - he entertained us at Polari Goes Pope last year, patent leather stilettos and all! A stunning presence.

His memoir Autofellatio is an exhaustive tale of Mr Maker's journey from punk via The Smiths, to gay goth-glam-rock, to his current (quieter) life in Spain. Great stuff!



Although he didn't actually sing last night, he is rather a fab musician too, so I thought I'd post one of his more atmospheric numbers (it seems appropriate):

James Maker - Trash

So finally we reached the headline spot for Andy Bell - and this is where the reality bit. Hard. I had absolutely no idea (until he approached that stage) that Mr Bell's lover of twenty-three years (and manager) Paul Hickey had experienced a series of devastating, paralysing strokes in a hotel room in America while they were on tour a few years ago. I never guessed that behind the "flibbertygibbet" persona Mr Bell portrays for his adoring public there was such a troubled, caring, loving man who nursed his partner back from what might well have been the brink...



And so it was that Andy stepped in to read a few extracts from Mr Hickey's book (launched especially at last night's Polari) Sometimes: A Life of Loves, Loss and Erasure.

As the synopsis says, "Awakening from a coma to discover he was unable to move, swallow or communicate, he was suddenly forced to take stock of his life of sex, drugs and rock and roll and to rebuild it from scratch. The only way he could communicate in the early stages of his recovery was by writing, and this is his story." And a fabulous and emotional roller-coaster ride his story certainly appears to be - we loved it, and the applause at the end was deafening!



Truly fabulous - and a fitting end to a thoroughly enjoyable evening. Can't wait for July's Polari, when the long-list of the Polari First Book Prize will be revealed...



Oh, and lest I forget - we wished a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY to our Ange!

Something for the weekend

To the Woman Singing Opera in Covent Garden

So.
When the world isn't giving you space to breathe,
when the sky's overcast
and you're trussed in shrink-wrapped tights
and a cheap interview suit,
regretting every decision you ever made
or didn't,
When the surface of life
is slippery and unforgiving,
your back is killing you
from your last abortive attempt
to lose those last ten pounds,
and the years have slipped selfishly
through your waving fingers,
this is what you need to do.

You need to brave the clumps
of European schoolkids,
stammering to a halt on the pavements,
cameras raised,
aching to freeze a fragment of today.

And even though these shoes
were made for dazzling clients,
not for walking,
you need to chance the cobblestones
and low-flying pigeons
to go where the applause is.
Unprepared, primal,
vital as the unstifled breath of trees.

Walk the cod-Italian piazzas
their scraps of blown glass and overpriced T-shirts,
Stand behind the railings
with the fragments of crowd
and look down
to where the voice is coming from.

The voice you assumed
could not be human,
manufactured like syrup
in some island processing plant,
to filter through restaurant sound-systems,
and press on to cold chemical discs,
so we're not surprised
when our speakers deliver us this gift.

Unashamedly loud, she sings
arias to the crowd that would bring
dictators to their knees.
It makes everything on your mind
so much clutter, so much
temporary litter,
that for the moment
your brain is wild and clear as water.

She is not dressed in cleavage-plunging velvet
with lacquered hair. No,
she's just got on trousers and a jumper
looking for all the world like she's not sure how she got here,
as if she left the kids
at a wide pine table
with cookies and Play-Doh
While she made this dreamy poppy-field of song.

And as she sings, even the hassled fathers
and fractious daughters, even the waitresses
sneaking fags on their shift break,
stop, as though having a revelation
that there's more to life than this.

That there are other deeper selves
revealed, briefly, in a shaft of light,
and this music so floods the air
that we know, despite all the hungers,
twitches, disappointments,
that we are alive, and that, just for now,
everything, for the moment, is all right.

More poetry by the lovely Sophia Blackwell

Any healthy man can go without food for two days - but not without poetry

"Any healthy man can go without food for two days - but not without poetry." - Baudelaire

John-John, Paul(ine) and I had another interesting and entertaining evening thanks to the lovely Paul Burston and his fantabulosa Polari gay literary salon! Even if this specially-themed "Polari goes Poetry" night did expose the fact that maybe, just sometimes, poets should let other people read their poetry...

Case in point was our opening reader Peter Daniels. His poetry is incisive, but short. And he rather befogged the audience by not indicating when each of these little thoughtful pieces was finished, so it was rather embarrassing not knowing when (or if) to clap at the appropriate moments. Some of his poems are brilliant, however! I particularly loved this lascivious little fantasy:

Breakfast, Palermo
One golden glazed bun, sliced open.
One scoop of custardy ice cream, speckled
with chips of fruit and chocolate. Sandwich them lavishly.

To be eaten in uniform by a young soldier,
with one careless hand, espresso in the other.
At the chrome bar, more coffee is hissing.
Sunshine slants in early, yellow.
Not a speck on his trousers.

[James McKay, Peter Daniels, Dean Atta, Sophia Blackwell, Keith Jarrett, Mark Wallis, Paul Burston]

Mr Daniels was followed (in complete contrast) by a rather more savvy performer - the musician and poet James McKay. Anyone who can open a set with the line "in the beginning was the word and the word was probably obscene but no-one was quite awake enough to properly hear it so I guess that makes it all right!" has my vote, anyhow. And, Geordie hunk that he is, he caused a bit of a frisson with John-John and Paul...

Hilariously, he got us all up out of our seats for a moment's contemplation, as he called us to a "prayer" - then proceeded to solemnly recite the opening lines from Bagpuss! Marvellous stuff. Read more about James at his "Make Poetry History" page.

Polari favourite the very lovely Dean Atta is always a joy - we love his enthusiasm for language, and his staunch attitude towards being gay in a hostile urban world. He read a new very poignant poem about an abusive relationship, which silenced the audience somewhat, but bounced back to the eternal crowd-pleaser - shagging!

Mr Atta's poem Morning Sex is one of my favourites from the past year or so of readings, and it went down just as well last night with the assembled Polari-ites:



You can download Dean's latest compilation album of poetry free at http://www.deanatta.co.uk/ - you know you want to...

Keith Jarrett opened the proceedings after the break (during which we took in the beautiful view from the rooftop St Paul's Pavilion), with a few of his youthful and energetic writings, which were fun and uplifting. But my dears - our next turn was one major mind-fuck!

Mark Wallis - who usually goes by the nom-de-plume of "I Am Cereal Killer" - with his bizarre face-paint is a "performance artist" and published poet. Although I don't think he was too well for last night's "performance", as he stumbled and slurred his way through some of his pithy autobiographical poetry about emotions, homosexuality, AIDS and his native Cornwall.

We were left feeling a little uncomfortable after that, so it was just as well we had the lovely and gorgeous lady lesbian poetess and glam diva of the poetry world Sophia Blackwell to finish off proceedings with a bang! Part burlesque, part drama queen and wholly brilliant! You can listen to some of Sophia's work on her MySpace profile page.

Another fabulous night - can it really be Polari's third birthday next month? How time flies... An unmissable event, and one I always really look forward to! We have our tickets booked already.

Polari

"Out of the quarrel with ourselves we make poetry"

Well, what an evening I had at Polari "at the Pavilon" last night! We've not only relocated to a swanky new penthouse venue on the roof of the Royal Festival Hall, but also had four readers to boot...

The evening started somewhat bizarrely, as I waited in line at the only kiosk open in the whole complex for a ticket (for a free event, mind you) that wasn't even there (disorganisation is the name of the game on the South Bank, in my experience).

I was entertained by the spectacle of three wonderful fur-clad queens seeking out the venue for Polari, as one of their number was due to be on as the first reader... Hilariously, I kept seeing them pop up like characters in a French & Saunders sketch on every floor of the complex as I made my way up in the glass lift to check with our host Paul Burston whether or not I could gain entry to the event after all. As it happens I was OK, the dishevelled drama queens arrived in a flurry of fake fur, and the show began.

Bewitched, bothered and bewildered, the leader of the erstwhile lost queens Zack Holland led us through a selection of his observational poems - from youthful experiences to Cornish fishing fleets - which were excellent. Considering he is merely a "new starter" at this game (apparently Paul came across his poems on the site that shall never be mentioned, i.e. Facebook), this lad deserves a publisher!

Next up was the the lovely Sophia Blackwell ("performance poet, cabaret vamp, burlesque wannabe, feminist lesbian warrior princess and Italian pasta-momma"), whose poetry is more of the emotional and subtle (at times) bent - her poem Wilderness Years, in which she explains to her Granny about why she is enjoying her life of unconventionality was particularly brilliant. I was so impressed that I did indeed purchase a copy of her new anthology Into Temptation, which she kindly signed.

After the "comfort break" it was time for a change of tempo, with the upbeat style of Mr Dean ("Spirit of London") Atta - whose work was recently featured as part of the Gay Icons season at the the National Portrait Gallery. With his semi-autobiographical, semi-rap tone, he explored family relationships and Morning Sex with consummate ease - brilliant! For a sample of the man's work, visit http://www.mediafire.com/deanatta



Now! How can I possibly put into words the experience that completed the circle of readings on this poetic night? There are very few adjectives I can conjure up that could adequately summarise the singular performance that was Jeremy Reed and The Ginger Light...



Like something from your worst nightmare, the presence that is Mr Reed began by flinging sequins around while he wailed his bizarrely inconsequential verse to a backdrop of thrumming electro-ambient music and what was meant to be a visual montage (which promptly fizzed out and got stuck, so was rather more manqué).

Missing the point of the evening completely, in that he didn't even notice let alone acknowledge that he had an audience (most of whom left not long after his third interminable monotone rendition), he ploughed on and on and on with more and more depressing and self-indulgent monologues about people he had known who had died, or fleeting potential loves lost on the Tube network. Half an hour of my life flitted away.

I was sat at a table with two very lovely, erudite and enthusiastic (straight) people who had never been to Polari before. I tried to assure them that this was not what the evenings were usually like, but I fear we may never see them (nor 90% of the people who were there tonight) again, thanks to this extreme avant-garde performance. Perhaps if the audience had been imbibing as many chemicals as the performer (sorry - he "had the flu"); perhaps if he had been appearing at Duckie or some godawful "alternative experience" it might have been different. Hey ho.

Anyhow, I had a (mostly) interesting, educational and enlightening evening as always, and I look forward to the next "peerless literary salon" on 10th February!

Polari