Acoustic Night

Andi Langford-Woods took up the MC duties and opened with a paean (I think!) to her old carpet, which towards the end of its long and downtrodden existence doubled as the Acoustic Night stage rug (“becoming…the shore on which countless nerves were shed”) (glossing over bodily fluids!). It brought a tear to the eye!

ANDI LANGFORD-WOODS

She then introduced Craig Wilson on his return to the Halo family after “about a year”: he has been adding music to his “High Performance Poetry” collection but stuck to the words of “The Glow Project” (the title track of the revised set) and “Lifejacket”. The former was full of helpful advice (“let loose sometimes: hold back in others”) while the latter was about survival (“actions rarely speak louder than words”) but this was Craig as we remember him and we have to hope it doesn’t take another year for him to return.

Mike presented himself as the four Ms, joking that he “ate the other three”. After ensuring that no-one present worked for the BBC, he sang “Morning Dew” by Tim Rose, a sweet sixties little girl lost song, followed by an altogether darker piece based under the sod. He is keen to return and be less nervous: we have all been there!

Simon Leake was another regular returning after a hiatus – he read “The Art of Imperfection” (“the whole dissolves into a play of vignettes”) and a piece incorporating two characters (“the red light of the answerphone waits for her”). As ever, he rewards careful listening and always comes up with some quality writing.

SIMON LEAKE

Steve Fanger was a newcomer to Halo although he recognised a few of the older hands from Croft/Brewhouse days (Polly, Julian and Ian!). He was still a virgin to us, though! “The Mid Life Crisis Blues” explains itself: any title which gets a laugh is onto a winner from the start, while lines like “I still haven’t decided / what to do when I grow up” certainly struck a chord with some of us. This authentic blues song was followed by a tale “about a dark night of the soul” with a gospellish tint and a spoken middle eight including the line “the sky was as blue as Paul Newman’s eyes.”

STEVE FANGER

Simon the Magician followed with more of his tricks including bad puns (“I’m dressed in black – does that make this black magic?”) and poor French (“Un, deux, three, double deux”). Fortunately the magic was somewhat better than the French or the puns!)

Mike Billing read a poem written quite recently about living next door to a pub (“I would live there if I could”) and, apologising in advance for his rare use of bad language, “The Streetfight”, in which “he pushed him and him pushed he”. Proving conclusively that swearing can be clever, even if only in a poem.

David Johnson then performed a very new poem (not written today on the bus, though, I presume!) about a middle class childhood memory of the lighthouse that sits opposite Appledore, of fish “escaping my net as it trawls by”. He then presented a second Devon-inspired piece of farm cats who “stroll the tables” and of “sweaty hikers (who) heft their packs”). Watch out for a longer set from David as a guest performer in the New Year.

DAVID JOHNSON

Tilted City comprised 2 guitars, 1 bass and three beards and were collectively our second virgins of the night. They combined a steady, constant beat with a gentle storytelling style in their songs: “Noxious Doll” and “Quarter to Four Pork”; the latter celebrating junk food eaten at an absurd hour of the night. Technical problems overcome, they made a strong impression in their short allotted time.

TILTED CITY

BREAK

Our first post break performer was the Trowbridge Titan himself, Talkin’ Tekla tha Narrata (in turquoise!) who gave us the momentous one to one hun-dread piece. I never catch the title but the poem itself is unforgettable and the performance is unreal.

(16 love rhythm and 17 melody”) (“49 and 50 me love me heart and soul”) ( “74 me love me mum”). He then performed “The Would-be Poet”, dismantling the art of writing in an amusing manner (“me and my mind are one of a kind…obviously”).

TALKIN’ TEKLA

To follow this was no mean task so the Winterbourne Wonder, Julian Ramsey-Wade, stepped up to plug the big Christmas Acoustic Night (15^th December, £5 per ticket but they’re going fast and changing hands on Ebay). In honour of its subject’s final day in office, Julian then performed the blindingly funny “’W’ 2” (“My fellow Armenians… Renaissance is fertile!”) (“No toleration to pterodactyls”). (You had to be there!).

Steve Fanger then returned with “Just a feeling”, an upbeat, poppy song and (“a song I wrote to cheer myself up”). Miles Chambers followed to plug his Ujima radio show (98FM - Sunday 8-10pm - “Lyrical Minded”) and to encourage poetic participation.

He was then (easily) persuaded to introduce Bertel Martin, a third former regular who has been missed. Compelled by his lack of paper support to perform old poems (for which he unnecessarily apologised!), he read “Immigrant’s Son” a deceptively pointed description of the careless racism which he suffered despite his Bristolian birthplace and accent. (“Caribbeans see me as a  white English rose”). The same unarguable points as Miles makes, but in a very different yet equally valid style! Then, in an entirely different vein, “Sex with Sandra” described the blooming of a sixteen year old falling in love for the first time…in his mind. Again, most of us have been there (although not necessarily with Sandra).

BERTEL MARTIN

Souls Liberation stepped up and performed opinionated rap/poetry with beatboxing – again a sharp contrast to some gentle poetry and music that preceded it. “True Deep” was “about my life” and the second piece was equally forceful (“If you come around you know it’s profound”). I don’t think we’d seen him before but I hope we see him again.

SOULS LIBERATION

Chris Beckett followed with Steve Fanger’s guitar, a waistcoat and a hat and sang Dylanesque songs 1) referencing “A Day in the Life” (“I saw a film today, oh boy”) and 2) taking us from an Autumn city bar/restaurant to a summer meander through America (“where the wild pastures meet the wide open sky”). If he gets here earlier he will get the larger audience he deserves!

CHRIS BECKETT

Finally Ian Sills pushed his way onto the stage insisting that he had written two new pieces and had to perform them. Anyone would think he helped to run the show! Fagin’s Credit Crunch referenced Lionel Bart’s version of Dickens’ favourite stereotype (“I think I’d better think it out again!”) to try and make sense of the monetary disasters befalling us all, while “The Kissing of Georgie” was based on Radiohead and karaoke. I wonder why no one thought of it before?

IAN SILLS

Thanks to Ian Sills for the review. Do you fancy writing the review for us? Talk to us when you arrive!

ACOUSTIC NIGHT STATS

AUDIENCE    47

PERFORMERS 17

VIRGINS  5