'Sup homies, hope your Feb went well, mine was a month of Mondays man, another hectic one, from recording an E.P. in three hours! to catch a deadline, to covering Bjork, gate crashing parties, stages, workshops, acceptances, rejections, I grumble, but deep down, would not have it any other way. The beautiful Struggle.So.. the formula, four news items, and YouTube link.
TRESPASS / TAWIAH / PUMA / GIGS / MAC
TRESPASS: I attract freaks. This is as factual as the statement 'water is wet'. It is necessarily true. I'm trap myself in conversation with some pretty... kaleidoscopic people. I always find something in common (which says a thing about me), forget the strangeness, chat as if we go way back and reflect on the bus. So far I have documented three such incidents. The first is as a poem in my first collection 'Dustbin Diaries' currently playing on myspace page. Second, I turned to a short story, recently moulded into a ballad (poetic form) called 'The Ballad of Abdul Hafiz', the third, took place in Camden before the Remedy/Bjork show. It involved a war veteran called 'Ron', the M.P. Diane Abbot, and a pint, I tell you, a PINT! of hot coffee. I can't give away the gist because the entire incident will be published in the next Issue of Tresspass Magazine, available from 1st April. Where to buy? check out: Trespassmagazine.co.uk p.s. if you went in search of my Time Out article / interview, it was put back, but I've been assured it is coming out this week.
TAWIAH: As well as word work, I am a graphic artist, design for the poetry community, music industry, illustration and commissioned portraiture, installations here and there. One of my recent clients is also a good friend, singer by the name of Tawiah. She is quite incredible. Has toured the world with Mark Ronson - who is everywhere at the moment, she holds it up for West Africa and is one of the most charismatic live performers I have seen. Her E.P. called 'In Jodi's Bedroom' just came out, the lead song is called 'Every Step'. The song begins simple, with a driving rhythm, then her voice drops like smoke, builds, layer by layer till it becomes an epic wall of psychedelia, drums, and all that good stuff then suddenly cliffs off, and ends with the starting simplicity. But listen for yourself, 30 sec samples on itunes. The E.P. is available from HMV, Virgin, iTUNES etc and I designed the cover.
PUMA: Following on from the news above, Tawiah is sponsored by PUMA, and the good folks there got all hot and bothered when they saw the cover I created, and reproduced it on t-shirts! Basically, PUMA made limited edition runs of my design. I ran down to her management offices and secured some of them -
// Womens - White - size 10 x 2 / size 12 x 1 } // Mens - Red - size XL x 1 / L x 2 } // Mens - white - size M x 3 }
This is what they look like: ttshirt And I am giving them away to you guys, FREE! (I'm that nice). All you gotta do is mail back detailing which you want and come get it at my next show. Simple. First come first serve.
GIGS: Quite A few this month, So I will just list the next five: March 5th - WORD // 8pm - Bambu, 21 Welford Road, Leicester, LE2 7AD // March 7th - PERFORMANCE + Q&A // 7 pm - Oxford Road, Manchester, M15 6JA // March 10th - NIGHT VISION // 7:30pm - Media Center, Northumberland Street, Huddersfield // March 11th - LDN WORD FEST // 8 pm - Cargo, 83 Rivington St, London, EC2A 3AY // March 15th - RADIO SHOW // 6.30 Life FM - 103.6 or from www.lifefm.org.uk // More events on myspace.com/phaze05 and the tour page of this website.
YOUTUBE: UNIQLO I am an Apple Mac head, I cherish these things, I mean, I look at PCs in contempt. I have a lil 12 inch powerbook I call 'Virginia' and in Motown - Mrs Jones style, 'we got a thiiinng, going on'. We have a healthy symbiotic relationship. This year Apple released the Mac Book Air and it is a stunning machine, I lust after that thing. So much so that I refuse to watch its adverts online on Virginia, because she'll get jealous and I'll have spend nights convincing her that she is the only one for me. The Mac Air is equivalent to a 'younger blonde woman' with a ridiculously thin waist, and big.... hard drives. It seems like others share some resentment towards the new Mac and made parodies of it's iconic - fits-in-an-envelope advert. This months YouTube offering comprises of four clips each under 90 seconds, beginning with the original ad, they are hilarious.
1) - original.
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4)
Yeah!