Saul searching, part three

much like the sold out spoken word set at Bardens Boudoir, Saul Williams gigs tend to be the type of things that you find out about too late to actually be able to get a ticket, on numerous occasions I have been left in the dark and left ticketless when Saul comes to town.

to date, there has only been one time that I have witnessed a Saul Williams gig.

promoting the 'honesty box' style released Niggy Tardust album, Saul Williams swang by the Scala in Kings Cross, resplendent in coloured feathers nestling in his hair like an Indian head-dress, glittering and face painted, like a black Bowie beamed to the U.S of A via Mars.

I had played the new album over and over, and the force of nature that blasted through Kings Cross prompted me to further into his back catalogue, and follow the motions and movements of the man they called Black Stacey, and yet still I found myself hearing about gigs in the years since always too late.

I think after his stint at Cargo, supported by Dan Le Sac and Scroobius Pip that I had not caught wind of until the night itself that I figured following Saul Williams on twitter may be sensible.

and via twitter Saul William spread word of a new project of his, a literary project, a literary mixtape that he would be looking for contributors to.

that literary mixtape is now published, with my own poetry included.

and that was a strange journey, through drum and bass tracks and minidisc recordings and missed gigs and odes to alcoholic spirits that has lead to the point I am at today.

did it require three rambling blog posts, who knows.

did it take three rambling blog posts, yes.

will normal service be resumed now....


what counts as normal around here?

Saul searching, part two

read part one of Saul searching here


finally, the Internet age was upon us, and was integral in the shaping of musical scenes, new music was now just a click away on MySpace and it was possible to connect directly with an audience.

one of my many, many, many musical discoveries was an Oxford based band called This Town Needs Guns (and yes, it is true, I often did choose who to listen to based on how entertained I was by their name) whose 7” vinyl I bought and whose t-shirt I still wear.

it was via a MySpace bulletin that I found out that This Town Needs Guns would be supporting Saul Williams at a spoken word set at Bardens Boudoir in Stoke Newington and I was full of excitement as me and my best friend that I had dragged along descended into the decadent basement venue, grabbing a loose flyer as we paid our entry fees on the way in.

we watched a couple of rather oddball acts, one involving fast forwarding and rewinding a dictaphone, both very unique, I looked at the flyer and presumed that one of them must have been Cats And Cats And Cats, perhaps I'd check out their myspace... but I wasn't sure who the other guys had been... and then the crippling truth hit me, and hurt me, that we were actually a day late for the Saul Williams date.

I felt pretty stupid, and bloody disappointed, and I cursed myself for not even being stupid enough to have been a day early, at least that way I could still come back the next day, but until I finally invent my time machine I'm just gonna have to live with my silly mistake.

thankfully our paths would cross later in life, and I would actually turn up on the right day for a Saul Williams gig, but who would have thought that missing Saul William's evening of poetry so narrowly, I would be included in his poetry anthology and actually be invited to join him on stage as his latest spoken word tour hits the road.

(except so far it has only hit the United States, I'm keeping my fingers firmly crossed for an English tour)

Saul searching.... part one

so what has lead me to the point that I am at today?

it certainly is a strange and twisted journey.

I guess it starts with xfm maybe? possibly The Remix show? I can't really remember now

but I heard Krust's Coded Language and it was like nothing else I had ever heard, a high tempo piece of warped industrial electronica that appealed to my tastes for music to be a little different, to challenge my expectations of what music could be, and all of this was heightened by the commanding VCR performance that graced the track.

it was poetry like I had never ever heard it before, a delivery that wasn't quite rapping, and it was this inclusion of spoken word overlaid atop a pulsing breakbeat that blew my mind.

I presume I must have picked up the single from one of a number of nonexistent record shops that had previously flourished in central London, it would go on to feature on the first ever (poorly) mixed DJ set that I ever recorded alongside my other left field musical choices and Coded Language remains a benchmark moment in my love of music, arriving at a time when I was straying from the mainstream and working harder to find what I truly loved.

my next experience of Saul Williams was purely accidental, as my taste for the more obscure, delving into up and coming music, led me to record Steve Lamacq's 'Lamaqc Live' on a Monday night and then listen back to it on my minidisc player (yes, minidisc player) on my journeys to and from work... Saul was not featured on this show, but as I would set my stereo to over run (a trick I had learnt from my mum when he wildest the video to record something off the telly) I had caught a little of Mary Ann Hobb's even further out there Breezeblock show, on which Saul would be appearing as Mary Ann Hobb's sung his praises, talking of his slam poetry.

this was a time when I did not have proper Internet access (we really are getting quite throwback here, with music stores, minidiscs, vcrs and lack of Internet) so to hear the name Saul Williams again was a revelation to me, it was a name I had not forgotten, and a name I was eager to hear more from....

but it would be a few years until the name would once again present itself to me....



ok, before this tale gets too tall, I have decided to split it down the middle for the sake of those with short attention spans....

reciting faithful chorus

this is certainly a rather momentous occasion for me.

ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls...

in the ever so changeable month of September, in the year of somebody's Lord, two thousand and twelve, a book of poetry was published.

a book that features the work of 100 poets, chosen by Saul Williams.

and in this book, on page 127, is a piece of poetry written by my good self.

.............


it is still strange and slightly dizzying to consider this, that my words are actually appearing in an actual, proper published book

a book that is available on Amazon, and at the time of writing only has one copy in stock (so it appears that people are definitely buying it)

a book that is published by MTV books, via Simon & Schuster (pretty big time if you ask me)

a book that was headed up by Saul Williams, a man that is an absolute inspiration to me in terms of his words and his music, and perhaps this is what makes me feel proudest of all.


Saul had made his intentions clear, via the big bad world wide web, that he was going to create a literary mixtape, that anybody's voice could be a part of, he would take submitted poetry to craft one long collaborative poem, so I picked through the handful of poems of my own that have stuck in my mind as being something like my favourites and then had to give careful consideration to what would be the one sole poem I would submit, I chose The Whiskey Trail

it is a poem that dates a while back, it is a poem that I once performed at an open mic night in Chingford if my memory serves me correctly, and it is a poem that I can still pretty much remember word for word if really pushed to do so, and if it stuck in my own mind, why should it not stick, or at least lodge itself temporarily in the minds of others....

I could not possibly comment on the creative process of selecting a fraction of poems from those that had come pouring in for the consideration of Saul Williams, I know that he was certainly not alone in this Herculean task, but I do know that at some point, for some reason, my words were chosen by a man that I have a lot of respect and love for.

and I am certainly in good company, 99 others, Saul himself included have contributed to a New Testament of New Voices, and it will be read the world over.

I know that the Internet can reach far and wide, that my blog has been to countries that I have never even set foot in, but to be published in a book that will be read the world over is just such a massive milestone for myself, because it is a book... a solid physical piece of created art that can be held and cherished and will sit in people's homes... I love the fact that I have been published in a book, cos I'm old skool like that.

from my bedroom at mum's house in Enfield, to a small bar on a Thursday night in Chingford, to the world....

my Whiskey Trail has taken me places I never believed it would, thank you Saul.



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