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Monty Python’ Spamalot, Theatre Review. Empire Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Jamie Tyler, Sarah Earnshaw, Joe Tracini, Will Hawsworth, Richard Kent, Richard Meek, Josh Wilmott, Michael Palin, Daniel Crane, Abigail Climer, Matthew Dale, Holly Eaterbrook, Richard Astbury, Ste Clough, Inez Mackenzie.

It’s no wonder that the chroniclers of Middle and Old English History have very little to go on, save the odd Anglo Saxon lord and a few scattered bones of cows that have been forcibly flown through the air and the legends of dire and almost indestructible rabbits who would tear a man’s head off given half a chance. Nothing of note seems to have happened until King Arthur and his loyal, if utterly bewildered, Knights of the Round Table went in search of the Holy Grail and under strict instructions by Michael Palin, as played by God.

Monty Python’ Spamalot, Theatre Review. Empire Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(376 words, estimated 1:30 mins reading time)

Darke Complex, Widow. E.P. Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

It is perhaps more of a telling state of the world in the last year, the feeling of sheer abandon that has crept through in certain quarters and into the lives of those who have been placed into such desperation that the debut E.P., Widow, by Darke Complex should resonate with the anger and warning of the Liberty Bell being struck with the same ferocity as was achieved when first cast in Whitechapel and before being cracked as it stood resplendent on American soil.

Darke Complex, Widow. E.P. Review. full post

(303 words, estimated 1:13 mins reading time)

Spooks: The Greater Good, Film Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *

Cast: Kit Harrington, Peter Firth, Tuppence Middleton, Jennifer Ehle, David Harewood, Tim McInnerny, Lara Pulver, Elyes Gabel, Eleanor Matsuura, Laura Swift, Shina Shihoko Nagai, Ronan Summers, Elizabeth Conbiy, Michael Wildman, Cosmo Jarvis, Lasco Atkins, Elliot Levvy, Graham Curry, Lee Asquith-Coe, Hugh Simon.

Just because the threat to national security is not to be seen, doesn’t mean it’s not there. The same goes it seems for television programmes; just because they are not on every week and being part of the nation’s lunch time natter, doesn’t mean that stories haven’t been envisaged, it just means that when the opportunity strikes, it is wheeled out without due recourse or consideration.

Spooks: The Greater Good, Film Review. full post

(514 words, estimated 2:03 mins reading time)

To The Memory Yet To Come.

How will it feel to see you again?

Part of me is terrified, not of you, but

of the memories you will bring to town

and lay at my door mat as you knock repeatedly,

Time your ally as you surprise me with a giant

version of pass the parcel, my layers since leaving you

regretfully, in some cases with genuine tears of affection,

stripped back, the me of now, just a school boy in bigger

trousers, longer hair, still angry at the world;

regressing through Time until the music

stops.

To The Memory Yet To Come. full post

(439 words, estimated 1:45 mins reading time)

Cum Tempore…With Seven Pounds.

I haven’t forgotten your plastic incredulity

as you maintain that a person can live on seven pounds a day,

I just don’t want you to think that just because

the mere mortals, the poor, the generous hearted,

those that work  to keep you in the lifestyle

of your choosing

the lifestyle of the miserable and the man who misses the whip

that  he could have used in days gone past in the plantation

as he rides over the emotion of the down at heel or

perhaps more likely he wishes with some girlish glee

Cum Tempore…With Seven Pounds. full post

(276 words, estimated 1:06 mins reading time)

Mark Poutney, MARK II. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

There is something intrinsically special, something that really gets underneath the skin of an artist when they can change tack between albums and give you further insight into their talents. It is an insight that hits you with without a warning note, without a declaration of war being announced or even hostilities being discussed; more like an offering of peace and long lasting diplomacy, an offering that makes you realise yet again how versatile Mark Poutney is as artist.

Mark Poutney, MARK II. Album Review. full post

(394 words, estimated 1:35 mins reading time)

Sick Glorious Bastard.

Sick, glorious bastard, you are divine.

You drive a hard bargain, I feel no benefit

to where you forced me, strong armed, to sign

and the knot in my stomach grows, you are the bottomless pit.

 

You beautiful fuck, the distaste aimed at me

you were always there haunting me in the background

even when fallen upon hard times and on bended knee

you would steal my dignity away and silence my resistance with noise and sound.

 

Yet my dear darling bone aching disease

Sick Glorious Bastard. full post

(140 words, estimated 34 secs reading time)

Eddi Reader, Gig Review. Epstein Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

There is impressive and then there is confident, to have both relative strangers on stage at the same time is a rare commodity in which to draw breath, exhale deeply at the thought and then just let your heart go with it. For the confident and the impressive will always take the breath away, you may as well surrender fully and let the air escape your lungs voluntarily than let the preposterous and beige tell you that what you are seeing on stage is nothing, for those twin shades of humanity know nothing.

Eddi Reader, Gig Review. Epstein Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(487 words, estimated 1:57 mins reading time)

The Alan Kelly Gang, Gig Review. Epstein Theatre, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

The pleasure in life is almost uncontainable when you come across a support act to a superstar who are not just un-bloodied and unbowed by being on the same bill, they are treated by that main act as equals, soldiers and comrades on the front line together, locked arm in arm and heading with strange insurmountable vigour towards the same goal.

For The Alan Kelly Gang, that sense of equality, of musical parity is one that is taken with great joy and sense of obligation to deliver a set of music that is beyond reproach and keenly felt all the way through their set.

The Alan Kelly Gang, Gig Review. Epstein Theatre, Liverpool. full post

(388 words, estimated 1:33 mins reading time)

Measured Control.

I throw one hand up in complete

surrender,

the other is reaching for a gun

in which to take my life

first

before

the disease takes hold even more

and I have to have the one thing

that I never wanted to have

which was to lose

control

and have to have

someone look after me

like I was a child, incapable

of making my own decisions

and life

is

rendered

meaningless

and sought for destruction.

 

Measured Control. full post

(170 words, estimated 41 secs reading time)