Stuck halfway between the sky and the sea,
I am unsure if the plane circling high
above Mellieha is the speedboat or just
a vapour dream brought on
by not being sure of what is up
and how far down the Devil rides.
They touch the fingers of a god
as they find faith in their soul
is not unbroken and yet in the Mellieha sky
I see the speedboat
flowing out the spilled Mediterranean seaweed
which a tractor, ridden with impunity,
collects at certain times of the day
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Mikhail Basmadjian, Pia Zammit.
The cold wind that had pummelled Malta from the early hours of the morning could not have been more aptly delivered as Anders Lustgarten’s incredible and soul touching play Lampedusa was brought to the St. James Cavalier with the same ferocity of spirit and damning verdict of Europe’s response to the on-going atrocity and loss of human life across Africa and the Middle-East.
The cold African winds batter my face
with red dust as the sound
of dead memories whistle
through the forest of boats
and rich men’s yachts and cruisers
named in some Channel Island port
or Black Sea safe haven
and the ghostly sound
rumbles in the Three Cities’ harbour
as the age old Inquisitor looks on
in distaste.
The yacht’s only movement,
the bobble on the aloof and frosty stared
sea, up and down in quarter back tussle,
the owners drinking green tea
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
It is in the act of performance to which we look for validation of our respect and perhaps arguably that of our own existence to how we hear a musician away from the studio and out in the open, out in the raw and with the possibility that all might not work out well. It is a confirmation of just how much a performer means to us when we hear the odd catch in the throat when words become emotional, when the language within the songs become fraught with touching sentiment or even the joy of laughter that pokes its way into the odd line of familiarity.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
It is in the action of the charade, the unheard words and explanations of what stares out from behind a complex series of gestures in which guess work is the key and the answer seen as a truth of interpretation and not a travesty or imitation.
For Toxic Moth the Charades are not a game of guess work, they don’t sit around as a finale to the evening’s entertainment, they are that truthful interpretation, they are the understanding to what is seen through different eyes and how memories shape how we see the world. Charades is the game we must play to comprehend the language of others and in Charades the listener finds a wonderland of expression and admirable content.
I see the Manhattan morning from the dusk
of a Maltese bay and I realise there is no colour,
just black and white memories
with the spectacular vision of off sepia groove thrown
in for effect as I recall days of stories
from the Adanac house and I know that
Time is eating away, burning up, like a Catherine Wheel,
spun by an unseen hand in the darkness
and the fireworks light up the sky
in desperation, in ground down coffee bean surrender
and the taste of yoke screams in heat
The category is now changed,
the box to tick is shuffled around
like a deck of cards in the hands
of a teenager drunk
on sideboard cider, cheap
and trashy, a sly grin of arrogant pissed up
humour, which now says I have found Middle-Age
and I scratch my head in confusion,
is it Middle-Age or is it just a shorter time
available in which to get things done.
Perhaps not the right way,
perhaps the way to see it
is that I have earned the right
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
The beat may well be redundant in many cases, squeezed to death between opinion and the lethargy to look beyond the obvious in terms of getting a particular voice across, but it lives on, perhaps in the shadows and forced to seek solace in an overcrowded music room but nevertheless when it finds an audience it breathes, grows strong and infects the listener to the point where most people cannot help but jive and swing as if life was going to last forever.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
With logic and reason going hand in hand with passionate freshly wrapped Blues, you would not expect anything less than sincerity and well delivered grooves from a band from Birmingham, Liverpool after all may be the heart and soul of the U.K.’s music appreciation but Birmingham offers the listener a certain abounding gravitas untouched by other parts of the country; it is a resonance of spirit that comes across fully in Broken Witt Rebels new E.P. Georgia Pine.
The clown,
the man who wears no mask at all,
plays the act of Ringmaster
with such defining grace,
that it seems impossible to believe
that he cannot be seen
for what he is, the terror of a toytown
enthralled by his smiling, almost leering,
inwardly demonic, outwardly man of the world,
sophisticated as an alleycat on heat,
the clown rules all, for he is King
of his own little world.
The Clown is cheered,
the clown is lauded as the saviour