It’s not until you wake up on the floor,
nose bleeding and the hard-hitting sober headache,
not caused by where you landed, the skull too hard
to damage the wooden flooring
to any great extent,
but from the lack of
your
own
blood
pulsing,
writhing and wriggling
slowly through the veins and capillaries,
slowly, the snail’s trail dripping, slowly
to get to the head, to keep imagery alive
and to not look drunk,
The television had been reluctantly
placed back in my bedroom,
although hardly watched, only for three or four
programmes that I truly wanted
to see,
Doctor Who, Match of the Day, Top of the Pops
or the late night horror film which
took me through teenage years and the sound of the
Vampire scream as he burned to ash, smoke rising,
enough to stoke the fires of the imagination,
so no great loss in the scheme of things,
but I was desperate to watch the event
Originally published by L.S. Media On Friday 16th July 2010.
This last week saw the 25th anniversary of the world’s first global concert, a celebration of all things music which was born out of, what was then called Ethiopia’s modern day biblical famine. This event was a concerted effort to bring more attention to the country’s plight and to help right a terrible wrong.
I won’t go into the politics of the time, it takes a person more clever and more learned than I to ever attempt to explain how the cradle of humanity had come to the point of almost complete and utter devastation and destruction, a country seemingly so far away that it barely touched the consciousness of the British Public.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
Cast: Amy Poehler, Phyllis Smith, Richard Kind, Bill Hader, Lewis Black, Mindy Kaling, Kaitlyn Dias, Kyle MacLachlan, Paula Poundstone, Bobby Moynihan, Paula Pell, Dave Goelz, Frank Oz, Josh Cooley, Flea, John Ratzenburger, Carlos Alazraqui, Peter Sagal, Rasida Jones, Lori Alan, John Cygan, Sherry Lynn, Laraine Newman, Paris Van Dyke.
You know where you are with Pixar. No matter how old you are, no matter your level in interest in cinema, even for the most impatient of observers, it has to be concluded at the end of every film that Pixar delivers to the world, the fun and moral standing of the film is enough to have the toughest cynic floundering for words in which to offer discouragement; Pixar basically rules when it comes the animation world.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10
Cast: Elizabeth Banks, John Cusack, Paul Dano, Paul Giamatti, Jake Abel, Dee Wallace, Kenny Wormald, Joanna Going, Max Schneider, Tyson Ritter, Erin Darke, Brett Davern, Graham Rogers, Wayne Bastrup, Diana Maria Riva, Nick Gehlfuss, Jonathan Slavin, Bill Camp, Johnny Sneed.
The strength of the biopic lays completely in its subject matter and how the director and writers wish to place empathy and sympathy down in the cinema-goers’ hearts. If treated with respect then the audience cannot help but come out of the cinema with the feeling of delving further into the subject’s life, in terms of music, it’s the assured way of driving the back catalogue sales through the roof for a while and for any fan of The Beach Boys, for the legendary Brian Wilson in particular, Love and Mercy, will have that desired effect.
Dreams are too cruel,
they either wake you after the chase,
when short
of breathe and the object of your anguish
slides into the shadows, the laughter of a thousand
screaming nightmares rebounding billiard ball like
against the empty echo that the cushion
over the mouth to stop your own petrified scream
is happy to assist with, even going as far
to enjoy the muffled choke of terror
that the dreams provide it, like food,
sustenance, the pork chop in gravy
to keep its own part in the play fresh and required…
Joanne Shaw Taylor at The Citadel in St. Helens, July 2015. Photograph by Ian D. Hall.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *
There have been many spectacular women who have dominated the music arena to the point where their sheer persona and drive is enough to set a million hearts racing and the acknowledgement that they are truly the very finest in their field. From the likes of Judy Garland, Nina Simone, Janis Joplin, Nancy Wilson, Tori Amos and Kate Bush, the world has been graced with the sublime and the outstanding, historic in their approach and what their music has meant to millions of fans world-wide; they are lauded for a reason, they are to be seen as perfection personified.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Throughout the travels and tribulations sometimes endured in the wonderfully never ending search of new music in which to spend time with, the support act is perhaps one that never gets the true recognition for the achievements or ability. It is a shame for before the sweat and beauty of the act you may have gone to see, for many the allure of the bar or the extra 20 minutes at home is a greater pull than ever traversing the unknown or unexplored.
Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *
Cast: Lyndsay Fielding, Lewis Marsh, Mair Terry, Sean Croke, Geraldine Moloney-Judge.
Dystopia is a place often visited in the arts, perhaps never more so than in the theatre. The natural surroundings of the enclosed space, the door to the outside world close at hand but out of reach due to the way that your neighbour next to you will look at you with suspicion and hate filled eyes should you interrupt their train of thought, all combine to make Dystopia more real, more authentic than any other way of getting the flesh to crawl at what just could be if apathy and lethargy allow it take control.
In a year when the most powerful nation on Earth finally saw sense and changed what it meant to be seen as an equal, Grin Theatre’s Queertet makes its fourth foray into the world of theatre with four new stories that tell of hope, love and even the element of danger at the Unity Theatre over three nights from Wednesday 22nd to Friday 24th July.
Queertet has been described as the jewel in the crown of Grin Theatre’s output, a rare company that talks the talk when it comes to delivering stories of a L.G.B.T. nature and a company that really sings with pride of all it has achieved in the city.