October 20th, 2005
Minus Uno
That Brendan
Mcleod. Fantastic. If you're on my Christmas
list, get ready to get some of his CDs in yer
stocking.
Leaving tomorrow morning. Performing tomorrow
night in Toronto. And then - no sleep till Brooklyn.
That Blackheart
zine has a second issue out and a hot, re-tooled
website. And they're featured in The
Link.
And now - I got ten pairs of socks and underwear
to pack. And a hundred or so books to overpack.
Because I'm still fucking crazy like that. Flying.
Directly. In the face of reason. Blind like a
fruit bat, coming straight outta E-Ville.
October 18th, 2005
Slam Master E-Ville
If you want to see one of Canada's top spoken
word talents in his only Edmonton show, drop in
on Brendan
tomorrow night. I saw him at the South Country
Fair and he was mic-smashing good. Seriously.
If you want to learn a few things about cranking
poetry in front of an audience, check it out:
Brendan McLeod
Wednesday, October 19th
Naked Cyber Cafe
10354 Jasper Ave.
Starts at 8 pm
And while you're there, bug him repeatedly to
get a hot new CD out the door. If you're confused
about who this fellow is:
BRENDAN MCLEOD is a spoken word artist and musician
based out of Vancouver, and has been called "Canada's
top SLAM spieler" by CBC. He is the winner
of the National Individual Final at the 2004 Canadian
SpokenWordlympics, awarded to the top SLAM poet
in Canada. In 2005, he was Vancouver's Grand SLAM
Champion. He finished second at Holland's World
Slampionship in June 2005. He has toured extensively
in North America and Europe, both as a solo performer
and member of The Fugitives. He received his MA
in Philosophy in 2001.
Prior to his visit to Edmonton, Brendan and The
Fugitives will perform at the Canadian Festival
of Spoken Word in Vancouver. Brendan will then
travel to Europe for a tour of England, Wales,
Scotland, Germany, and Denmark.
October 14th, 2005
Three Small Things
One
Is anyone reading The
Garneau Block? It's still absolutely free.
And that Raymond Terletsky character is fucking
brilliant. He should have his own book. Anyhow,
he first appears in Chapter
Two.
Two
Someone bought another copy of nunt
on Amazon,
jolting us from # 2 000 000+ on the best seller
list all the way up to # 628 350 on the best seller
list! If only those bastards would count all the
stolen copies that are being sold, we'd probably
crack the top 500 000!
Three
A progressive for Bush bought nunt
the other day and gave it this review:
Fuck banning. My copy
was so bad that I read it twice. It's too filthy
for banning or burning. I rip out the pages and
use them to clean up the sanatorium after double
anal.
I'm so proud of my baby.
October 13th, 2005
A Roara Coda Boreala
That Roar,
it was pretty smoking awesome.
Read with Stuart
Ross and some smashing good E-Ville poets
in a tea and china shop. Later, Wayne
Arthurson said that "[h]aving Mingus
Tourette read before you is like having Gwar open
for you."
That Wayne, he's a funny guy. And pretty accurate,
I think.
A surreal moment in the afternoon - a couple of
septugenarians were seated in the front row, off
to the right. The woman cringed when I read nunto
35, but her husband laughed the whole way
through. Bizarre to watch a seventy-five year
old man chuckle during that stripper
love poem. He was digging it, I tell you.
So, that was good.
Hosting twenty poets at the "Five minutes
no tomorrow" event was sweet. Some excellent
poets and performers. Some who were just getting
their legs and could use some work, but that's
a part of it. Rewarding to be involved in creating
an event where neophytes sat and drank and laughed
with other poets, and even made some poet friends.
Because lots of writers don't have that. So being
a part of that was good.
And later, at the big gala, walking in to wild
applause as everyone clapped for the festival
director was good, if oddly timed. I rolled with
it, gestured magnanimously, walked up to the bar,
handed over a twenty and refused change. I held
up five fingers, and when it was pointed out that
I could only carry two beer, I was brilliant and
witty and screamed out "Don't worry - I'll
stuff the other three down my pants!!!"
What a jackass. Reminded me of this poem:
be explosive
be explosive
be drunk
be an asshole
be entertaining
but
don't be so
at my expense
at our expense
don't run out your daily drama at our leisure
we'll wait until the precipitate version
is available
years after
with all the footnotes
about the women
and the times you sat with your knife
on your ledge
and laughed about doctors
-- -- --
Anyhow - thanks to Thomas Trofimuk and the rest
of the RP
for inviting me and my publisher to be a part
of this. Pretty fucking amazing.
October 7th, 2005
Roaring E-Ville
Edmonton's big poetry festival runs tomorrow.
Starts at noon, rolls all afternoon and into the
night. Something for everyone. Check the full
schedule at TheRoar.ca.
Or check Gravel's
rundown.
We picked up good coverage in the entertainment
weeklies. Even a fine shot of Mingus crushing
out some John Newlove on a megaphone. Check the
articles at:
See
Magazine | Vue
Weekly
I am alternately referred to as a 'well-known
name' and 'E-Town’s verse-hoodlum Mingus
Tourette'. Unfortunately, only one of those terms
is correct.
In any case - enough is enough. One day. One night.
One hundred poets. The first time ever in this
fucking city. If you miss it, I'm eating your
first born.
The Roar. Be there.
---
A Note on Thanksgiving Reading: After more intense
negotiations on the part of Doctor Law, The Edmonton
Journal opened up the archives for Babiak's
Garneau Block. Now you can catch up and read
the whole thing for free, but only until October
14th. More on this next week.
October 6th, 2005
blogger albums
I like to support fellow bloggers on their side
projects. Especially bloggers that blogroll me.
So I thought I'd mention this. One of my favourite
political bloggers has a new album out, and
he's touring it. It's called In
a Coma, and covers the best of his musical
work from the last ten years. Some of it is politically
motivated, and some is not. Overall, though, it's
pretty frickin' amazing. Most bloggers' albums
sound like they were recorded with wired diaphrams,
but this sounds totally professional. And the
songs are kick ass.
The one thing I don't quite get is the yellow
rabbit on the cover. Does anyone else know of
the symbolism of the man in a rabbit suit? I've
noticed it in American films - The
Shining and Donnie
Darko, for example. It can be pretty horrifying.
Like a juice monkey clown.
Anyhow - check it out, and maybe try to catch
him in concert. He's got three shows
in Edmonton (and various shows across the country)
and the
album's on sale in record stores. I think
this guy's going to be big some day. The name's
Matthew
Good. You heard it here first.
October 5th, 2005
early october
the street drains
full of yellow leaves
putting on the parka
this year
like
burying someone's father
October 3rd, 2005
Roaring Week
This is Roaring Week - the big week of
The Roar on '24th.
Over 100 poets will be reading this Saturday-
even fellahs from the unofficial Mingus Shitheadery
Brigade. There are readings all day, starting
at noon and going till ten at night. The party
should last till midnight. Or thereafter.
I'll be reading at 4pm and hosting one of the
'Five Minutes No Tomorrow' sessions at the Acquired
Tastes Tea Company, where Brad and Angelina will
be reading some of Ezra Pound's early work. If
you have requests for the Mingus, start hinting
now. Also, I'll be drinking heavily at the evening
session and pretending I'm the lizard king. So
watch out for that!
Yup, don't be a fucktard. If you dig poetry and
sex, get down to 124th street this Saturday. If
you don't, you're a loser. Get off my site.
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October 3rd - October 16th, 2005