Liner Notes Vol 4: A spoken word tribute to The Cure!

Liner Notes is coming back at ya.
Q. What is Liner Notes?
A. Poetic responses to iconic albums of our time.

One writer is chosen for each track and asked to respond whatever way they like.

Vol 1 was David Bowie's Hunky Dory
Vol 2 was The Velvet Underground & Nico
Vol 3 was Madonna's Like A Virgin

and now Babble is proud to present Vol 4
The Head on the Door by The Cure!

Side A
1. In Between Days - Mandy Beaumont.
2. Kyoto Song - alicia sometimes.
3. The Blood - Dan Lee.
4. Six Different Ways - Emilie Zoey Baker.
5. Push - Klare Lanson.

Side B.
6. The Baby Screams - Ben Pobjie.
7. Close To Me - Montrice Shumpert.
8. A Night Like This - Sean M Whelan.
9. Screw - Marc Testart.
10. Sinking - Chloe Jackson Willmott.

Hosted by Three Imaginary Michael Nolans.

House band is The Heavy Cases providing their own unique interpretations of Cure classics.

Entry by donation!

Thursday 15th May
Bar Open, Fitzroy.

Australian Poetry Centre Festival

On Saturday night I'll be performing Sweet Cowboy with Emilie Zoey Baker at the first Australian Poetry Centre festival in Castlemaine.
We're performing on Sat 26th April at the Phee Broadway Centre.
See www.australianpoetrycentre.org.au/ for the full program.

Blue Velvet Bar Reading

This Thursday night I'm performing at the Blue Velvet Bar in Collingwood.
The convenor of this event, the esteemed Geoff Lemon has written a wonderful little blurb about the whole event.
So I'll let him sell it for me....



Yes, after the dwarf month of February it's that time again. Velvet time! Which is much like Hammer time. But softer. And easier to upholster furniture with. This month we have:

Ben Pobjie
One of the literal and metaphorical giants of the Melbourne performance arena, Ben wavers between spoken word, stand-up, and storytelling, much like our revered Blue Velvet sensei, the honourable Crazy Elf. You will be half delighted, half horrified. In which case you may wish to block one ear.

Chenoah Ellis
is Canadian. Don't get that mixed up. Especially with that weird little country just south of there. Seriously, don't. It will be bad for your health. She is a deliciously fresh new voice in a choir of otherwise boring old cadavers who don't so much sing as make semi-tonal flatulent noises when build-ups of gas escape from holes in their carcasses.

Ben Ezra
has mercifully escaped from the awful, trashbag clutches of Sydney, NSW. With styles that range from tongue-twisting hip-hop wordplay to gravel-sung blues explosions, who knows what he will bring? And who cares? Just take what the man gives you and be grateful! When I were a boy...

Sean M. Whelan
The poet laureate of my mind. Known for his spoken word fusion project with rock band The Mime Set, Sean is one of the most distinctive and charming voices currently weaving tales in this country. His poems are stories - elegant, surreal, meticulously crafted, and always softly beautiful. When he's reading, there is nowhere else that you should be.

Come on down. You can't afford to miss it. As ever, bring your friends, as many as you can. If they hate it, I'll offer some obscenely biological forfeit in the adjoining alleyway. Now that's a guarantee. Forward this mail on to people who might be interested, send me names of people who want to be on the mailing list, and all the rest of that fine, fine jazz.

Poets Breakfast at the Shepparton Arts Festival

This Saturday morning at the unlikely time of 8:30 am I will be performing with my good friend Terry Jaensch at the Poets Breakfast as part of the Shepparton Arts Festival. If you happen to be in Shepparton at 8:30 Saturday morning, then please swing by the Spaghetti Hollow restaurant in Wyndham St and join me and Terry for a good stiff cup of coffee.

Hey, Hey, Which Way?

The above illustration was created by an incredible Melbourne based artist by the name of Beck Wheeler. It was based on my poem, 'Dear Elliott, written on the death of American singer-songwriter Elliott Smith.
Beck has been doing works based on my poems for about a year now, after we randomly met each other through MySpace.
This Tuesday night, the 4th March, an exhibition of Beck's work will be opening at the Uber Gallery. The work above will be part of the exhibition, amongst many other wonderful pieces.
I've also been asked to read my poem Dear Elliott at the opening.

Uber Gallery is at 52 Fitzroy Street, St Kilda.
'Hey, Hey, Which Way?' opens on Tuesday the 4th March at 6:30pm.
The exhibition runs until the 30th March.

Liner Notes Vol 3. In pictures!

Last Wednesday Babble hosted the third volume in the Liner Notes series. Liner Notes is a series of readings I founded which are spoken word tributes to iconic albums of our time.
It began in 2006 for the Melbourne Fringe Festival, the first volume of Liner Notes was in tribute to David Bowie's Hunky Dory album.
Then in 2007, again for the Melbourne Fringe Festival, The Velvet Underground's 'Banana Album' was given the Liner Notes treatment.
The nights have been so successful I've decided to run them more often than just once a year for Fringe.
The concept is simple, match a writer to each track on the album and ask the writer to respond in any way they like.
Mostly the responses are in a poetic form, but there's also monologues and comedic approaches.
I'm pleased to say that this last volume of Liner Notes was the best ever!
The quality of work was astounding. Not just from the writers but also from the house band for the night, The Heavy Cases. Their unique takes on Madonna classics were brilliant.
The host of the evening, Michael Nolan, was in excellent form and educated us about Madonna in ways I didn't think were possible.
In the past Liner Notes have always been one night only, but Vol 3 was such a great success that I am thinking seriously of a return performance of this one sometime in the near future.
In the meantime we do have another Liner Notes booked for early May.
Which album?
Well, I have a few in mind, but I'm keeping it under wraps... for now.


Michael Nolan our glorious host.


Phil Norton responding to Material Girl


alicia sometimes takes on Angel


Chloe Jackson reclaims Like A Virgin


Ben Pobjie turns Over and Over on its head.


Sean M Whelan does Love Don't Live Here Anymore











The Heavy Cases and Michael Nolan sing up a storm


Steve Smart reinterprets Get Into The Groove


Emilie Zoey Baker takes us through Material Girl, on tape!


Dan Lee tells it like it is - Shoo-Bee-Doo!


David Prater is the Pretender


Terry Jaensch takes us home pleading us to Stay.

Babble presents Liner Notes Vol 3 - Madonna's Like A Virgin!

It's time for Liner Notes Vol 3 at Babble this Wed the 20th Feb.
Liner Notes is an original concept first started by Babble for Melbourne Fringe in 2006.
Here's how it works, a classic iconic album is chosen. Then for however many tracks there are on the album an equal amount of writers are also chosen. Then they're randomly assigned to their tracks. After that their mission is to respond to their allocated track in whichever way they see fit.
Liner Notes Vol 1 - David Bowie's Hunky Dory.
Liner Notes Vol 2 - Velvet Underground's 'Banana Album.'

And now presenting Liner Notes Vol 3 - Madonna's Like A Virgin.

Here's the lineup.

Madonna - Live A Virgin.

Side A

1. Material Girl. – Phil Norton
2. Angel. – Alicia sometimes
3. Like A Virgin - Chloe Jackson Wilmott
4. Over and Over – Ben Pobjie
5. Love Don't Live Here Anymore – Sean M Whelan


Side B

6. Into The Groove – Steve Smart
7. Dress You Up – Emilie Zoey Baker
8. Shoo-Bee-Doo – Dan Lee
9. Pretender – David Prater
10. Stay – Terry Jaensch

Also helping out with deconstructed Madonna covers and a healthy dose
of their own originals will be The Heavy Cases!
http://www.myspace.com/theheavycases

The whole shebang is hosted by the irrepressible Mr Michael 'Material
Boy' Nolan.

Where: Bar Open Upstairs, 317 Brunswick Street, Fitzroy.
When: Wed 20th Feb.
What time: 8:30
How much: $7 entry.

One show only! Don't miss out!

'Dead Of Night' themed contribution for Photo Friday.

Taken at Dennis Station, Northcote around 2am.

Sean M Whelan & The Mime Set with Emilie Zoey Baker present Sweet Cowboy

Part magical realism, part Morricone, part poetry, part spoken word, part rock and roll, part sweet, sweet country and all Sweet Cowboy.
Wed 10th Oct.
ONE NIGHT ONLY.
10:30pm
The Toff in Town.
Level 2, Curtin House.
252 Swanston Street, City.

Going Down Swinging #25

The new issue of Going Down Swinging is being launched this Tues night at the Northcote Social Club. I have a brand new track on the CD, a recording with myself and The Mime Set called Disappointment is the Evil Bunny of Misery's Best Friend.
We're going to be performing at the launch and will be sneak previewing our brand new Fringe Festival show, Sweet Cowboy. Our new collaborator and special guest on the night will be Emilie Zoey Baker.

The Rooftop Bar Gig - in pictures!

Last Sunday to celebrate the third birthday of my collaboration with The Mime Set we played a very special gig on the Rooftop of Curtin House.
We did two sets and not even the rain cutting short our second set dampened the spirit of the evening. As you'll see in the pics!
This was also a unique gig as it was the first with drummer Bec Matthews. Hopefully the first of many!


Setting up the stage.







Sam Wareing.



Sam Wareing



Justin Avery.



Justin Avery.



Jonathan Shannon and Andrew Watson.



Jonathan Shannon.








Me and Sam Wareing being shielded from the rain by the wonderful Rooftop Bar Manager, Emily.

A special celebration.

It's been three years since I started collaborating with musical act, The Mime Set. We've written two Fringe Festival shows (Death To Your Dreams 2005 and LCUK 2006), are a currently working on our third, Sweet Cowboy.
To celebrate this fact we're having a party!
Sunday 8th September, 7pm, at the exquisite setting of the Rooftop Bar, Curtin House, 252 Swanston Street. High above the streets, amongst the stars and the city lights we're going to do a free performance of two 45 min sets, which will cover most of the work we've written together to date. Plus a couple of surprises thrown in.

Back from Indonesia and having a very special event already!

Hello, I'm back from the Utan Kayu Literary Biennale in Indonesia. It was truly a mindblowing experience which I will blog about in greater detail soon.
But for now I just wanted to quickly let you know about a very special collaboration I've begun with an amazing artist by the name of Beck Wheeler.
Beck has been creating illustrations based on some of my poems, for which I feel totally blessed.
Here's a sneak preview of a couple of them.

ELVIS TEARS


DISAPOINTMENT IS THE EVIL BUNNY OF MISERY'S BEST FRIEND.



Tomorrow night (I know it's short notice but I just got off a plane!) there will be a group exhibition called Hung By The Sticky Bits at Until Never Gallery in Hosier Lane which will contain four of these works and much much more. Check out more previews of the exhibition here.


UNTIL NEVER Gallery: 05th - 29th September 2007
OPENING NIGHT 05th September 6-8PM
http://www.myspace.com/citylightsuntilnever
2nd Flr 3-5 Hosier Lane (enter from Rutledge Lane),
Melbourne

Utan Kayu International Literary Biennale and TERRA: A Bilingual Anthology from WordStorm

I'm very pleased to announce that this Wednesday I'm flying to Indonesia to participate in the Utan Kayu International Literary Biennale. This is a very exciting festival taking place from the 23rd-30th August featuring some of Indonesia's finest poets and authors as well as visiting writers from many other countries. Events are taking part in Jakarta and Magelang. I feel very privileged to be asked to be involved and I give many thanks to the director of the festival, Sitok Srengenge, an incredible poet himself. I also must give thanks to Sandra Thibodeaux who first introduced me to Sitok at Wordstorm, the Darwin Writers Festival in 2005. Sandra has since become director of Wordstorm herself and has recently overseen the publication of TERRA: A Bilingual Anthology from Wordstorm.




My poetic tribute to singer songwriter Elliot Smith, called Dear Elliot, has been published in this anthology and for the first time ever my work has been translated into Indonesian.

TERRA contributors include the illustrious, iconic and emerging (in alphabetic order): Kaye Aldenhoven, Nukila Amal, Peter Bakowski, BenEzra, Mark Bowling, Jane Camens, Ze’sopol Caminha, Linda Christanty, MTC Cronin, Gregory Day, Marian Devitt, Peter Docker, Nick Earls, Ali Cobby Eckermann, Melchior dias Fernandes, Kieran Finnane, Richard J. Frankland, Pru Gell, Dorothea Rosa Herliany, Alec Kruger & Gerard Waterford, Frank Moorhouse, Chris Mansell, Miles Merrill, Meg Mooney, Romaine Moreton, Leonie Norrington, Graham Nunn, Alvin Pang, Helen Pavlin, Dorothy Porter, Iswadi Pratama, Leni Shilton, Milena da Silva, Abe Barreto Soares, Sitok Srengenge, Jared Thomas, Triyanto Triwikromo, Ayu Utami, Alana Valentine, Zevonia Vieira, Sam Wagan Watson, Sean M Whelan, Terry Whitebeach and Jacquie Williams.


For more details about the book visit the NT Writers Centre website.


To see the full program of the Utan Kayu International Literary Biennale go here.

Under Star Poets at Federation Square.

I'm performing with The Mime Set at an event called Under Star Poets tonight. This is at the lovely BMW Edge theater in Federation Square. Also appearing with us will be Emilie Zoey Baker. The gig kicks off at 7pm and runs until 10pm.
Also appearing will

Sugarfree Masons

Andy White

MiteyKo (aka Allan Boyd and Kevin Gillam)

Trisnasari

Ben Ezra

Lish and Steve O’Prey

Belfast Poets

Reading at Thangs Cafe, East Brunswick, 16th August

I'm doing a free reading at Thangs Cafe on Thursday night. 502 Lygon Street East Brunswick. There's also an open mic and every open mic reader gets a free glass of wine!
They also do pretty good grub there I'm told.
I'll be debuting a brand new story too.

Reading at The Blue Velvet Bar - Overload Poetry Festival

I'm doing a pretty special reading tomorrow night at the Blue Velvet Bar, 60 Smith Street, Collingwood, as part of the Overload Poetry Festival. Haven't done a reading without the band in Melbourne for a while. I'm also debuting a brand new piece of writing that will be appearing in the next issue of Voiceworks, called 'You Voted Zebra, I Voted Cow.'
It's a fantastic lineup of other readers too and I can't describe them any better than the convenor of the event, Mr Geoff Lemon.
So, here's his personal breakdown on the whole event in his own words below.

Nanoarts.
7:30
Thursday 9th August.

The readers.

ðO
Transliterated as PiO for those who never did Year 10 trigonometry, this man is an absolute legend of the poetry world. His business card simply reads "World Famous Poet", and frankly, that's enough. My father used to watch ðO dominating poetry readings back in the early 70s, and we're still watching him today. ðO was writing in dialectical English two decades before Irvine Welsh was hailed as 'revolutionary' for Trainspotting. This is his only listed performance for the Overload Festival. Do not miss it.

Thomas, Jack of Hearts (aka Citizen Tom, aka Tom Keily) (NSW)
Citizen Tom is jetting down from Sydney on the day itself to perform under his new title. If Prince could do it, why not Tom? This gentleman is a prince, a jack, a knave of spoken word, and captained Housecat Havoc to back-to-back Australian Poetry Slam victories. Hispoems are richly lyrical, shot through with the rhythm, rhyme and flow of Australian hip-hop. A master of the fusion of these two great arts.

Emilie Zoey Baker
EZB is Melbourne's First Lady of Sass, a comedic tour de force, and last year's winner of the Nimbin Poetry Cup. Some of you would have seen her storming through the Melbourne Slam at Glitch last December, some would've seen at her at Babble under the guise of DJ I Was Young and I Needed the Money. Some wouldn't have seen her at all cos she's just too damn fast. Here's your chance. Check out some of her poems with music at myspace.com/emiliezoeybaker

Sean M. Whelan
Sean's poetry has been going gangbusters over the past year since his teaming up with rock band The Mime Set, including the rare privilege for a poet of going on tour. In fact, such has been the buzz that we haven't seen him reading solo for a long long time, and his regular gig Babble had to go into hibernation. Now we get to see the man solo, unadorned, in the raw essence of his manhood. Eww.

Meg Dunn
One of Melbourne's loveliest. Poet, artist, and winner of Best Spoken Word Performance at the 2002 Melbourne Fringe. Some would describe her as impish, some as sweet. If she didn't like it, she'd stab you in the kidney. But in such a charming way you'd love her nonetheless.

Preacherman Says (aka Phil Norton)
Part beat poet soulman, part blues troubadour, part film noir hero, Phil Norton mixes poetry with music, visuals and anything else he can find. He even featured on a couple of tracks on sonicanimation's last album. At Blue Velvet, Phil will don his new alter ego for the first time just for us. Who knows what to expect? I have no idea.

Helen Child (WA)
Jim Morrison said, the West is the best. We have one of their finest. Helen is a veteran performer, poet and comedian with a definite penchant for the wrong, the twisted and the macabre. For us...who knows? She might do poems about why pigeons are pretty. But I wouldn't count on it.

Plus the usual hosting and cameos from myself, and you may even catch a glimpse of Mr. Overload Director Steve Smart in the flesh.

With the long line-up, we'll be starting earlier, the sets will be shorter, and things will bang through at a dynamic pace. Entry by donation in the five dollar region.

Doors open at 7:30, drink specials from the word go, and we will kick off a bit after 8:00. PLEASE come by then, or you'll miss some of the awesomeness. And there's really nothing on that bill that you can afford to miss. I'm excited. You should be. Hope to see you all packed in (another reason to get in early, if you want a seat).

Much love to everyone,

Geoff Lemon

Our first full band gig in 10 months. We're baaaaack!

This Wed night, the 8th August, I'll be playing my first full band gig in Melbourne with The Mime Set since last year's Fringe Festival!
But wait, there's more.
We'll be supporting the incredible Justin Heazlewood. If you don't take my word that he's incredible, then run don't walk to his myspace page right now, or take a look here and you'll see that I'm right.
And here's something else to sweeten the deal, Emilie Zoey Baker will also be making a guest appearance as a sneak preview of the show we're all writing together for this year's Fringe Festival.
So, in short, this will be a CRACKER of a gig.
Where?
The Empress Hotel.
714 Nicholson Street, Nth Fitzroy.
8:30pm start
and it's only $8.

La Mama Poetica

This will be a great gig with such a bitchin' lineup. Check-check-check it out.

there will never be another

Performing at the State Library

As part of an event called Beyond The Page, I'll be giving a free reading at the State Library on the evening of Thursday 12th April.
Also appearing will be the incredibly cool editors of Going Down Swinging, Lisa Greenaway and Steve Grimwade. As well as Jessica Tuckerman and Luke Sinclair.
Starts at 6pm.

postcard poetry no. 4

click to enlarge