Poet, co-founder of poetry night BoxedIn and host of Jawdance, Yomi Sode

Eclectic, competitive and radical, Slam Poetry is a fringe form of spoken word poetry and protest, blurring the lines between hip hop and the performance arts. It is an increasingly popular art form for those wishing to express political protest and radical emotion, due to its dramatic intensity in action as well as in language. It is also unique for its organic propensity to resist commercialisation and remain authentic on stage.

Poetry slams provide a platform for every kind of person to express their feelings on issues as far-reaching and globally significant as the refugee crisis, Black Lives Matter, identity politics and oppression of sexuality. As the world moves towards ever-increasing commerciality of art and self-expression – an example being the twisted use of feminism as a fashion statement – it seems that Slam Poets may be the only people with the ability to resist these falsehoods and cut straight through to the truth of our times.

Rhiannon Williams speaks to Yomi Sode, the talented Nigerian-born London-based poet, co-founder of landmark poetry night BoxedIn and host of Jawdance, on what makes Slam Poetry special.

LUX: Did you always want to be a poet?
Yomi Sode: No, poetry kind of crept in. I used to MC before, I used to DJ, I still have my vinyls – I am a proud collector of what I could class as ‘vintage grime’. I kind of ventured in all aspects and areas of music first.

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LUX: How did you discover Slam Poetry?
Yomi Sode: I first discovered Slam Poetry through a legend of a poet called Joelle Taylor. I saw this event that was happening, I think it was a SLAMbassadors event, and I thought this was cool to get involved in, and that’s how I met Joelle. I’m now faced with what is Slam poetry and I saw how these groups came up, how these individuals came up to do solos and it just blew my mind. But even after the event it wasn’t enough to pull me in to be interested in spoken word poetry. I loved it, but it wasn’t what I was used to with MC-ing, it was a very different form of expression.

But then I was in New York and I wanted to share some poems. The Nuyo [Nuyorican Poets’ Café] is a staple spot in terms of spoken word and the evening I got there I signed up but I didn’t realise it was a Slam – I accidentally signed up for my first Slam. Not only a Slam, but a Slam in America. And I actually got through to the final but the next stage of it was on the Friday and I wasn’t in New York for it!

LUX: How would you describe Slam Poetry to someone who hasn’t encountered it before?
Yomi Sode: It’s so difficult because Slam Poetry in different parts of the world is expressed in many different forms. So, should you look at the way the States take it on it has a very intense feeling to it; it’s very passionate, it’s driven with purpose. Folks don’t just go onto that stage and read a poem, they bare absolutely everything. It’s very personal, it can get very political, they take it very seriously there. In England what I’ve noticed is that it can be lighter, it can be a bit comedic, and of course there are many elements of seriousness, but the core of how it is in the states is very different.

You can make something very special out of 3 minutes’ worth of work and that’s an experience – as a a poet and an audience member – that you remember for a very long time.

Yomi Sode in performance

LUX: What’s the difference between a poetry Slam and a spoken word night?
Yomi Sode: I just came off the back of judging UniSlam in Leicester and there was this one piece that actually made me uncomfortable. And that’s what the power is of a Slam compared to your typical poetry night. At Jawdance for example, each person comes up to an open mic and you’ll see them again next month probably. With a poetry slam, even though the ethos isn’t about the winning and more about the experience, the process, you are still there to win and through that drive comes this energy. You get triple the amount of passion for the message coming through.

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LUX: You said you were judging UniSlam. What kinds of things are you looking for in these Slam poets’ performances?
Yomi Sode: It was very hard when I was judging. I was looking for any quirky lines, I was also marking up anything that sounded a bit cliché. One poet I remember went on there and he started with ‘my love’ and I was like oh god, because straightaway when you start with a line like that, I already know where you’re going.

LUX: What do you think is the unique appeal of a poetry that is performed and not just read? How does it feel to stand up on stage, vulnerable and utterly visible, sharing your art with an audience?
Yomi Sode: Performance is very important. To stand on stage and just read a poem and trust that you will feel what I’m feeling. I could have the most powerful poem on stage but if I read it in a monotone voice, it won’t sink into you as much as I want. Or I could absolutely read it in that monotone voice because that’s the kind of energy I want to give. You just need to know how your poem will present on stage.

LUX: Slam poetry is often both political and personal. What are some of the common themes that recur in the Slam Poetry scene?
Yomi Sode: What I find often in Poetry Slam is that the same themes will crop up along the lines of heartbreak, sexuality, rape, racial injustices, all those things there, are all packaged into a similar poem – but the way the poem approaches it is what is interesting to me. You have to believe in what you’re saying.

LUX: You’re involved in lots of poetry events going on in London – what do you think is the significance of nights like these for poets and poetry-lovers, as well as the community as a whole?
Yomi Sode: BoxedIn and Jawdance are not the only poetry nights that happen in London; there are a lot of mini poetry nights across London that people are not necessarily aware of. Those nights happen either weekly, monthly or bi-monthly or whatever it is, and they’re not in the limelight. I guess one of my aims with BoxedIn is that I’m going to encourage poets from these nights – other poets on the poetry scene – because my concern is that we’re always dipping in the same pool, picking out the same poets. And there are poets in and out of London doing some amazing things.

LUX: How would you describe the poetry circuits in large multicultural cities such as London? What needs changing, in your opinion?
Yomi Sode: It’s saturated in London. I feel like I’ve exhausted in London. And even then, there are still so many poets in London that we don’t know about. UniSlam is the national poetry event: there were folks from Glasgow, folks from Manchester, Leeds, Bristol, and I’m like this is what I’m talking about. It was just amazing to break out of London and find out what else is going on.

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LUX: How do you avoid creative burnout?
Yomi Sode: I allocate my time well. I say no to things often. I spend less time on social media now and I’m so used to coming off social media so regularly that I honestly have no reason to be on there anymore. I wanted to tackle the need to be on there every day – it was a pleasure to go offline for a while, then come back on to announce a new project. All that learning has been interesting for me – making space and time for my work.

LUX: These days there is a certain commercialism to creativity. In what ways would you say Slam poetry is able to resist commercialism, giving people who may not otherwise have a ‘true’ creative space a voice for self-empowerment?
Yomi Sode: Poets maintain a bridge between commerciality and their own individuality – whether we’re talking about Kate Tempest or Inua Ellams and his Barber Shop Chronicles which, last I checked was in Australia. It’s amazing stuff. A lot of my peers and the folks that I’ve grown up with on the scene are being used in adverts, and the purists, the poetry purists, see these adverts and go: that’s not poetry. And while it’s a massive clash of ideals, I can’t speak for another person’s choice. I can’t tell someone that they should be a purist when they might have a family to feed. People make their decisions for what they want to do. Poetry going commercial? It will happen. It’s up to the writer as to how they want to balance that. It’s their own journey going forwards.

Poet, musician and playwright Kate Tempest

LUX: Is there a poem that you feel you need to write, but have yet to?
Yomi Sode: There are poems that I’m waiting to write. I’m trying to eradicate the thoughts of writers’ block. I’m working towards a collection of poems.

LUX: What does poetry mean to you?
Yomi Sode: It’s an experience that’s life changing. Because you could be in the position where your life is in a certain way and that one person comes on stage and does something that speaks to how you’re feeling. That’s what poetry does, it gives that kind of permission to almost speak someone’s thoughts, and I think that that’s a beautiful thing.

Glencoe, Scotland. Image by Max Hermansson

Scotland was recently crowned the most beautiful country in the world; it conjures up images of wild northern mountain rises, plunging cliffs and bottomless lochs.  The combination of Scotland’s bustling cultural hubs with its raw, breath-taking landscapes makes it seem only natural that artists and poets would gravitate towards this northern haunt. Rhiannon Williams turns the spotlight on Scotland’s best poetry nights and slams, and speaks to The Loud Poets collective about the poet’s role in contemporary society.

In both Glasgow and Edinburgh today there is a veritable traffic jam of poetry nights, collectives and slams all fuelled by furious creation. These include the regular Illicit Ink showcases which like to focus upon ‘the sinister, the witty and the weird’, or collective Inky Fingers who run writers’ workshops as well as incredibly cool performance nights in Edinburgh at the popular Fringe venue Summerhall.

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Poets and the poetry community alike meet to learn from each other, share ideas, and of course laugh and enjoy themselves – Edinburgh is not the capital of comedy for nothing, and a lot of the poems performed will jump over into being stand-up sets too. This is the case with Neu! Reekie! which often set up at the quirky Monkey Barrel Comedy club.  Whilst, Growing Underground at the Forest Café in Edinburgh is as unique as it gets. The radical arts hub hosts monthly nights, serves organic hot food, and has a basement gallery and venue space which is as mouth-wateringly atmospheric as it sounds.

Image by Perry Jonsson

Finally, there are the Loud Poets who, as with a lot of the poetry collectives, resist any concrete
definition. They’ve been together since 2014 and perform at Fringe shows, run club nights, create art  and music and now have a hub in Annexe Arts of Edinburgh. Popular in both Glasgow and Edinburgh, the appeal is in the idea of noise, empowerment to speak out and encouraging others to do the same.

Rhiannon Williams: What’s the best part about being in a collective?
Loud Poets: The best part about being in a collective is the ability to bounce ideas off of your fellow artists and brainstorm together. In Loud Poets we have not only writers and performers but also musicians and video artists, so any time someone wants to create new work, they can draw upon a range of talented folks for ideas and advice.

RW: How did the members of the Loud Poets meet? What is your creative process; do you ever write collaboratively for example?
LP: As a collective we’ve grown and evolved over time: what began as a small group of creative folks DIYing a monthly showcase has ballooned into a larger collective containing many different artists. One of Loud Poets’ aims has always been to foster a community around spoken word in Scotland, so we’ve always encouraged folks who are passionate about the art form to get involved in the collective. It’s hard to say there’s any one creative process – it varies for the different artists and it’s always changing!

The diversity of creative practices in Loud Poets is, I think, one of the things that makes it work so well – if one person is stuck, another person can jump in with a different strategy to help. We do write collaboratively – we have several partner and group poems that we’ve performed as part of our Edinburgh Fringe shows. Those are challenging but also loads of fun to compose, since the process involves balancing different styles to create the piece that will work the best in live performance.

RW: Your work spans all kinds of medium, from physical performance to live music and visual arts. Where would you say the roots of the poetry lie for you?
LP: I think each member of LP would answer that question differently, which again I think is a good thing! We each draw upon different creative practices: for example, Kevin is a trained actor, Katie a trained dancer/choreographer, and Doug plays multiple instruments. As a collective we perceive performance poetry as a multi-medium art form to be experimented with, and we’ve had a lot of fun innovating at the edges of the genre.

RW: Which poets/artists/musicians are you excited about right now?
LP: It’s so hard to just pick a couple! One artist who LP has admired for a long time is the Leicester-based artist Jess Green, who not only writes and performs poems but also works with a live band and has recently penned a play! Jess often targets political inequalities through her sharp, beautifully realised poetry. We’ve recently fallen in love with Glasgow artist Sarah Grant, an incredibly talented film-maker who came along to LP last year and performed her first poem there to great success. Since then, she’s won two of our slams and graced our stages many times, as we can’t get enough of her often hilarious yet always powerful work.

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RW: What do you do to prepare for the performance, just before going on stage? Any quirks or
particular thought processes to get into the zone?
LP: Again, this is different for everyone – we’ve tried doing team push-ups before shows but that
tradition didn’t last long… For some of us, it’s essential to run the poems either in our heads or out loud before performing, whereas for others they trust that the material is in there from prior
rehearsal. Some of us have physical warm-ups that we like to do so we can use our voices fully
onstage. Sometimes performing a certain poem, especially if it’s emotional and personal to the
performer, means taking an extra moment to mentally prepare before walking onstage. It really
varies!

RW: What kind of role has Scotland played in the content and inspiration of your writing?
LP: Again, this will really vary! Catherine Wilson and Katie Ailes have both written directly about Scotland, Catherine from her perspective of living here her whole life and Katie as an immigrant.
One thing that I’d say for everyone is that it’s great being in such a vibrant spoken word scene in
Scotland today. Spoken word across the UK is currently booming, so it’s a great time to engage in the art form. Scotland also has a cultural devotion to literature, especially live literary traditions, which makes it a fantastic environment for writers. We’re lucky to have resources like the Scottish Poetry Library, Scottish Storytelling Centre, Scottish Book Trust, and more organisations devoted to this art forms to support our work.

Image by Perry Jonsson

RW: What would you say is one of the most difficult things about being a poet today?
LP: Unfortunately, I think a lot of the general public thinks poetry isn’t for them and so don’t engage with it: perhaps in school they were taught work that wasn’t relevant to them or had to analyse it past the point where that was any fun. To quote the brilliant Adrian Mitchell, ‘most people ignore most poetry because most poetry ignores most people.’ Not to knock other writers at all, but if our work looks entirely inwards or is so experimental or reference-heavy as to be inaccessible, it’s not going to engage most folks.

Our core mission has always been to make work which is accessible and interesting to everyone: poetry which is exciting, which touches on issues in contemporary life, which is performed in a way that makes you sit on the edge of your seat. Our favourite thing to hear is someone admitting that they were dragged to one of our shows, swearing poetry wasn’t their thing, only to actually really enjoy it – or, even better, to enjoy it so much that they themselves were inspired to write a poem. So we want to change the assumption that poetry is an ivory tower by making work that encourages everyone to speak out.

Rhiannon Williams: Glasgow or Edinburgh?
Loud Poets: Ah, don’t ask us that! We’ve run monthly showcases in both cities for nearly three years now, and we love them both. The spoken word cultures in each city have slightly different flavours, Glasgow’s being more influenced by the fantastic Scottish rap scene and often quicker-paced than Edinburgh’s, which tends to have lots of international students and thus a wide pool of influences. We love booking artists from one city to perform in the other, not just with Glasgow and Edinburgh but across Scotland, to try to expose each city to the great artists and styles from elsewhere in Scotland and the UK.

RW: Highland Loch or a North Sea cliff face?
LP: Well, they say poets are narcissists, so I suppose the loch so we can stare at our reflections like Narcissus until we die? How’s that for a poetic answer… On the other hand, standing on a bleak cliff face with our hair tangling in the brutal wind sounds equally poetic… Tough choice. We’re going to have to go with Greggs. Whether it’s taking place in a pub, a club, beneath a café, in the streets or on the air, some of the most exciting and diverse poetry in the world is being created in Scotland right now, so head up whenever you can, open your ears, dig in with every sense. It’s a blast!

loudpoets.com

British poet and co-founder of Brainchild festival, Bridget Minamore. Image by Suki Dhanda

LUX’s Contributing Poet Rhiannon Williams puts the spotlight on British poet Bridget Minamore this month, exploring her unique portrayal of love and her vision for Brainchild festival.

Bridget Minamore′s poetry is red hot. Addressing race, feminism and popular culture in verse that scalds, this epic young British poet appears to be everywhere at once these days – the poetic version of a catchy new tune. However, her star has truly been accelerating in its ascent since the publication of her pamphlet ‘Titanic‘ (Out-Spoken Press), a collection of poems which hilariously and hauntingly dissect what it means to love another. In ‘Titanic’ she uses the most famous disaster story in history as an analogy for a rocky relationship, writing with a spotless humour and style that tangos with your emotions. The excerpt below shows how Bridget portrays the way the violence of doomed love can be transfigured into dark humour, which nevertheless calls out to our deepest fears of being bereft – or shipwrecked – in love, desperate for the beloved to stay:

I want to cut your legs off

not so you can’t walk away,
more in the hope you’ll stay
exactly where I want to put you.

Her talent for a sentence that can leave you floating on pure emotion has done exactly the opposite of the doomed ship, buoying her up and into a stratosphere of significance, and marking her out as a striking new voice of a generation. When I asked what drew her to using this imagery of the ship, Bridget shared her thoughts: “I always felt so embarrassed writing or reading poems about love or heartbreak, and the imagery gave me two things: a crutch to hide behind, but also a level of humour that made everything easier. I’ve always loved being near water, whether its canals or the sea, and back in Ghana my Dad’s whole family live right next to the largest man-made lake in Africa. But I have this real fear of it as well – I can swim, but I get nervous when I’m actually in open water. So subliminally there must be a part of me that compares the open water of the ocean to love: home and comfort, sure, but also terror. The Titanic sums all of that up for me.”

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Although the symbolism of the distressed ship is one that has been used by poets throughout history – Horace’s ‘The Ship of State in Troubled Waters’, Rimbaud’s ‘Le Bateau Ivre (The Drunken Ship)’, Bridget guides this metaphor firmly into modernity by using popular song lyrics in her transitions between poems, and colloquial language. The overall effect is ground-breaking…or should we say ice-breaking?

Brainchild festival. Image by Hollie Fernando

Not just a poet however, Bridget has her fingers in all of the creative pies; she has worked with the National Theatre, the Royal Opera House, represented the UK at the International Biennale in Rome and has even masterminded an incredible music and arts festival, Brainchild. And through her journalism she tackles burning issues that many are afraid to speak out about – for example the concept in fashion of the colour ‘nude’ and the unrecognised problem that it causes for women of colour who just want to find a pair of skin-coloured tights – something which should be guaranteed for all women.

Furthermore, her writing invariably leans towards promoting those who are in need of a spotlight, for example she champions the (long overdue) rise of black female DJs, such as Jordanne of GCDJ (Girls Can’t DJ). This is also where her Brainchild Festival comes in. Because instead of just talking about change, Bridget does. “The answer lies in visibility,” she wrote in a piece for ‘The Debrief‘, and at Brainchild each July, Bridget provides the vital visibility that up-and-coming music, poetry and dance stars need.

Bridget was one of the founders of Brainchild, a quirky festival in the United Kingdom – it is very literally her brainchild. Nestled among the grounds of the Bentley Motor Museum in rural East Sussex, the chilled out setting comes with a surreal wildfowl park and miniature railway in tow. In addition to running it, Bridget took to the Brainchild stage this year to perform her poetry, as well as run a discussion about the housing crisis in Britain – and this combination of acts acutely captures the feel of the entire festival; subtle, cerebral and important, the achievement is a melange of conference and intellectual discussion in addition to the vibrant festivities.

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Brainchild is volunteer-run, and yet endlessly inventive, even more so than the giants of festival Britain like Glastonbury and Reading which are simply too crowded to be truly intimate or different. In contrast, there seems to be no end to what Brainchild puts on, from silent discos made hot by the cutting edge GCDJ group, to the on-site art installations which also created a centre of gravity this year, such as the out-of-this-world geometric playgrounds of Kristi Minchin. There was even an act called 5 encounters on a site called Craigslist featured on the line-up this year. When asked about her vision for Brainchild, Bridget discussed how it evolves with each run: “Each year it’s got easier to know what our vision is—these days, I’m pretty sure we all want to create an inclusive space for as many people as possible, a place that’s fun but also engaging enough to make you think. But also fun. Retaining the intimacy is probably the next most important thing, as it’s something we’re really conscious of the larger we get.”

A yoga class at Brainchild. Image by Jerome Toole

Bridget Minamore’s work with Brainchild is a testament to her talents. Playing on the word ‘brain’, the festival describes itself as ‘a meeting of minds’, a network and safe haven for people in the arts to push their talents to the forefront of the stage – and it is because of Bridget that this creative network has become so strong. It can sometimes seem that the options available for young people to forge a career from artistic abilities are diminishing every day in Britain, due to lack of funding and the troubling expectation that they will work for free. However, Bridget’s work demonstrates how this is not necessarily true. I will be looking out for more of her presence in the future, as I am sure that the name Bridget Minamore will continue to be trailblazing, taste-making and trendsetting in the poetry world; she shows us how it can be done.

bridgetminamore.com

Jawdance is a powerful blend of poetry and protest at a venue in east London. Image courtesy of Apples and Snakes

LUX’s Contributing Poet Rhiannon Williams discovers street poetry and protest is alive and thriving on the fringes of the international urban art scene.

As a young poet living in London, I have come to know the many hidden faces of our contemporary poetry landscape well. But nothing has struck home in the way that Jawdance has.

In the heart of Shoreditch, in East London, there is a dark stage. Feel an insistent bass, which picks up pace to keep time with an energy that builds and builds and doesn’t stop building. From the stage comes a spiky, eclectic hybrid between music, hip hop, art and poetry – and a rare glimpse into the soul of an arts scene which is uninhibited and so, so alive. Unseen, and yet bursting at the seams from a small room with a small stage full of big voices.

This is spoken word poetry, a poetic hybrid that speaks of and to people who are otherwise unheard. The talent of the poets you’ll find here is home-grown, full of heart, and iridescently free. Free from the dust of astringent commerciality which can so often choke artists. Free from the inhibitions of so-called ‘sensible society’; day jobs are all forgotten for tonight. As free as the rhymes which are so full of life they seem to transcend their meanings to reach a vivid corporeality. Oh, and it’s free to enter too, which leads to the creation of a rare welcoming charm, something lacking in a world where so many precious things are valued primarily by their marketability and not originality.

Always passionate, spoken word can be personal or political. Image courtesy of Apples and Snakes

It strikes you as reminiscent of the kind of golden poetry you would have found in San Francisco during its sixties scene, or Harlem during the Revival time of Langston Hughes; the real beauty is in the spontaneity. Spoken word as an art form has evolved since its first explosion onto the scene in the early 20th century primarily through the prisms of political change. Since then, its use as a form of protest and experimentation as well as just for a riot of a good time, bringing together a collective consciousness and feeling, has been a powerful influence over young creatives all over the world. And this characteristic of the genre is just as potent today. More than ever, the urgency is palpable, getting bigger and louder often in forgotten corners of our urban landscapes, on both sides of the Atlantic.

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At Jawdance, presenter and poet Yomi Sode MCs the evening’s electricity. The creative mastermind behind the evening is an event in himself in the way he merges stand-up comedy continuity with his mastery of the at times very profound issues being laid bare. He calls up act after act to the microphone to infuse the air with a poetry that bites, that shocks, that electrifies. Whether the act is the whip-smart all-female poetry collective Octavia or an open-mic first-timer who has wandered in from the humdrum of the city, the quality of performance is staggeringly high – and what they have to say is important. Because in the poetry at Jawdance there is a sense, from a social and cultural perspective, of something moving. Raw at moments, hilarious at others, a common theme is for a poetry that is plugged in and almost cruelly receptive to the times. You are left breathless from listening, but enthralled to be so, as the candle is held up to the intimacies of life, the social and political issues that trouble so many refracted into words. It is thanks to platforms like Jawdance that there is still a space for this passionate, immediate self-expression in cities where those who may feel themselves to be voiceless can soar.

So if there’s one thing you take away from Jawdance, it is that poetry is willing itself to be heard every day. So grab a craft beer from the bar, let yourself be absorbed into the crowd and lie back for the ride, because to quote from the night, if the true Prime Minister of London is gigs then Jawdance is without a doubt the Woodstock in the cabinet.

Jawdance, every last Wednesday of the month at Rich Mix, Bethnal Green Road, London