Monday September 3rd brought this academic year’s first spoken word extravaganza back to Loughborough, under the banner “Speech Bubble”. The event took place in the Union’s Cognito club where the dimly lit blacked-out walls and the slightly raised stage, usually reserved for dancing, provided the perfect backdrop for some of Loughborough’s literary creatives to perform their poetry.
A respectable audience for a poetry reading of around 45 swamped around the stage as the first performer of the night, Cameron Brady-Turner took to the stage to begin proceedings. In all there were ten people performing their writing providing a varied display of styles, from the humorous to the heartfelt, and to pick a highlight would be criminal, not to mention impossible, so I won’t bother trying. All I can say is that there is a wealth of writing talent within the university’s vicinity that proves that poetry is still a credible and viable media despite its lack of attention within mainstream culture.
Further proof, if proof were needed, of the vibrancy of the spoken word scene on all levels came in the form of the two headline acts: John Berko Berkavitch and Anna Freeman. “Berko” as he is sometimes known, certainly makes for a striking presence on stage and his psychedelically humorous and sometimes emotional poetry proved a great hit with the audience with whom he connected with, with great effect providing an all round great and rapid fire performance.
He was followed by the award winning slam-poet Anna Freeman, who performed relatively short set of endearingly self-deprecating, hilarious, ginger-championing queer poetry. Her topics included a five-minute poem about the suspicion aroused from finding, and sniffing someone’s knickers on the floor, the trials, tribulations and joy of being a ginger person and the emotional upheaval following a break-up. In short it was an emotional rollercoaster, albeit a greatly entertaining one.
Speech Bubble returns to Loughborough on March 4th 2013, and as it is free for students, and given the success of the most recent event, there is very little excuse not to go along!
