The Best Yet

The Best of May....

What a month! The Blond Bombshell himself, Alex Hulme, excelled himself at both John O' Gaunt and Water Witch recently, his original boyish style now maturing nicely: depth, range and professionalism all on the up. With a little help from his friends, he's launching a new E.P with lightning tour of Lancashire included, beginning at The Pickerings Hotel Friday June 17^th, with Rae Morris, Steph Fraser and Maxwell Watts.  Check out:

www.facebook.com/alexhulmemusic (release tour)

cityscaperecords.co.uk (music info.)

Also going from strength to strength, but more in the suet line than our Alex: Gran The Gusset Tester launched her latest venture, Skerton School of Proper Dinners, as a riposte to “them poncy chefs on telly,” as she so succinctly puts it. Her World Tour of Lancashire launched to a select audience at The Stonewell on Easter Sunday, she will be demonstrating her considerable expertise in the arts of dripping, suet pastry and stout as an art form at:

The Water Witch, Lancaster, 7^th June

Wordsoup, The New Continental, Preston on 30^th June

Video on youtube: World Premiere at The Stonewell or just type in her long-suffering manager's name, Sue Seddon

Baksheesh go from strength to strength: Saturday 7^th at The Stonewell Tavern saw a tight set, exuberant delivery, enthusiastic following and to everyone's delight, Dervla in fine form as crowd-pleasing Balkan belly dancer. Girls have to take a back seat at this point (or get upstairs to watch) as the floor is stacked shoulder to shoulder with the male part of the enthusiastic following.....

A complete and welcome surprise last Thursday afternoon, also at the Stonewell: the last strains of excellent jazz, courtesy of French Connection, had long faded as had many of the clientele. Upstairs a confusion of Thursday Girls perched amongst the drum sets was rehearsing its latest, with apologies to Chaucer. Suddenly the pub was full of energy, sound and a hotbed of young talent fresh from LMC and strutting their stuff in no uncertain terms. No names, I'm afraid, as such raw vitality hasn't yet connected with the business of talking to boring old bats like me just for a plug, but some extremely gifted girl vocals and a couple of nice 'n feisty guitarists.

COMING SOON

Hard Times are good times, The Robert Gillow, Thursday 19^th May

Lancaster Unlocked Medieval Festival, 27th-30^th May, full preview in following blog, including acrobatic taster from The Duke's evening show, Slightly Fat Features  (27th/28th May) juggling with The Thursday Girls' affectionate tribute to Chaucer, Lanterbury Tales in Market Square, St. John's Church and The Grand. Unbox, Arteria's edgy progeny, host urban art in the making on Brock Street and Saturday 28^th comes to a splendid finale with Quattro Formaggio, in-your-face jazz funk from the Czech Republic, at The Stonewell Tavern, 9.30

And, a bit out of my range but I've heard good things about this bookshop, (I'm dead jealous as I can't get to this):

Living Daylights and Love’s Loose Ends …

Two poets, Jennifer Copley and David Tait, are launching their latest pamphlets at Penrith’s Bluebell Bookshop on Tuesday 17 May.

Jennifer Copley reads Living Daylights, “wistful, haunting and sad on the one hand, and funny, memorable and unique on the other.”

David Tait reads his Love’s Loose Ends- “careful and concise … like glimpsed scenes and small, intense dramas, full of knowing detail and telling lines. Tender but shrewd.”

7.30pm, admission free.

Jennifer Copley was born in Barrow-in-Furness, returned there and began writing poetry in her 50s- MA at Lancaster University in 2001- Poetry Business Pamphlet Competition winner.

In 2006 she was the national winner in the Ottakar’s/Faber Poetry Competition. In 2007 she was awarded 2nd prize in the Academi Cardiff National Poetry Competition. Her work has appeared in many magazines and anthologies, including The Forward Prize Anthology 2008.

She was appointed South Cumbria Poet Laureate in 2005– Beans in Snow (Smokestack, 2009), Unsafe Monuments (Arrowhead Press, 2006), and House By The Sea (Arrowhead, 2003). Living Daylights is published by Happenstance.

David Tait: born in Lancaster; lives and works in Hebden Bridge. His poems have been published in Stand, The London Magazine, The Guardian, The North, Magma and The Rialto, amongst others.

House Poet at Manchester Royal Exchange- working on Leeds Independent Poetry Press Festival – General Editor of The Cadaverine 

Whew!  get yer heads round all that! You can't win 'em all but you can have a good try.