Wet those pants, jump on that sofa, scream Hallelujah to the Lordy himself, tickets for the final 3 Wave If You’re Really There shows are now on sale.
Click here to buy em up - we’re not lying when we say the first one in June totally sold out and we had to turn away a tonne of sad faces from the door, so don’t make the same mistake twice. Full lineup announcement to follow …
Is this the coolest band on the planet?
Can we save Korova’s life?
Mercy came across BLK JKS on our trawls of the international scene looking for fresh bands to shake down … and we are mad for them! We’re hosting one of their first ever UK tour dates - even though we promised ourselves to steer clear of band-promo for evermore years ago. All part of our mission to bring the freshest artforms on the planet to Liverpool, a shitshaking warm-up to our Biennial programme …
“The sound of a new South Africa… you’d be hard pushed to find a better example of the post-apparthied nation’s new cultural momentum and boundary breaking sensibility” - Jamie Hodgeson feature in OMM
Okay, so thanks very much to everyone that attended our SOLD OUT first Wave If You’re Really There event. A box of Roses also to John O’Shea and his brother for all the tech and emotional support, Gary Daly for his drawings in the kitchen, Scott Spencer for decor, Deellyn and my Tali, Kate and Beth for all their help, and to the clergy for showing up and loving every blasphemous minute of it!
NOW, onto business!
We’ve (nearly) confirmed these headline poetry acts for the next three WIYRT events. Tickets are not on sale until mid-August tho, so keep your knickers on and wait and see what we’ve got planned on the music and arts side until you wet all in them.
September 20th – theme: Marriage
Dress nice, but not so much you outshine the bride.
David J . . . “The Vocal Pugalist” our number 1 priority act finally got in touch and confirmed his attendence. This guy is THE SHIT. Check this video, and tell me people aren’t going to cry when he does this shizzle in the church.
Luke Kennard . . . Was going to be our solo headline act for this night, until David J got in touch. Now he’s sharing the top spot. Luke was the youngest person ever to be nominated for the Forward Prize. That means he is a genius. And he’s a really charming performer too, there’ some sample poems, random big-ups from the nationals and an mp3 here…
Plus new work from Ross G. Sutherland and Nathan Jones
October 18th – theme: Funeral
Blacks, shiny shoes, muted tones and glum faces
Byron Vincent . . . as recommended by just about everyone ‘on the scene’, Byron is a funny manc with a dire outlook. Aren’t they all tho! Check some of his rabid stand-up poetry here (I love ‘Bob’ on the music player).
Salena Godden . . . our brilliant, filthy, sexy, boozy bitch from London. She brought the house down when she performed at Korova for us a few years ago, and since then she’s had a massive book deal for her autobiography off the biggest publisher in the country Harper Colins.
“Salena is a tour de force. Her reading was immaculate, witty, crafted punk and ignorant of the petty poses that are perfected by the style merchants of what is apparently a scene. Rather than perfecting a style Salena is style. Like most artists of note - there is noone like her” Lemn Sissay
There’s nothing really of her poetry on the internet that does her poetry justice, but you can listen to her band here, and you get a bit of an idea about the content.
ALSO
Lizzie Nunnery’s play, Death in Upper Duke Street … Lizzie’s play Intemperance, was produced at the Liverpool Everyman in October 2007 and published by Faber. She was one of four writers on Unprotected (Liverpool Everyman, Traverse Edinburgh, BBC Radio 4, 2006) which won the Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award. She is Pearson Playwright in Residence at the Liverpool Everyman for 2008. She is also a singer songwriter performing regularly around the UK, and her acclaimed second EP Hungry was released in March of this year. The title track of the EP is included in the compilation, Liverpool Music Today, released by Ultimate Fake Records on June 30th 2008.
November 29th – theme: Future 8002
Neon platforms, Hyperlink blouses and Digital trousers
Infinite Lives . . . a collection of songs, stories and poetry inspired by video games, past and present. Half literary recital, half episode of Gamesmaster. Nuff said. Or perhaps not? How about this:
“November Infinite Lives will be ace cakes.” Ross Sutherland.
Watch other shit from Ross Sutherland, Chris Hicks, Joe Dunthorne and Tim Clare on myspace. Listen to The Girl from Donkey Kong on here “in donkey kong there is a level based in a pie factory / and I think you’ll agree it mirrors out relationship exactly”…
AND I will also be presenting a new bionic music collaboration with painist Sarah Nicolls
basically she thinks she can piss all over Wave Machines….
AND Nina Jones will be showing a brand new choral music peice….
CHECK OUR CRAZY FLAVOUR… flavour flavour flavour…
The music will be announced shortly… O my!
Sat 7th June | St Bride’s Church, Percy Street, Liverpool | 7-11pm | £5*
The ‘Anticlimax’ issue aside, we’ve been a bit quiet so far this year. That’s because all of Team Mercy have been locked away in a church every Friday night - with Wave Machines and the minds of some of Liverpool’s most respected directors, curators, musicians, digiticians, designers and artists - drinking warm cans of beer and getting all excited. And waiting for a letter from the Arts Council.
The good news, is that said letter arrived and we have the go-ahead to run a series of 4 events that utilise the singular atmosphere and spectacular surroundings of Liverpool’s only church-that-looks-like-a-temple (St Bride’s) to our own devious ends - Wave If You’re Really There is our mission to present the best live literature, music and performance art in an environment conducive to having a brilliant time and telling your cousins how mad Liverpool is … amen to that.
Featuring
WAVE MACHINES (Chess Club)
‘The cleanest and purest of sublime art-pop’ - Art Rocker
www.myspace.com/mywavemachine
SLOW CLUB (Moshi Moshi)
‘Gut-wrenchingly beautiful’ - The Guardian
UNIVOCALISM Tim Clare / Joe Dunthorne / Ross Sutherland
Three of the UK’s most acclaimed writers perform their lecture and series of poems written in only one vowel.
THE BELL Nathan Jones / Wave Machines
Brand new collaborative poetry, music and digital art piece from your hosts. The freshest perspective in spoken word since the invention of the soapbox.
Plus: THE INVESTIGATION TO FIND OUT WHAT IS THERE AND ISN’T THERE
Performance art project by Kathryn Cooper.
Plus: Visuals by Phil Communication and Emily Voelker
Music from Igor Hax (binary jam)
and Art Direction by Scott Spencer
We’re so massively excited about these shows, and we hope you will be too. Entry will only be open to ticket holders, which you can buy online from this site (we will deliver them to you within a week of the show) or in person from one of our shady operatives - just give us a call in the office on 0151-708-9781 or bug Nathan on 07877-660-150 and we’ll come and hunt you down.
Future WIYRT dates - a Biennial triple-header, 6th September / 18th october / 29th November
Mercy’s team of poets, journalists and creatives are now taking on copywriting pitches.
We’ve already this year created a characteristic new style for Urban Splash, for their giant Liverpool homecoming project, and have lended a substantial hand to Uniform in their current rebranding. We have also reprised our role with Diesel, supplying music, art and style content for their online Cult programme.
Please direct all enquiries to doug@mercydesign.co.uk or nathan@showmercy.co.uk
Hello everyone, at the risk of seeming narcisistic to the point of banality, I’d like to draw your attention to the following websites, which contain all the footage Sam Meech did of our performance at The Bluecoat… Cwm Bie Yer, The Barman, and Live to Learn the Language.
There’s some great camerawork and if you listen carefully, you can hear my tongue-smacks from having such a dry mouth. Feel free to distribute word about our prowess…
Nathan and Wave Machines shizzle, with extra juice
After our sell-out performance at Tate Liverpool a couple of weeks ago, Mercy’s band of the moment are back with their awe-inspiring interpretations of Nathan Jones’ poetry.
Synth-stanza, vibra-verse, shouty-shouty, ballarinadry, lyrithmical sonnicts, cymbolic villanellectro…? you got it. Ha! Villanellectro.
PLUS live digital visuals from Phil Communication & Emily Voelker
Anyway, it’s right in the middle of the day at Bluecoat’s openning, in the small performance room… get there a little bit early to hear us pissing about with the speakers and reserve your seat with a leaflet.
O, and there will be copies of the latest Mercy around too.
Just to remind you that the shit is going down in Tate this evening. IT’S ON.
Ross G has arrived safely in town with his bag of paranoias, Wave Machines have been packing away their equipment since early yesterday morning, DJ Marcus Soukup AKA Igor Hax is practising his swirling eye-brow trick, Mercy’s AntiClimax Issue arrived last night, damp with disgusting ink, Phil and Emily have figured out how to get the NO INPUT screen showing on the projector, and Carl Rohumaa is speeding up the M5 making explosion noises with his cheeks as I type.
We’re very excited. And so, it seems, is everyone else. There’s a whole plethora of filmcrews and journalists, artizans, friends, countrybumpkins, fatcats and gossipmongers coming down for the free drink and to catch a glimpse of Joe’s gigglesack, and we already have confirmation that my mother and father will be on the scene. Be on your best behavior everyone.
Here’s the line-up one more time:
In the Lecture Theatre:
6:00 Virgin Shroud 1993, Dorothy Cross
7:00-8:00 Camelia e le Dragon, Niki de Saint Phalle
In the Café:
7:00 Kaya
7:30-9:00 Mercy Launch, w/Binary Jam DJs
7:50 & 8:50 Guitar and Pyro, Carl Rohumaa
In the Hospitality Suite:
8:00 It Looks Like You’re Writing a Letter, Ross Sutherland
8:30-9:00 Live to Learn the Lanaguage, Nathan Jones w/ Wave Machines, Phil Communication and Emily Voelker
plus The Alternative Turner Prize exhibition and announcements
Don’t be late.
Be at ‘Late at TATE’.
sorry.
xx
Here we go … First issue of 2008, ‘Anticlimax’, is back from the printers with a record low of mistakes, bad credits, typos and print fuckups. Huzzah!
Featuring work by Stephen Chan, Graphique Club, Ross Sutherland, Bobby Newall, Hugo James, Kenn Goodall, Roger Osborne, Kenn Taylor, Doug Mercy, Kathryn Cooper, Shane Gladstone, Richard Fairhead, Jonathan Greenbank, Eva Datta, Juliana Charltonova, Jennifer Anne Isabel Poole, Joe Mercy, Nathan Mercy and Naughty Babies. Whew!
We’ll give it an official release at the Tate Liverpool show tomorrow night, even more reason to show up. If you are babysitting or going on a bad date, then fear not: we’ll get it distributed to the usual stockists by the end of the week. x
2008 in Liverpool is 6 weeks old at the time of writing, and already any chance of writing some ‘hilarious’ sarcastic comments about it have been utterly topped by reality: months, years, of build up, the pomp and the ceremony, the piéce de résistance - a golden son brought ‘home’ to sing to us from the roof of one of Liverpool’s grandest buildings - then he goes and dicks it right up. Brilliant.
We’re all for honesty and controversy from our pop stars but it is a bit much to start slagging off the city - you know the one, the one you say you supposedly “never let down” in your shit song - when said city has endured great expense to get you and your rubbish mate to come and entertain us. Cheers la.
While we’re on about the opening weekend, who was that guy who never bothered to learn his lines presenting the thing from a scrumpled-up piece of paper? They should have got Craig Charles to present it, he needs a break.
Funnily enough we only set the theme for the next issue (Anticlimax) with our tongues-in-cheek, truth is we were sort of excited - then we get those big banners on the tower block outside Lime Street for example, fucking travesty of bad design and roll-call of clichés they are… carnival whore? Check. DJ? Check. Superlambbanana? Check. Odd yoga-type gents? Check. And then they have the cheek to put words like ‘nonconformist’ and ‘rebellious’ all over the damn things. Pisses us off. One positive though, is that it does look like an advert for a manga movie from really far off. The other positive is that they’re really shit, and we knew they would be.