March 2007

Jacob Sam-La Rose – animating literature through spoken word

Poetry is back on the menu as we welcome British poet and writer, Jacob Sam-La Rose, to perform and conduct workshops in Klang Valley from 7 to 11 March.

A former Poet-in-Residence at BBC London, he has taught creative writing internationally, and has facilitated and taught workshops and extended projects through institutions such as the National Theatre, the Arvon Foundation, Spread the Word, the Roundhouse, the Barbican, as well as a range of schools across England.

Jacob is also the Artistic Director of an annual teenage poetry SLAM project that works across London schools. Check out Jacob’s website and note the dates below to catch him performing alongside Malaysian poets!

WAYANG KATA III: AN EVENING OF SPOKEN WORD
Jacob and our own local poets take the stage.

Date: 7 March 2007
Venue: No Black Tie, 17 Jalan Mesui off Jalan Nagasari, KL
Time: 9:00 pm
Admission: RM5 at the door

SPOKEN WORD AT THE FOOD FOUNDRY
Come watch Jacob perform alongside participants of his workshops.

Date: 10 March 2007
Venue: Food Foundry, http://www.foodfoundry.us/
BG-8, Happy Mansion, Jalan 17/13, Petaling Jaya, Selangor (next door to Dram Projects)
Time: 4pm to 6pm
Admission: Free

PERFORMANCE POETRY WORKSHOP WITH JACOB SAM-LA ROSE

Date: 9 and 10 March 2007
Venue Dram Projects, BG-6, Happy Mansion, Jalan 17/13, Petaling Jaya, Selangor

For more information on any of the events above, email us at arts@britishcouncil.org.my

Say It On The Sidewalk

We have done spoken word, music and indie films. And now we are looking into how we can incorporate visual art into our projects and gigs. Yes, something new for the new year.

To start off we had two graphic artists to do some chalk drawings on the sidewalk outside the studio we call home. The theme was anti-valentine's and my favourite is the sawed-up bunny with its brains and guts exposed. The pictures do no justice to the stretch of concrete they made into a canvas.

If this kind of thing is your kind of swing, drop us a comment or an email! We would love to hear from you, your ideas, or how your art projects can complement our gigs. Best ideas win a bucket of jumbo-sized-chalk.

It Happened Last Sunday


Our emcee opening the night and the stage

Jay Ong reading his piece on broken toys

Patricia Low doing the quirky and random thing

Nicholas Wong on dedicating a poem to a nearly extinct bird, and snippets from his journal

Elza Irdalynna said, 'Valentine's can go stuff itself'

Sharanya's poems are rich and sensuous with allusions to myth and the Hindu gods

Reuben Kang with the opening set

Gary Ooi dramatised his poems

Nick Davis with songs about the other sex in mellow, jazzy tunes

Ian Theseira/Pass Caring closed the night with an intimate and melancholic selection


Thanks to everyone who came for our (anti) Valentine's gig! Hope you had fun, and see you at our next outing (check our blog for updates) :)

And as usual, thanks to The Dram Projects and the Food Foundry for generously sponsoring the event.
And to Rachel and Rebecca Chew for photography and the amazing sidewalk art.

*For more pictures click on our photos link

Valentine Vehemence : A Night of Un-Romantic Spoken Word

*4th February, Sunday
*8.00pm
*The Dram Projects, BG-8 Happy Mansion, Section 17/13, Petaling Jaya
*RM5 (inclusive of drinks and snacks)

Our way of celebrating the season of love and fancy candy.


Elza Irdalynna is 19 and studying Performance + Media at Sunway University College. A broke actor, so hire her.

Jay Ong. Emo.

Sharanya Manivannan was born in India in 1985 and grew up in Sri Lanka and Malaysia. A writer, dancer, painter, actress, photographer, journalist and activist, she has performed extensively at public readings in the last five years, and her work has been published in a number of periodicals and anthologies here and abroad, including Softblow, Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore, Collateral Damage, The2ndRule and Poetika. She is working on her first novel and a full-length collection of poems, and recently published a chapbook of poems, Iyari.

Nicholas Wong was a recipient of the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2006, Britain's most prestigious poetry prize for young writers between the ages of 11-17. He was awarded the Singapore Young Dramatists Award (SYDA) Third Prize in 2005 for his play Good Morning, Tree, an absurdist piece written in homage to Samuel Beckett and the late local playwright Kuo Pao Kun, and First Prize in 2006 for Death off the Mainland, a contemporary exploration of Singapore-Malaysia relations using the historical context of the merger. He also won First Prize in the National Chinese Essay Writing Competition for Secondary Schools by Singapore Chinese Teachers' Union and Lianhe Zaobao in Secondary 1 and 2. He was Head of Literature Wing at his junior college. His publication credits include the Quarterly Literary Review of Singapore and the "Eye on the World" series as part of the Creative Arts Programme (CAP) Mentorship Attachment in Singapore. Recently accepted into Columbia University, he plans to major in Comparative Literature and Creative Writing. He is very happy to be home.

Priya K is a self-declared selfish, untalented dreamer who wishes she could change the world. An extremely witty, thought-provoking and humorous writer (depending on how you see it) and a part-time poet.

Patricia Low is an English Literature/Performing Arts undergrad in a local university who writes her best poetry in the dark hours of the morning. Besides trying to rhyme strings of words, she also does songwriting (also in the dark hours of the morning, but with her trusty old acoustic). She reads more than the average Malaysian, wishes she could travel more often and bakes cupcakes when depressed. She has a purple paper-mache dinosaur as a pet.

with Gary Ooi and Nick Tan.

With featured performances by Reuben W.J. Kang and Pass Caring.

All this - with drinks and scrumptious snacks (courtesy of Food Foundry) in a cosy and intimate space - for a mere RM5. Whether you are in or out of love you wouldn't want to miss this!

It Rocked Our Socks


Piccies of August's gig. A big thanks to all who came, cheered and ate.



+ Talking rocks welcome guests at every table. What did yours say?
Picture by Grace Tham


+ The scrimpy-looking welcome pack: A talking rock,
postcards by THINK and the itinerary for the night.


+ Poetry reading by Jamal Raslan


+ The boys from 2 Piece Band did a musical tribute
in the spirit of merdeka


+ Lee & Gomez. Sweet melodies juxtaposed with mean guitar riffs.


+ Azmyl Yunor (we adore him so much that we insist on
putting up a picture of him although they were all fuzzy)


Thanks also to the awesome people at Food Foundry and THINK Online.

Project OMG!
August Series

19th August:
INDIE FLICK NITE



on the reel:

Halun (John Naflish)
What happens when one can multiply oneself?

The Blind Girl and the Thief (John Naflish)
A heartwarming story of fatherhood and letting go of one's hold on sin.

A Thousand Miles (Elroy Lee & Raja)
A boy, his family and new-found love finds that there is no space for all.

Abandoned (Kenny Seah)
The adventures of an abandoned cat who gets picked up by a two-legged creature.

The Alley (Robin Lee)
A beggar and his quest for fast-food is fleshed out via animation and laced with humour.

Impress Them (Ian, Elena & Yi Wei)
Jason Lo's songs, before he got famous and sang anthemic tunes like 'Evening News',
gets a video treatment.

With performances by Reuben Kang, Rauf Fadzilla, Michael Chen and Gary Ooi.



26th August:
PROJECT OMG! SESSION 2



Featuring:

Gary Ooi
Graphic designer with both hands in theatrical arts and poetry. He draws inspiration
from his not-so-normal life. This will be his first solo attempt.

Priya K.
Self-declared selfish, untalented dreamer who wishes she could change the world.
An extremely witty, thought-provoking and humorous writer (depending on how
you see it) and a part-time poet.

Jamal Raslan
Jamal returns to the scene with more poetry in our bahasa kebangsaan.

Raymond Yong & Grace Tham
A collaboration of sorts. Raymond is an accomplished musician and singer-songwriter
who will be performing with Grace, another lass with artistic tendencies of the same kind.

Azmyl Yunor
Azmyl Yunor’s music evokes the working class down-to-earth folkiness of American
singer songwriter heroes such as Bob Dylan and Neil Young, but imbues it with his own brand
of infectious humour and colour. A fiercely independent artiste, the multi-genre and
multi-instrumental Yunor has performed and released recordings as a solo artiste and as a
member of The Maharajah Commission, Ben’s Bitches and Thunder Coffee Club. He has also
organised various gigs including the 'Sapu-Sapu' series which featured various local talents.

Lee & Gomez
Gomez & Lee are a couple of disillusioned wannabe poets and frustrated ex-smokers who
write and perform songs when they're not wrestling with life's great, unanswered questions
(like "What brand of disposable diapers is the best value for money?"). In an alternate, infinitely
more pompous and pretentious reality they are members of snob-rock outfit, Mojo Pin. Their
influences (in and out of MP) include Joe Queenan, Blues Clues, David Bowie and Van Morrison.
They are always, always tired and seldom happy.


All happening at-

The Food Foundry, BG-6 Happy Mansion, Jalan 17/13, PJ.
7.30pm onwards
Admission is free

(Maps are in the previous posts!)

This is a very tiny map to Food Foundry via the Sprint/NKVE side.




This is another tiny map via the Fed. (Tips: On Jalan Barat, turn left after you see a Maybelline billboard. After the 3 o'clock turn at Rothmans, lookout for a Bosch billboard. Turn left before it.)

So, we have been up to our arms making sure everything goes well this weekend, from shopping at Pasar Road for AV equipment, sending posters for printing to deciding what kind of flowers we want to furnish the tables with.

And if you realised, we have changed our time slot to 7.30pm. That's because like over everything else, football gets first dibs once every four years. So after the gig, kita sama-sama tengok bola lah. Should be fun :)

Food Foundry will also be offering a special dinner set meal just for the occasion.

See you this weekend for an evening of poetry (read and performed by very normal people, and no, it has nothing to do with Sonnet 18, The Dead Crow or weird people all dressed in black), acoustic sets and short films (of wigs wanting to take over the world, unmarried musicians and people in jungles).

Whee!