Okay, thanks very much to everone that attended our SOLD out first Wave If You’re Really There event… thanks also to… John O’Sheo and his brother for all the tech and emotional support, Gary Daly for his drawings in the kitchen,  Scott Spenser for decor, Delyn 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.

http://video.aol.com/video-detail/david-j-at-fiascotv-july-03/28267893

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…

http://www.saltpublishing.com/books/smp/9781844713073.htm

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):

http://www.myspace.com/byron_vincent

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:

http://www.myspace.com/wearesaltpeter

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

Infinte 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 exactaly”…

http://www.myspace.com/homeworkldn

AND I will also be presenting a new bionic music collaboration with painist Sarah Nicolls

http://www.sarahnicolls.com/

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!

Right, new website. Bloggy. Comment away, and check the photo gallery especially, where we’ve started to put up loads of our photos from past events and exhibitions. We’ll keep adding to this and tweaking bits over the coming month but to all intents and purposes this is it, so have a tour, and keep coming back as we add new bits. At last!

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.

http://shootoutproject.blip.tv/

http://shootoutproject.co.uk

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…

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.