Yes, I know, its been an incredibly long time since I updated this site. Fact is, I've been busy. Been on the road with the Spasm Band in Europe, touring relentlessly. Its been hectic, moving from place to plane, eating weird shit and drinking copious amount of Martiniquan rum but also performing some heavy shows with the guys. This leg of the tour goes on till Aug 9 when we fly in from Reunion Island to play the Big Chill. There are more gigs in September, October, then in November : I tour Germany promoting my Bird Head Son book. In terms of writing, I am working on 2 major texts. Firstly, my PHD project, a fictional biog of lord kitchener (not the English guy, the calypsonian), finally managing to get a rhythm going, getting through 1000 words a day, in 80 days I'll have a novel, well, at least a novel lenght thing. Wish me luck. Secondly, a new collection I'm hoping will get published next year, its an abstract, experimental work-100 poems based on a surrealistic technique I think I might have invented. Its a secret. But the book will be called 'Rubber Orchestras' (Ted Joans describing Bob Kaufman's work). Its a strangely haunting work that will either be deeply profound (concerning the slippages and dark spaces of language) or deeply odd. Either way, I'm enjoying the process of discovery. I've finished teaching for the summer : a great group of Birkbeck folks, amazing to see the transformation from beginner to writer by the end of the 22 week course. They even put together a booklet of their work as an end of course gift to me. Good stuff. Teaching resumes in September when I will be teaching a new Life Writing course. I designed the syllabus, looking forward to it. So, to make up for the lost time, here's a vid from a recent New Morning, Paris performance.
And here's a new review of the Bird Head Son album from Cyclic Defrost
The first thing that hits you is the funk, the throbbing urban grooves, taut, almost militant 70’s funk that drifts into the stirring power of spiritual and free jazz, even Afrobeat or bizarrely enough Calypso music. And then we meet Anthony Joseph. He is a poet. But you wouldn’t know it. He comes across like a New Orleans preacher, loud, proud, rousing, over the sweat and the sin of the music. His delivery is somewhere between Martin Luther King Jnr and Jimi Hendrix, these incredibly vivid spiritual street stories that build and swell with the music. Make no mistake he’s not thumbing earnestly through a dog eared excercise book, he’ll wail and sing, writhe and live the music. These are songs, not poetry put to music, where the music can just flow on instrumentally for long periods before Joseph will pop up with his unique wordplays. Jospeh is Trinidadian, based England, he even lectures in creative writing there, though it’s his super cool 7 piece band with horns, hand drums, wah guitar, organs and shakers that really takes this out of the classroom. They’ve really transcended the spoken word medium here, creating the kind of obscure rare groove record that crate diggers would go mad for if it was made thirty five years ago, like it sounds like it should have. Bob Baker Fish
Anthony Joseph is a Trinidadian born poet, novelist, musician and lecturer. He is the author of three poetry collections: Desafinado (1994), Teragaton (1998) and Bird Head Son (2009). His first novel, The African Origins of UFOs was published in 2006. Joseph performs and tours internationally accompanied by his band The Spasm Band. He has released two critically acclaimed albums with the band; both released to coincide with book publications. His debut album with the band, Leggo de Lion was released in 2007, and featured lyrics taken from his novel The African Origins of UFOs. Bird Head Son followed in 2009, with lyrics from the Bird Head Son collection. Joseph’s third album with the band, Rubber Orchestras will be published alongside his fourth poetry collection of the same name in 2011. He is also a lecturer in Creative Writing at Birkbeck College, University of London, where he was instrumental in the development of the first Creative Writing BA course offered by the University. He lives in London.
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