Football Poets

Live Reviews & News – September 2001

OUT TO LUNCH with the FOOTBALL POETS LIVE! August 25th at – 2001 A Football Oddity – Alternative World Cup, Thorncombe, Dorset.

Hosted by the Easton Cowboys and Thorncombe FC the second Alternative World Cup is anbout bringIng people together through football, music (AND POETRY!) by socialising without isolating people by colour, sex age or culture. It’s an event that encourages passion and endeavour rather than the straight game’s obsession for commercialism and money. We’ve been kindly invited to perform by Will of the Easton Cowboys who got the Big Issue interview together with us. So with Stuart Bulter stranded, poems in hand, at the last-minute in Salcombe and Simon Inglis stuck up at Edinburgh Fringe, it’s down to yours truly (Crispin) and Jeff The Fuse to fly the Poets flag at this unique football and musical fest.

It’s a steaming Bank Holiday Saturday, and without a motorway in site, we drive down from Stroud in blue skies and eighty odd degrees,listening to Morcheeba and Radio 5, winding our way through village lanes and tiny back-roads to this oasis of footy. Picture the scene.Two immaculate pitches, a huge camp-site, three big marquees, with music, beer and food. There are teams in every colour sprawled and playing everywhere… buses from Germany, Holland and god knows where. It’s Hackney Marshes meets Glastonbury on acid! Shaved headed and long-haired teams of young and old compete and joke in the sun with dance music blasting from cafes and tents.A feeling of bohemia and footy anarchy abounds, a spirit of freedom and grass roots supremacy.

There are May Day flags and one that declares boldly Freedom Through Football (shouldn’t that read Football Poetry?) ah well…. and.. even when it strikes 5pm no-one makes a bee-line for a radio to find out how the straight world of footy is getting on….who cares…this is where the real game is played..stuff em! And what do you need straight after a game… that’s right Football Poetry(!!) so with the heat still relentless… and the generator for the PA still arriving by tractor (it’s that kind of festival)… we manage to get our slot put back to 7.30pm as it’s just too hot for anyone to think about being in tents… (i mean, who wants to be INTENSE at a festival- crap pun-sorry). Anyway despite the farmy-smell back-stage It’s a decent PA, cool sound-people…and someone hands me 16 bottles of beer(!)…WOW – A rider !

We’re on in the main marquee…before the bizarre Gong for Europe talent competition… we end up doing fifty minutes of poetry and music to children and monged out players who form a decent crowd around the tent… by the end..and clap and laugh in all the cool places…by the end we’ve got kids at our feet pulling at Tweetie Pie resplendent here in his Football Poets T-Shirt and smiling faces… the punk version of “What’s So Wrong About Wanting To Marry A Soccer Star”and “The Price Of A Beer”( a new poem/song about immoral ticket prices and being reduced to watching Sky) go down well …as i read Stuart’s Zapatista poem for the day to bemused beer-swilling blokes and their girl-friends …basically we just enjoy ourselves ….who was it said life isn’t a rehearsal (Geoff Hurst or was it Nabakov?) anyway it’s a great vibe here.. Jeff is on form on guitar..it flows well… people are
chilling and one or two even dancing(!) we end on old favourites “Superstore” and the new version of Murray Lachlan Young’s “Being Followed By The Rolling Stones” ….i even get to wear my new blue wings (sad eh?) that i bought at Arlington Festival last weekend…and turning round at one point ask the audience to “Look At The Wings On That” in praise of the sexist comments men usually make about women at such events!.We go down ok.(he wrote humbly)..we’re promised a later slot next time..and are invited back..it’s a hard job but someone’s gotta take the football poetry to the people.haven’t they..or are we alone out there?

A great event….well done to the Cowboys .. and thanks for having us….
Un-biased(!) Report by Crispin Thomas
(find out more about Easton Cowboys and see pics of the event at www.hemalimodha.co.uk./eastoncowboys

GIGS – A BUSY SUMMER….
Summer with Out To Lunch has been busy ,we’ll have done seven festivals and met some great people along the way at Tiverton, Larmer Tree Festival, Energy 21, Arlington Folk Fest, Malborough and now Thornecombe… we’re looking forward to WORD UP (Out To Lunch with the Football Poets) at the Stroud Fringe – Saturday Sept 8th.. It’s totally free so come along and chill……Football Poetry Workshops in the morning and a great gig in the afternoon…..there’s details about the day on these pages …seeya there!

for details of up-coming Out To Lunch Poetry & Music gigs/festivals go to www.ctmuk.com/outtolunch

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