Hello from old London town. I would gush forth with interesting tidbits and witticisms except I am completely and utterly fucked. Nothing like a 24 hour flight accompanied by my sacred lady time to complete knock the stuffing and a fair amount of iron out me.

I'm reclining on my friends couch, hoping to recuperate in time for OPENING NIGHT! Yes I am about to hit the tour trail in the UK with an international poetry group. 9 Poets from all over the world could be heading to your town so check out where we're going and come and so hi.

I promise to be witty then, otherwise stay tuned for results. It's a poetry slam tour which means there'll be a winner every night as voted by the audience. Fingers crossed!

The Hammer and Tongue Four Continents Slam

The four corners of the globe slam together

Event: The Four Continents Slam: UK Tour
Dates: Tuesday 24th November 7th December 2006
Venue: London, Cambridge, Leicester, Bolton, Nottingham, Leeds, Newcastle, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Brighton, Oxford, Reading, Bristol

Some of the best spoken word artists that the world has to offer will come together next month for Hammer and Tongue’s “Four Continents Slam Tour”. The tour will take teams of top performers from Africa, North America, Europe and Australasia to tour the UK in a series of high profile poetry slams.

A poetry slam is a high-energy performance poetry competition held in public where random members of the audience are asked to judge the competitors with an Olympic-style scoring system. The result, invariably is high octane, highly entertaining performance that is both exciting and relevant to the audience.

The Artists:

Europe:

Elvis McGonagall (Scotland) - The current world slam champion
Henry Bowers (Sweden) - World slampionships runner-up 2005

Africa:

Kojo Baffoe (South Africa) - Monstafunk productions supremo
Ardreattah Chuma (Botswana) - Star of Exodus Live Poetry

North America:

John Akpata (Canada) - Capital Slam Champion 2005
Sonya Renee (USA) - 2004 US National Slam Champion

Australasia

Penny Ashton (New Zealand) - Critically acclaimed comedy poet
Thom the World Poet (Aus) – Legendary traveling street poet

Hosted by:

Steve Larkin (England) - Spoken Word Olympic International Champion


London - Fri 24th Nov, 7:30, The Cochrane Theatre, Southampton Row, London 020 7269 1606
Cambridge - Sat 25th Nov 7:30, Mumford Theatre, Anglia Ruskin University, East Road, Cambridge, CB1 1PT, 0845 196 2320
Leicester - Sun 26th Nov, 8pm, Firebug, 1 Millstone Lane, Leicester, LE1 5JN 01865 200550 Leeds - Mon 27th Nov 8pm, Brudenell Social Club , 33 Queens Rd, Leeds, LS6 1NY, 0113 275 2411
Bolton - Tue 28th Nov 8pmThe Phoenix, Bolton, Lancashire BL1 2BG www.writeoutloud.net Nottingham - Wed 29th Nov 8pm Canal House, 48-52, Canal St, Nottingham, Nottinghamshire NG1 7EH, Tel: 0115 955 5060
Newcastle - Thu 30th Nov 8pmThe Cluny, 36 Lime St, Newcastle Upon Tyne, NE1 2PQ 0191 2331113
Glasgow - Sat 2nd Dec 8pmThe Halt Bar , 160 Woodlands Road, Glasgow, G3 6LF, 0141 352 9996
Edinburgh - Sun 3rd Dec 8pmBongo Club, 37 Holyrood Rd, Edinburgh, Midlothian EH8 8BA, 0131 558 7604
Brighton - Mon 4th Dec 8pm Komedia, 44-46, Old Steine, Brighton, East Sussex BN1 1NH, 01273 320399
Oxford - Tue 5th Dec 8pm Zodiac, 190 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 01865 420042
Reading - Wed 6th Dec 8pm South Street Arts Centre, 21 South St, Reading 0118 901 5234 Bristol - Thu 7th Dec 8pmThe Polish Club, 50 St. PaulÂ’s Rd, Clifton, Bristol, 07771900583

check http://www.hammerandtongue.co.uk/ NB not .org