So recently it was announced that Alan Vega of the band suicide had passed away, for me this was the first musicians death that made me cry. I didn’t weep for Bowie, Prince, Poly Styrene or Lou Reed. But Vega was the one who made me fucking weep for hours, I was kind of a lost soul the entire day. But I got thinking why was it Vega who broke my tear virginity? I think it’s in no small part to how much Suicide means to me and the impact they’ve had on my ability to preform both inspiration wise and on the scene. I could go on and on about their music and how they contributed to the acceptance of synths in music that we all embrace today, but I’d rather concentrate on Vega and performance aspect. Besides someone else can probs do the music history lesson better them me.

So for those of you who follow my blog you’ll know that while the stuff I write is mostly tame love poems, the stuff I PREFORM however is a lot less so. Most of my performance stuff is based around screaming one word 80 times and putting some prose around it every now and then. In a town like Colchester where we get a lot of the London crowd a.k.a the kind of people that just want to see THAT ONE POEM preformed again and again by white middle class people, needless to say I’m not always well received, even when I cave and do preform the love poem stuff! In those times, like when I’m preforming at a Folk Festival and some 35 year old twat shouts “What is this crap? Where’s his fucking guitar!?” I often think of Suicide, and very often think of their gig in Brussels

For those who don’t know, Vega would often preform his songs not unlike how you’d preform a spoken word poem, at the time of the first album anyways. At the tamest you’d get stuff like Ghost Rider where it’s like delivering the lyrics with a rockabilly tint, at the most abrasive you’d get stuff like ‘Frankie Teardrop’ which involved Vega doing HOWLING screams after preforming lyrics about a man putting a gun chamber to his 6 month old baby’s head and killing it. Couple this with his backing being Rev’s synths at a time where going to a musical gig without a guitar was grounds for a death warrant. THEN imagine that when your opening for Elivs Costello and the only thing in the way of him and the crowd is you…. yeah they put up with a lot of shit needless to say. If you can listen to the recording of them in Brussels I 100% recommend it, it’s an experience

But I don’t think it’s a stretch to attribute the fact I can preform my poems screaming about BPD or screaming about giving a lady multiple orgasms so she’ll buy you a milkshake, with literally ZERO fear of having my teeth kicked in… Well to Suicide’s work with preforming live taking the brunt of that aggression. Vega sort of taught me no matter the kind of performance and art you want to show people, no matter how little ‘conventional talent’ or appeal you have. Keeping on with something real for you and showing the world with enough conviction, you’ll start to change things and change lives. Gotta keep those dreams alive, even if no poetry elitist cunt from London wants to accept me, if my poetry can help one person then I’ll have achieved my dreams~