Niall O'Sullivan – Poet

For anyone that didn’t make it, here’s an video of my set at Utter! Evolution a few nights back, click on the “facebook” icon in the top right hand corner to watch it in HD. It was a quality night, with great performances by Baba Brinkman and Kelly Swain. Big kudos is due to Charlie Dupree, who not only wrote some blinding new material, showing a real grasp of the concept, but also memorised the whole lot and performed it seamlessly. Richard Tyrone Jones was his usual charismatic self, energising the room despite having a bad case of the lurgy. Robin Ince headlined the show, and while he confessed to being grouchy after commuting from Brighton, it certainly put some fire in his belly as he gave both barrels to Anne Coulter and some similarly tactless audience members. It was a great end to a great night.

While I am always grateful to be asked to do a whole set of my human evolution poems, I don’t think I was at my best here. Call me a prima dona, but I’m just never that comfortable with the sound of a crowded bar filtering through as I read. I’m not a “between bands” type poet, so I appreciate having a bit of silence to play off, apart from after I’ve told a joke, of course…

The look of disappointment on my face when I find myself dealing with a drunk at the very beginning is completely genuine, though I turned it into a one liner. I’ve dealt with enough drunks and hecklers in my time and made good sport of it, but I really wanted this gig to be different.

That said, I learn twice as much in front of an audience than when reciting at home and I’m certainly stronger with the new material because of it. Apart from the occasional intruding voice, the audience were pleasant and smart enough and the evening carried on from strength to strength. I’m beginning to quite enjoy going on first too, where the price of a slightly cold audience is offset by the benefit of being able to have a beer a bit earlier and enjoy the rest of the show. Big thanks to any of you that turned up and much gratitude to Richard Tyrone Jones for including me on such a great night with such a strong line up.