Moggelin.

Yeah check this out I'm in someone else's blog.

House Of Billiam

Industry people

My half-cousin twice removed was saying yesterday how he wants to be an industry person.

I told him if there’s one kind of person I unequivocally hate then it’s fucking industry people. Dirty-nosed, pin-striped, fileofax-weilding, no-talent, art-raping idea thieves.

Make’s me want to start shitting into padded envelopes and posting them round to all the industry offices. Even though I know full well that they’ve got some volunteering cock-sucker of an art school graduate who’s sole purpose for existing is to make regular trips to Nero for skinny decafe what’s-the-fucking-point lattes and to spend around 3 hours a day filtering all the incoming mail so as to make sure all my envelopes were spotted before they reached their intended targets. Poor little wannabe fuck-job.

The way that I’d do it would be to drop my load on a sheet of A4 grease-proof paper, fold the paper in half secluding my secretion in the belly of the fold, then carefully stuff the folded paper into the envelope, seal it with gaffa-tape, and beat it flat with a table-tennis bat. 

This way when the package is opened and it’s contents tipped out onto the desk, 

the paper should unfold upon landing revealing a filthy, stinking, toothless, corn-ridden, Rorschach butterfly smiling back at him. 

A virtual mirror of an industry person’s heart.

"Looks like we got us a reader"

At one point last night I was in a room in the upstairs of an East end pub while a group of about 40 fairly cultured people chanted Rape at an 18 year old girl.

[Edit: She's contacted me on Face book, 

Turns out she's only 16].

Had a gig init,

I know what yu thinking, after last months fairly well publicized notoriously "Bad Gig" I bet some of you are surprised to see folk are still willing to book me. (To be honest this had been booked for ages and the new booking ain't exactly flooding in), 

but Berko's still on the circuit. 

Infact I'd like to take this opportunity to commend the bravery of the promoter, Jody Porter, who'd already booked me but choose not to sack me off. Even though I'm pretty sure he must have got a lot of negative pressure from the promoters guild, (I feel reasonably confident in asserting that there must be some kind of guild/co-op of promoters who meet on regular occasions to discuss my blog, it's just like the coalition of psychoanalysts who meet to discuss the validity of my deluded assertions).  

Anyway, Nice one Jody. 

14 hour at the griffin

Shorditch London

right this one was a bit different to the kind of gigs I normally do,

This time I was asked to read, Yeah "Read" not just talk like what I normally do.

tell yu the truth,

I'm not much of a reader.

But the idea of it made me nervous and excited in the kind of way that teenagers get right before their first sexual experience.

Yu know the feeling of really wanting to do it but not completely understanding the mechanics of it. Hoping to think that I'd probably be good at this but at the same time not completely sure that I'd know how to do it right.

Right, I was the headline which meant that I got to watch a couple of actual readers doing there thing before I came along to lower the tone,

One of these readers was a girl called Ash.

She did a few things, some were about relationships/sex etc.

One of her poems included a list of things that were better than sex and she pointed into the audience for us to shout out our own suggestions.

I shouted Vagina and it sort of through her off, but to be honest she opened that can of beans when she pointed her finger at ol' Berxy.

Anyway, it was this girl Ash that they were chanting at,

she offered us a choice for her last poem. It was either one about a girl who got raped or one about her ex I think.

it took literally seconds for the "Rape" chant to start.

In the end I found myself standing up in front of the girl calling for the crowd to back down, 

Shit was like the Colosseum,

In retrospect I imagine after the whole vagina thing, the sight of me lumbering towards her as an excited crowd incessantly chanted "Rape, Rape, Rape, Rape," might have been a bit daunting, I'd like to hope the memory should at least stay with her for a couple of days.

I was on next, here's how I opened my part of the show.

thanks to Inua for filming.

I actually read some sections of this blog and an edited version of the first 3 chapters of DogMan.

If your interested in DogMan you can read it all if yu like. Here it is.

All in all it seemed that everyone in the room was into what I was doing, 

everyone, the crowd, the promoter, even me.

I think this might be the beginning of a new style of gig for me. Berkavitch the Reader. Crazy.

Oh and in case all you people were wondering. No I didn't get paid. But I didn't want paying, it had been arranged. Basically it's a free entry night run by good people who do it for the love of what they do. 

Yeah they actually love it.

Thing is I love it to yu see, and it's all about supporting the events that support the people who do what we all love.

Berko out.

"for many years in the future I will be fascinated by time travel",

this blog for example, exists in multiple times,

right now it is only 2 lines long and only exists as an idea from the past about the future being brought into existence now. In the present.

When I wrote that in the past it was true but right now in the present as your reading this then that might seem confusing, if you ever read this passage again in the future it'll probably make more sense,

OK

In the past when I thought about writing this my plan was to read it out in front of a crowd in a room in London, In the present this is still my plan. 

In the future I have achieved this, in fact that's happening right now, In this room with these people,

I am filming it here in the present, I plan to put the video on youtube in the future, when I do it'll appear in the past as if it was always there, 

See 

If you where in the video of the past and it looks like I don't know you, that's because I haven't met you yet, I'm gunna do that now.

"hello,

what's your name,

good to meet you"

see perhaps time is an unchangeable constant and all our destinies are predetermined,

or maybe I'm just talking shit, there is no video, I never read this out, we never met, the future is undetermined and the past was written earlyer today.

Who watches what I'm watching?

you know what this is.

It's Berko's occasional foray into telling yu about things to watch,

I'm gunna build it in though.

check it out

I've been doing a lot of youth projects of late, (I figured I should try and give something back to da yute dem).

On one project I had a 14 year old girl called Sophie tell me,

"Yu know what yeah? If you got a decent hair cut, had a shave and got some nice clothes then you might be alright yu know, not alright to fancy like, but alright as a mate."

I told her if she was about 10 years older and didn't have a mouth like an arse then she might be alright an all,

anyway on a different project I'm working with a graphic novelist called Al Davison a.k.a. the Astral Gypsy.
Al is one of the most inspirational people I have ever met so check him out.
Al has made me want to develop moments from my life into comic form, so I've been drawing a lot on the last few weeks.
He made his own life story into a graphic novel called The Spiral Cage
and the forward is written by Alan Moore.
Yeah Alan Moore........ who wrote Watchmen. (Bang d'yu see how I linked it).
So anyway I've just finished watching the Watchmen motion comics, (torrent link)
It's the graphic novel set in motion, It's like a cartoon but it's not a cartoon. Feels like a film because of the angles yu get me.
I'm saying it's probably one of the best things I've ever seen. And I fucking mean that.

This is an edited version with Alan Moore reading the duologue

I really like the character Rorschach,
The one with the mask that changes to different "blot-test" patterns.
Down load the torrent and watch it eh.
Anyway the films out now init.
I'm actually gunna go the the cinema.
yeah not downloading. can you imagine?
We're going in a group of us, bout 10 I reckon, and we've been talking about taking masks so we can fight some crime on the way home.
I've been a vigilante once before and it was one of the best moments of my life.
Tell yu about it next time.

here's a Rorschach test yu can do yourself, write down what you think each blot looks like and email it to me.

The other side of the Lectern.

I was on it yesterday yu know.
I had to give a talk at a University,
Well I say talk, it was more just an introduction,
and I say University, it was actually Demonfort.
I was actually introducing one of the special guests they had for the cultural exchanges thing that's been going on all this week.
Big up Demontfort for this week, there's been some good people on, Lemn Sisay, Billy Brag,

They got me in cos this time their guest was my mate, JONZI D. so it made sense for me to big him up eh.

if you don't know Jonzi then click his big name up there and have a look.
He's basically one of hiphop theatre's pioneers. Hiphop theatre is basically theatre made in the audio/visual language of hiphop and it's elements. The hiphop elements are basically rapping, breaking, djing, graffiti and beatbox. so that's basically it.
Basically

see I worked with Jonzi since 2006 and we've spent a lot of time talking about hiphop as a language so if yu want I can get less basic.
in fact that shit gets as deep as time travel.
Right I ain't telling yu bout Jonzi's talk cos he does um all over the place so catch it yu self. Trust me though it's worth a listen.

here's my role in the day as a list of actions and observations.

Enter building,

follow signs to hospitality suit,

sit watching excited faces talking through smiles at nodding Jonzi,

watch Jonzi process information before spilling answers into hungry ears,

hungry myself now,

ask about buffet and smile as am pointed in it's direction,

sandwiches spread thinly over mostly empty table, run my fingers through them,

fillings unfamiliar,

put tea bag in cup,

fill cup with hot coffee,

realise mistake and back away from table empty handed,

they're calling me now,

follow people down stairs and into room,

more excited faces pregnant with promise and anticipation, naive vestals ready to be filled from Jonzi's fountain of hiphopology,

2 o'clock now I stand at lectern,

recant story of our first meeting

Jonzi smiles, story finishes,

We awkwardly embrace,

I sit, writing this,

Jonzi finishes speaking people leave,

we leave to.