Plectrum - The Cultural Pick Live Edition

Event information

An evening of live music, film screening, ghost stories, rock ‘n’ roll poetry, and more. Featuring:

Madam
(Presented in collaboration with Kaparte Promotions: http://www.kaparte.info/)
Playing live, with a special electro-acoustic set

Fronted by the charismatic chanteuse, Sukie Smith, Madam's noirish, nocturnal music brings to mind PJ Harvey, Portishead, and Cat Power at their smokey, intoxicating, late night best. Earlier this year the band released their second album, Gone Before Morning, which like their first, In Case of Emergency (2008), has received widespread critical acclaim. Whilst Sukie also wrote the soundtrack for Neophyte Films’ debut feature film, Hush Your Mouth - an ‘urban ghost story’, which won Best Film and Best Director at the Portugal Film Festival 2011

Praise for Madam and Gone Before Morning:

**** - Q Magazine

“Sultry, slightly spooked, and lusciously late night Americana noir” - Time Out

“lots of dark, sinister undertones, and her voice is sultry and dangerous with a hint of vulnerability and skewed glamour… one to look out for” – Mail on Sunday

“Throughout her music Madam affects the listener in many ways; her evocative vocals leave you wanting more” – Aesthetica

“Ten tracks to treasure create highly atmospheric vignettes of pleasure taken in a moment, love that lasts a weekend, lies told in the name of love, and lovers that cannot risk staying in the same place too long” – Plectrum – The Cultural Pick

Madam: www.madam.org.uk

Syd Moore
reading from her debut novel, The Drowning Pool:
“a stunning reinvention of the ghost story and an exploration of a 19th-century Essex witch hunt” – The Guardian
telling the often chilling background story to the book, and giving a special taster of her next book, Afterlife.

Syd Moore’s debut novel, The Drowning Pool, is inspired by the legend of a 19th century Essex woman: the Sea Witch, Sarah Moore. It was published by Avon in September and is currently number one in the Amazon Horror Charts.

She is also co-creator of Super Strumps, the game that reclaims female stereotypes through the medium of Top Trumps, and was founding editor of Level 4, an arts and culture magazine based in South Essex. She has worked extensively in publishing and the book trade and presented three series of Channel 4’s late night book programme, Pulp.

She is currently completing her second book, Afterlife, which looks into the Essex witch hunts of the 17th century, and the career of Matthew Hopkins, the self-styled Witchfinder General.

Praise for The Drowning Pool:


‘a stunning reinvention of the ghost story and an exploration of a 19th-century Essex witch hunt’ - The Guardian

‘Moore’s novel, with its connections between past and present, is a mustread for historical fiction fans. Its vivid descriptions will leave even the toughest of souls with goose pimples’ – Closer magazine

‘a goose-pimply old-fashioned ghost story’ - Christopher Fowler, author of the Bryant and May series

Syd Moore: www.facebook.com/pages/Syd-Moore


Bad Obsession (Dir. Ed Edwards, 14m, UK)
Screening introduced by the film’s writer and producer, Sam Edwards.

Two North London teenage girls, Lottie and Nickie, wake up from a wild night out, worried about a boy who has been stalking them only to find out that he is waiting for them outside the house…

Sam Edwards
Performing Rock ‘n’ Roll poetry about madness and bad behaviour, including her new poems, which are published for the first time in issue 10 of P-TCP, and poems from her first collection, Sodium, in front of a looped photographic backdrop created exclusively for this event by photographer and film director, Ed Edwards.
Writer, poet, film producer, Sam Edwards, is the daughter of a 1960s wild child and a one-time rock star who turned his back on fame to head up a religious cult deep in the English countryside. After working in the television industry for many years, in 2008 she founded the film production company, Ragged Crow, with director Ed Edwards.

Sam Edwards: www.facebook.com/pages/Sam-Edwards-Poet-Writer-Independent-Film-Producer

Hosted by Guy Sangster Adams, editor of Plectrum – The Cultural Pick magazine.
www.theculturalpick.com

On sale on the night:
Performers’ CDs and books at special prices; which they will be happy to sign.
Plus:
Issue 10 (Nov/Dec 2011) of Plectrum – The Cultural Pick.