Fans of spoken word will be excited to hear of the return of Reading Between the Lines (RBTL) this evening (Friday) from 8pm.
Spearheaded by Tim Martin, the event will be held over Zoom, with highlights added to YouTube, and links for the room posted to the RBTL Collective Facebook page.
Every Friday during lockdown
During lockdown, the events take place every Friday night (8pm) and beyond that, Tim says they’re looking at something online once a month, with very occasional live events in physical spaces.
Apricot Jam Poetry Slam
Tonight’s instalment – Friday 13th – will be very much an open-mic affair.
Tim told News OnTheWight,
“We’re reviving the ‘Apricot Jam Poetry Slam’ that we used to run at Isle of Wight Festival.
“The winner gets a jar of delicious locally-made jam sent to them – when we’re in a slightly safer post-Covid environment – as well as a featured slot at a future event.”
Special guests
Next week – Friday 20th – sees an addition to the open-mic, with featured sets from the RBTL Collective’s own Doris Doolally and Adam Gaterell, as well as a headline set from Improv Poet and DNB MC wunderkind, Gramski.
Expect equally brilliant special guests for future events.
Zines, EPs, and inspiration
As if that’s not enough, he’s also looking into setting up a short-run press for pamphlets/zines/EPs and the like as well as running daily writing prompts on social media, in case people are feeling the itch to write, but struggling with inspiration.
Improving accessibility
Tim told News OnTheWight,
“Initially it’s just for a bit of fun during the second lockdown, but longer-term, I’m researching into closed captioning, and other ways we can use video conferencing to make spoken word more readily available to folks with accessibility issues.”
Head over to the RBTL Collective Facebook Page or Instagram Account to find out more.
Image: freestocks.org under CC BY 2.0
