Punk Site Poetry With Cherry B: The Bewildering Experience Of Attending A Stadium Gig

Cherry B is our punked up pumped up performance poet, who has been described as the The Punk Pam Ayers and The Cockney Cooper Clarke, she has returned with The Bewildering Experience Of Attending A Stadium Gig, her latest exclusive poem for The Punk Site. Cherry B had this to say about the poem: “This poem sums up how overwhelmed I felt being in such a huge space with a different tribe of ‘normalness’. I love the Arctic Monkeys, especially their last two albums which is a maturity in words. What I’ve learnt from writing this poem, is that I too have to accept their choices (audience) and that we all came together to enjoy the music.“

The Bewildering Experience Of Attending A Stadium Gig

Every now and then, to be honest quite rarely,

I step outside my world and reality hits squarely.

I get to witness behaviour, not clever or big,

Of audience types at a stadium gig.

Like an ant colony, forever undulating up and down,

Pints in plastic beakers, costing fourteen pound.

Armies of youth, descending on the lash,

And the requiem plays its bereavement tune to cash.

I heard you, taking the piss out of my hair,

But to be honest, I really don’t care.

It was heartwarming to recognise stupidity,

You was so unimportant I was blinded by your invisibility.

And so it began, the swarms of blandness and lack of style,

Swigging from cheap bottles of alcoholic chemicals, turned into bile.

Matching t shirts confirm the lack of identity, the uniform of fools,

White trainers, shorts and swaggering balls.

The sense that you don’t embrace this world much,

That to be honest your music taste is out of touch.

A hit song from your youth that you sing along,

Arms flailing above your head as you get the words wrong.

Do you actually listen to what is being said?

And take on board the sentiment and the poetry they have read?

Do you actually know who wrote ‘I wanna be yours?’

And respect their heroes and believe in their cause?

Because here stands a band that has changed in their years,

Their levels of depth and how their writing appears.

Yeah they charged on the scene and got your attention,

But now their crushed velvet songs you’d rather not mention.

Depth versus shallow, are bedfellows of woe,

And the love for their music, unites us I know.

We enter the territory which is neutral to share,

And learn to accept what we both cannot bare.

Author, writer, poet, psychotherapist, professional swearer, dyspraxic and opinionated, words that define and illuminate qualities that feature within the personality of Cherry B. Straddling the Shakespearean themes of comedy and tragedy, teasing with laughter, then taunting those undesirables in society. One half of the unique Cherry & Peesh, who have embellished the punk ‘n folk scene with melodical tales and catchy tunes for the past five years. The duo also released an album last year, Dont Make It Easy On Yourself, are currently working on a new album and EP and will also be appearing at Blackpool’s Rebellion Festival. Cherry B is also collating her new book for publishing later this year and will be compering at Unity Fest in August.

“Coming up, triple header for me this weekend, Huddersfield with Carol Hodge and Dan Sealey (Ocean Colour Scene) on Friday. Then back to the 1 in 12 club Bradford, with Rites of Hadda. Then with Peesh at the Hope & Anchor London with Headsticks. We have almost completed our new album called ‘Bigot’s Banquet’ which is released at the end of July, we have two promotional gigs in Sunderland then too.” (Cherry B)

Cherry B‘s collection of poetry and lyrics, Job Lot Of Rhymes, is available via Flapjack Press. Job Lot Of Rhymes spans three decades of Cherry B’s performance work. Political, societal and inclusive, it is uncompromising and passionate punk ’n roll poetics firing from the belly of social conscience. Cherry B also appears on her monthly radio show on Louder Than War Radio, Poetry Is The New Rock ’N Roll, that offers an hour of lyric led, spoken versed, genre smashing, musical adventure into the exploration of hidden poetry, that is often camouflaged behind powerful rhythms and riffs.