Last night'’s show at The Swan presented a challenge because the work I had been doing in the studio had digressed away from the performance poetry that I had in mind when I proposed this shows many weeks ago.

The shows with Bob & Roberta Smith had given me a safe space in which to establish my performance poetry and gain acceptance though Bob'’s kind patronage. However, I had been criticised for placing my work within the safe bubble of white cube galleries. People expect to be challenged by contemporary art; therefore paradoxically challenging people in art galleries is sometimes not that challenging.

I am good friends with a punk band from Ipswich called Skreworm, they are Frogstock regulars and they had given The Blo Boys a few gigs when nobody else would dare. Following a discussion about John Copper Clarke, they had kindly give me a slot reading poetry in-between the band at last night's gig in a pub in Ipswich. It was a challenge to see if I could face down an audience outside of the art gallery. Punks appealed to me because they are usually culturally active people, but not so cynically art-savvy.

I had recorded a podcast for Motif radio a couple of weeks previously for which I had cobbled together some new material to temp listeners who had heard my previous set quite a lot of times by now. I was still uncertain about the new material, as it had not been presented live before and I had not yet received much comment from the podcast. I nervously had shuffled much of this new material to the side, but when I got to the venue last night I realised my time slot was longer than I expected and I need to include any extra material I had to hand. One piece in particular concerned me which was entitled ‘Democracy of Mediocracy as it dealt with politics in a confrontational manner. I was very aware that political art can be a bad move and this risk of failure became all too tempting for me.

The response to the show was mixed. The favoritesites received a good response, as did a revised version of ‘Tomorrow's World’ which I had finally got to work after several failed attempts. Following the first half of set I was approached by offers of more gigs. The second half of the set was to a drunker audience and contained the new material, which was sweetened by sofavoritesourites such as Angry Badger. There was a distinct sense of unease in places judging by some of the whispering between the more stony faced members of the audience. At my next gig I might put a video camera behind me and record the audiences response rather than my performance. What I do is not just light entertainment, I want it to provoke the audience. Whispering in the audience is good.

After the show I received several comments from people at the bar, I had a suspicion some them had presumed I'd done a runner when I went to the toilets to change out of my costume.

One young chap at said that I had “balls” to stand up there and say that stuff, he sounded impressed but added “you can'’t dance to it”.

Another girl approached who was from a commune who were involved with some of the other bands performing that evening and offered me a gig at a Green Fair. She was impressed I'd dared to get up there and say what I said and she no doubt wanted that kind of attitude for an politically motivated event. I responded that I was sorry if it freaked people out, but she replied :

“maybe you're saying something the bands can't say”.