Originally from the concrete swamps of Stockport, Rev Porl has been performing as a Poet since 1995. He has appeared at poetry events organised by Commonword and the Green Room Theatre, and has appeared at Manchester Poetry Festival in 1999 and at the Manchester Literature Festival in 2006. The main thrust of his work though has been to bring poetry to non-poetry audiences, usually by appearing as a compere or support act to bands playing at venues such as Night and Day, the Star and Garter, Retro Bar and the Roadhouse. He has supported veteran Punk bands the UK Subs, GBH and the Subhumans, has appeared with Attilla the Stockbroker and Nick Toczek and has performed throughout most of England and Wales bearing sharp shades, a pint of something lethal and a big pink cross.


In 2001 he teamed up with City Life’s unsigned band of the year Superstring to produce “Reverend Strings the Blues” an album featuring the Revs spoken word rants and surreal stories over harsh electronic backing, which appeared in 2002, and in 2005 they teamed up again for the more collaborative and melodic “Hablo Diablo”, a track from which ended up on rotation play in a chain of hairdressers in Japan! Since Hablo’s release, he (and primary collaborator Stuart Crozier) have strived to put together a group of musicians who could recreate the tracks in a live environment, and this led to the formation of the 8 piece “Rev Porl and the Voice of God” who have played a number of showcase gigs and continue to perform when the members other commitments allow. 2007 should see the release of an album featuring the whole band. He is also contributing lyrics and vocals to the next album by Welsh punk band “The Pain”, and attempting to bum-rush the stage whenever they play.


Since 2003, he has also been involved in the Speakeasy project, bringing together the cream of Manchester Spoken word artists with musicians from a variety of disciplines in a quarterly event at the GreenRoom theatre.
Rev Porls philosophy is that a poet can and should be as engaging and entertaining as a stand up or a singer, and if audiences see a poet performing in an environment where they don’t expect to, hopefully their view of poetry as the stuff of high art or ivory towers might shift a little. Or they might at least get the poet a pint….or get out of the way.

http://www.revporl.com/
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