call it cross promotion.

So as an up and coming alternative artist, you got to promote yourself until you're big enough for it to be someone elses job to do it, but sometimes, actually often, its a tricky task. a strange one at that, my mum after all raised me to be modest so it always feels weird to give myself props.

if only someone else would do it for me. recently i was discussing this with my mate b-ski, AKA comedian David Deery, and we stumbled on a brilliant idea, why not team forces and combine writing skills to big each other up???!!

and so, without further ado i present....

Motherf**kin David Deery.................




Its no secret that I’ve always had a thing for skinny hipster boys with glasses, especially if they’re funny. But David Deery is NOT a hipster.

Don’t be deceived by the glasses, the bike, the hoodie, the ironic t-shirt, the admiration for Dilla, Dylan and dubstep, the fact he lives in Berlin, the jeans that may be tight sometimes but are not, I repeat NOT skinny. Are you listening?? I’m here to set the record straight ok!!

DAVID DEERY IS NOT A HIPSTER!!!!!!!!!!

But believe, this boy is most definitely hip, insanely funny
and very very angry…

Angry? Yes angry, about all sorts of things... but particularly..

1. Grocery stores that close on Sundays. (Germany are you listening?!!)
2. Protesters/Demos. (If he had his way he would put on one big Demonstration to protest all of the protesters once and for all.
3. Girl’s boyfriends. (Dude get over it. I mean its not his fault she wants him ok??!!!)
4. Bands without instruments. (Because really kids, without your American apparel, twitter, your iphone, and your hairdresser, where would you be?
5. The word “Hipster” . (Do not, I mean really do not EVER get him started on this. I can’t possibly warn you enough. )

David Deery is like a hip crazy indie comedy superhero. He may not be invincible but he is what like to call ROCKET SOBER!!!

The only man in all of Berlin’s seething narcotic alcoholic nightlife that never ever drinks.

I know I know, I don’t believe it either, but then again, between his passion for knocking back club mate’s and his insatiable sexual appetite, he more than makes up for it.

And ladies he may even let you call him a hipster, if you’re hot, and willing to go home with him enough.

David Deery will make you believe in reincarnation. What am I saying? Let me clarify, this man has had too many lives to count. Go on ask him, ask him.

Buy him a mate’, let him tell you about:

• The hip hop dj days
• or the time touring with that indie rock band
• or any of the major musicians he’s supported
• or go further back to when he was a graffiti artist
• or further still to the skateboarding

Maybe that’s why he laughs at hipsters, because most of them really aren’t hip enough.

Oh by the by ladies, did I mention that his record collection is (I have to take a deep breath here) GI-NORMMMMMOUS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! What it comes down to my darlings, is this…

David Deery is probably funnier than you, a lot funnier than you, probably funnier than ALL of your friends.

But don’t be intimidated by that, because you couldn’t find an easier guy to talk to. You can ask him anything, better yet, just get him a mate’ , prepare to laugh yourself blind, as he talks about well...whatever he wants...

Only remember this, he is not, most Definitely not....

A hipster . ==========

oh and by the by, in case you wonder what that comic wonder wrote about me,
click on the link here...

lets make tracks....

gosh. this project has been a long time coming.....

After a poetry workshop run by Apples and Snakes, Jonas McCloud and Paula Varjack got talking on the back of a 242 bus to Hackney East London, in a mixture of german and english. This dialogue on hip hop, spoken word and cultural identitly led to an ongoing musical collaboration. The result of which is their first EP,
Lets Make tracks...
released online in a matter of weeks. i bet you wonder what it sounds like right??? well, lucky for you jonas mcloud has mixed this tasty little teaser mix...
PaulaVarjack and CloudFistConceptz e.p. taster by CloudFistConceptz

Memento Mori

i’m not sure what made me think of this. but the flashback was so vivid it felt like a dream, a dream that you wake from and have to write down. and this is what i remember...

it was two winters ago, a girl friend was staying with me. it was during that time where my spare bed was rarely spare. she was between flats. that typical berlin harsh winter meant it had been weeks where we rarely went outdoors. but she was restless, she was always restless. but now she was enought to make me restless. she convinced me we needed to get out of the flat. at least for drinks. it could be any bar, it could be near, and so she coaxes me out into the night.

we go to the bar that opened across the street from my atelier. it was kind of “the place” at the time. usually chill, but always cool cute looking people. a few heads turned as we walked through the door. the windows were steamed up. i think we just about found a couple seats together, i don’t remember what we talked about, but the turning point was when i noticed a stream of people walking through the back .

there were three rooms, the third room had few seats and a kicker table. i like kicker but my girl friend wasn’t so keen. i said i’d go check out the crowd and come back to get her, but i noticed something strange when i walked through the third door. it looked like, it looked like people were dissapearing behind the wall by the kicker table, and they weren’t people who worked there, so it wasn’t some kind of store room. i’d been in berlin long enough to know back rooms and kellars were often open at random, and so i followed the next line of people who went through that "secret" door.

it was the kind of place that felt like sweat must of been dripping down the walls. so so crowded, unapologetically a fire hazard. the room was larger than any of the three that were generally open. there was another bar and a blaring pa. and the dj, a guy with glasses, maybe hair falling into his face, and some kind of ironic t-shirt, had total control of the floor. everyone was dancing. everyone was going crazy, it was that we’ve survived this winter and fuck it we’re going out vibe. once you’[ve made the effort to be out i guess you want go for it a whole lot more.

i went back and grabbed my friend, she was skeptical but then she’s generally dubious about most things. when we finally walked into that back room, even she was taken back by all of the crowd on the floor. it took no convincing then. we wanted to get dancing. the beat was building. and then my flashback meets my flashforward, because now i think of how my friend will add her bag to a towering pile against the wall, because of course there’s no cloakroom. and sometime between the first and third boy she dances with, before she goes for her wallet to buy another drink, she’ll realise someone’s been into her bag, and she doesn’t have a camera anymore.

and the track playing, kid cudi day n’ nite.

Kid Cudi - Day 'N' Nite [Crookers remix] (Directed by BBGUN) from bbgun on Vimeo.

will become massive in the charts eventually. the mc will be hailed as the new hip hop great hope. but back to the moment. i’m deeply into all of it. I hadn’t danced in months. a friend of a friend will arrive, alone. i dont’ know him that well. we’ve never been out dancing before. and as we start dancing close and then closer, in the frenzy of everyone pumping hands in the air and grinding, we’ll start kissing, kissing like mad, even though i never found him attractive before. but then it will start to feel awkward, or i’ll start to feel pressured, and i’ll start to feel like i don’t want to dance anymore.

i think then, he may try to go home with another one of my friends, and fail. i think i’ll try to find my girl friend and fail. she’ll have found another guy she’s dancing with against the door, but i don’t see her, so i decide to leave, without saying goodbye.the next track playing is even better than the last. i really want to see this dj play again, so i go up to him to get his name, but he’s too deep in the mix ,so i ask his friend. he tells me, but its too loud to make out what he’s saying. finally after the third time, i’ll think i heard him say “whiskey” and be disipointed when i go home and look it up and see i must have heard wrong. a year later, this dj will become my friend. only, he won’t be a dj anymore.

i will then try to leave, no less than five times. running into person after person i know, arriving, who will convince me to stay. and then i’ll be stopped by boys i don’t know, who like the look of me, who try to convince me to stay. until i finally get to that front room and a guy at the bar offers to buy me a shot, and i relent saying, as long as he understands i’m going home. i knock it back. he takes my hand and asks why i’m leaving. he orders a glass of wine and asks if i could stay for just a little bit more. and we talk about music i think, and its interesting enough but i’m tired now. and when he says we could continue the conversation in his flat i’m just irritated, so finally i walk out the front door.

my friend will also try to leave unsuccessfuly. she will be stopped by the bar manager who fancies her and buys her a drink. who is chatty enough, until she’s distracted by another, with who she will finally leave with and walk out the front door. and when they reach his flat, she’ll have a little panic. because he lives across the street from me . and for weeks after ,hoping to never run into him, she’s cautious entering my front door. and from time to time i’ll look out my window at the flat on the other side ,and wonder if he looks across from time to time, trying to figure out what happened to the girl from that night. i know after he definitely called her more than a few times. but she will never answer. because after that night she won’t want to see him anymore.

and that backroom, the secret back club will close. in less than three months. and then the bar itself will close, at the height of its hype, and no one will know why. hanging from the front door a sign saying “off on holiday” but it won’t open again until half a year, or more. but it won’t bother me so much because i’ll move from the atelier across the street. a rich young couple will take over the contract, all six studio spaces. and i won’t have to as much of a reason to walk up that way. soon i won’t think of it anymore.

eventually that bar will reopen. only that backroom will never reopen. and it will never feel the way it did that night.

years later, i will find myself there alone on an early sunday evening. myself the bartender and one couple in the back. watching them sit together silently with her head in his lap. as i’m sitting with my glass of red wine writing and writing and writing, writing all this, writing everything i can remember, and more .

then i’ll stop. sit back and listen to chet baker, ask the bartender to to turn it up, and wonder why the friend I texted never turned up. and i’ll think back to that night that winter and think, i don’t even want nights like that anymore.

sometimes you act and don’t know why or what you want. sometimes the actions lead you to something, and sometimes in getting that thing, you start to want something else. i don’t know what made me think of all of this. i don’t know why i had to write it down. other than it was a moment i wanted to capture for some reason. like a dream you wake up from so vivid you have to describe it. i can’t explain it anymore.. ing that time where my spare bed was rarely spare.
she w

his arrival/her departure.

As sliding doors opened, I stumbled in with my two bags and suitcase. I fought for a space to stand , as my eyes collided into his. He was good looking and seemed friendly, but there was no warmth in the stare I gave him. It was exhausted if anything. I looked down, away. Stops later I turned, and caught him looking again. I had been lost in thought. I am wearing an outfit that may have seemed trendy but also incongruous: black Chanel oversized t-shirt, oil slick black leggings, gold hightops, a leather jacket covered in studs. I still had my massive sunglasses on. There may have been mascara stains just beneath them, the remains of tears.

When it was time to get off, I fought my way through the crush of rush hour commuters. When I looked up ahead, I felt like Sisyphus at the mountain. Why oh why did this station have to have so many fucking stairs???!! Suddenly my train voyeur was there. Did I want help with my suitcase? My yes was all shades of grateful.
“ Good holiday?” he asked. In my mental state of departure, the fact I could be arriving didn’t gel. It’s funny that isn’t it, someone coming or going, how can you ever tell? Whether we are coming or going, we look the same.

I’d paused too long, he was struggling with my suitcase, but still seemed intent on hearing an answer. I mumbled..

"uh..kinda. "
“kinda a holiday?!” he smirked
“I kind of live here part of the time, so it wasn’t really a holiday. I’m on my way back to Berlin.” There was a level of exasperation in my voice. The statement sounded strange to my ears, more glamourous than the reality. What would I think if I met my doppelganger and heard such words? I’d probably want to ask what she did for a living, and look at the gold trainers and gold bag, and think about what the cities of London and Berlin had in common. I’d then decide she was either: a dj or an artist. Maybe he thought all this, maybe he just accepted it , at any rate he nodded, and in a considered way , as if putting pieces of a puzzle together said
“ Which I guess is where you live the rest of the time.”

He told me he’d be going to Vienna soon . The mention of the city cheered me up for some reason.
“Oh its gorgeous, I’ve been twice this year.”
“ Yeah… I’m from there. But I haven’t been in ten years." His accent was completely London.

"The thing is. I’m going because… I’m going to see my dad… We haven’t seen eachother in.. well… we don’t’ get on so well. "

I nodded. This was the preamble to a conversation that could be interesting or meaningful but would have to end prematurely. I saw the barriers to my line. We stopped. He needed to go the other direction. For a moment it was almost as if he was considering walking along with me. I quickly interrupted the pause.
"Good luck . it is an amazing city". I said. He handed me back my suitcase.
"Well..." he searched for something else to say. "Have a safe journey. "
"You too." I said.

I walked off, and as I reached the barriers I looked back to see him looking my direction, before turning and walking away.

Me and Marty - the post fringe fest report...

The night before Marty and I left for Edinburgh, two of our close friends were leaving Berlin for good. These leaving drinks in typical Berlin fashion stretched much later than planned. Until Marty and I were left to scramble to our flats and finish packing before taking a cab to the airport in a sleepy panic.

Only we needn't of panicked. On arriving at the airport we realise we've arrived four hours before our flight. The lack of sleep leads us further and further into delierium. After failed attempts at conversation on the plane we pass out.

Suddenly we've arrived. After briefly meeting our wonderful host Emma in the town center, we get set off exhausted in the late afternoon in Leith, taking a nap that ends up wasting most of the day. By the time we get up its fifteen minutes until that evening's Utter spoken word programme. In our haste to get dressed and ready, we jump in a cab, only to realise en route we've left the flat with no flyers... Not a good start. But at least we could check out the venue, and collect a stack of utter flyers and free fringe programmes. Utter-Covers is good fun. Afterwards we get to meet a few other performers, and see another show before deciding we'd best get to bed early so we can start early the following day.

Day two. Its time to get flyering. We kick off by half price fringe box office, but as we have arrived at peak time, about two pm or so, the area is so clogged with people we can barely find a place to stand , let alone convince people to come to our show.

Everyone around us appears to either be flyering, or desperately fleeing those who are flyering. We decide to switch locations. Martin had never been to the fringe. I had tried to describe to him the madness of the royal mile and promoting there, but I don't think he got it until we arrived. Within seconds we were nearly knocked over by a group of people dressed up like doctors, then got out of the way to stumble over a mermaid.

We tried to find the spot on the mile where people wouldn't rush past us, and had no luck. No one wanted to pause for a moment, especially to take a flyer. And then somehow by accident we stumbled on an idea. I had my camera with me. At the very least we thought if no one was going to take our flyers, we could document the act of how hard it was to flyer on the royal mile.

As soon as I had the camera out and rolling, Marty called out "Free Fringe Festival Programme" and suddenly everyone wanted the programme, our flyer, and to know who we were and why we were filming. However from what we could tell, and we spent a good few hours up and down the royal mile. NONE of these people, came to our show....

Day three, also time to move house. We leave lovely Leith to just below the royal mile, as Emma's boyfriend George kindly rents his flat to us for the last days.

Our new "back garden" has hills as far as the eyes can see. Before setting off for more flyering and then our shows, we rehearse the show. more or less while we go about the flat and get ready and make tea and such.

And as for the shows, including our preview at Utter, They were all great fun! , and we made some new friends from our audiences. I think our favourite after show comment was

"I just wish I'd been stoned for that"

Cheers James Mckay... :-)

For our second and last show, we wrote on the back of flyers that we would buy a jaeger shot for everyone who came, with a flyer. This did mean that all the money we made from that show bought the round. But it was really nice to have a little after party with our crowd in the bar. Although the bartender did look at me like i was crazy when i ordered all those shots...

What have we learned? From speaking to other performers and hearing how their runs went compared with ours, it seems like it would be helpful to be in town for longer and to have a longer run, maybe four or five days. With everything going on and

so much to see, it can take time to see even the shows you're keen to see.

For example, we saw a comedian guest in a show we stumble upon on sunday. We thought he was hilarious and were committed to making it to his show.

When we got back to the flat we saw we had his flyer already, it was in the saturday pile.. The flyer hadn't made an impression. And Even with us both keen to check out his show, it wasn't until the last day that we did (and we were late... oops)

Audience. Why do people come to one show rather than another? We thought about the shows we were convinced to go to. Most of all the key thing is a personal connection. Either you know someone, or that stranger engages with you in a way that makes you feel like you know them, or would like to. After we left Peter Bearder wrote a really helpful email giving us advice flyering. he said the the one line sell doesn't work. You have to get into conversation with people. We agree. You have to use your charisma and energy and make friends, But those new friends may not come the first day you meet them, which is why it helps to have a longer run. Guest slots also seem to make a difference in promoting . We would have liked to do some guest slots (other than Utter) before our shows. Guest slots are really helpful in making contacts, and in turn building audiences for your own show.

Probably the last thing we learned was about flyer design. We realised our flyer made a brilliant poster, but was far too busy for an a6 format. We needed one strong image, one catchy line and maybe buzzwords like "Free" "Berlin" "Cabaret" . The problem with our flyer is visually it said too much, but verbally it wasn't direct enough. Now having seeing more flyers then we ever want to see again until next year, We've learned that our flyer was not the kind we would pick up from a pile of others, or that would be memorable after taking. Now we know.

It was a brilliant experience to take a show to edinburgh, to be part of the free fringe and to be supported by the tireless and courageous efforts of Richard Tyrone Jones. It feels very special to be part of the first dedicated spoken word venue. It definitely deserves a place in the fringe. We noticed that a lot of punters are scared of the phrase "spoken word" and we think that Utter is on its way to changing that. We're grateful to be part of the free fringe. Having to pay for our own expenses with the flights, accomodation and flyers there is no way we could afford to do the fringe in any other way. We've learned so much that it would be a waste to not come back stronger next year. We are definitely keen to come back and up our game.

P.s. to all our Berlin based performer friends. We also have been thinking it would be cool to get a collective together to hit the fringe en masse next year. Going as a group (we're looking at you comedians, slammers and burlesque artists) means cross promotion, and shared help for tech... With all the hype generated by our city at the moment, I can't think of a better place to trade off of it... I'm just saying

toto, i don't think we're getting any younger...

so i was all geared up to write a post today about my current tv series obsession, but i'll have to save it, as i have discovered that today the iconic film "the wizard of oz" is seventy one. and gosh, don't she look good for her age... the film was one of those that always seemed to be playing on one channel or another when i was growing up. Its images are forever imprinted on my brain. As for the dialogue, Its arguably one of the most quoted films of its time,. (my personal favourite has generally been variations of " toto i don't think we're in kansas anymore" which is useful in all manner of social settings that a girl about town and club kid can often find herself in).

but my own personal connection with the film deepened last year, when i was invited to perform at a vernissage of a visiting french artist, who had created an exhibition based on queering themes in the film. this invitation led to what was my first commisioned poem, and somewhat by accident. the artist in question had asked me to perform " the affair behind london's back" and somewhere between being sick of that poem by that point, and the charm and professionalism on his behalf, i thought it only right to write something particularly for the vernissage.

it was a fateful event. i ended up writing two pieces , surrender dorothy, my queer shout out to dorothy, and one coffee, a heady journey into a day out in berlin that transformed into higher levels of decadence, that felt oz like somehow. those two pieces are now the biggest crowd pleasers in my set. even when i performed in the least spoken word friendly settings, somehow audiences seem to stop and listen.

as a performer and a writer the wonderful thing about tapping into a universally recognized iconography is wherever you step into the story, whatever your take on the character, the audience is instantly with you . when you choose to twist them, the journey becomes even more enjoyable.

there are some pieces that take days and weeks of rewrites workshopping and feedback. there are some that start and then fester in notebooks for years. and then there are those i love most, that i come out in one full stream as if someone else has written the poem for me, and i am taking dictation. surrender dorothy was one of the latter. i wrote it in all of ten or fifteen minutes.

i had the theme "queer postmodernist oz" in my head, and then watched half a dozen wizard of oz clips on youtube. more than anything what struck me was how lame dorothy was. she was on this wonderful magical adventure and she wanted to escape? the dazzle and technicolour of her setting grabbed me, and she got in the way. berlin felt very much like oz at the time, it couldn't have been further away from my concept of kansas. it was clear to me, she had got it wrong.

http://vimeo.com/10467580 from paula varjack on Vimeo.

i never get bored of that poem....

maybe its time i start mining other iconic films as fuel for subversion and playfulness. any suggestions are most welcome.

Tonight 23h on Now Hear This!!!!

On Tonight's episode of Now Hear This, Paula Varjack is joined in the studio by a dynamic trio of hilarious and quirky writers: Jacinta Nandi, Sarah Bosetti and Mirabelle Jones. Expect sharp wit, all manner of subject matter, and stories with surprise endings. In between all of this punchy prose, find out what these literary femme fatales get up to when they're not writing and performing, including (but not limited to): documentary filmmaking, blogging, and running Berlin's first alternative beauty pageant.

listen tonight !!! at http://reboot.fm/ or in berlin on the radiowaves at 88.4 fm...

Jacinta NandiJacinta Nandi wurde 1980 in Ost-London als Tochter einer britischen Ex-Katholikin und eines indischen Ex-Hindu geboren. Beide Eltern tauschten ihre alten Religionen gegen eine neue: den Sozialismus. So verbrachte Jacinta fast jeden Samstag ihrer Jugend auf einer Demonstration gegen Margaret Thatcher. Ihre erste Veröffentlichung kam mit acht Jahren: Ein sehr ernsthaftes, emotionales und ziemlich sentimentales Gedicht über die Gefahr der Umweltverschmutzung wurde in einer lokalen Öko-Zeitung abgedruckt. 1998 ging sie
an die Universität Exeter, um Germanistik zu studieren. Mit 20 kam sie nach Berlin. Seit sie in Berlin wohnt, sind ihre Geschichten und Artikel bei Exberliner, Bordercrossing und Dummy erschienen. 2004 bekam sie ein Baby. Für Exberliner schreibt sie einen Blog über die Schwierigkeiten des Ausländerin-Mutterseins: den Amok-Mama Blog. Sie slammt seit 2008 und war sogar bei den Berliner Stadtmeisterschaften 2009 dabei, wo sie es bis ins Finale schaffte. Sie liebt viele Dinge an Deutschland, versucht aber integriert zu wirken, indem sie sich ständig über alles im Lande beschwert. Diese Taktik funktioniert meist prima.
www.jacinta-nandi.de
http://rakete2000.blogspot.com/
http://www.exberliner.com/topics/jacinta_nandi


Sarah Bosetti

Sarah Bosetti, geboren 1984 in Aachen, lebt als Regisseurin, Autorin und Übersetzerin in Berlin. Zuvor studierte sie an der Hogeschool Sint-Lukas in Brüssel Filmregie und Drehbuch und schloss mit dem „Master of Audiovisual Arts“ ab. Neben der Realisation eigener Filmprojekte rief sie dort die dreisprachige Kunstzeitschrift Submarine ins Leben. Nach dem vierjährigen Studium in Brüssel sowie diversen mehrmonatigen Aufenthalten im europäischen Ausland zog sie im Januar 2009 nach Berlin. Dort arbeitete sie zunächst als Übersetzerin und Produktionsassistentin für die deutsch-französische Koproduktion Die Schlafkrankheit und machte sich anschließend als freiberufliche Filmschaffende und Übersetzerin selbstständig. Seit 2009 tritt sie auf Berliner Lesebühnen und Poetry Slams auf. 2010 gründete sie mit Daniel Hoth, Karsten Lampe und Jan Papke die Lesebühne Couchpoetos.
www.couchpoetos.de
www.sarahbosetti.com


Mirabelle Jones

Mirabelle Jones is a 26 year old writer, performance, book and other artist from San Francisco who also lives in Berlin sometimes. She attends Mills College in the Bay Area where she is getting her MFA in crafting novels and perfecting her skills at building books and book-like objects. She is not going to be famous in 15 minutes, but maybe 51. You can read more about her projects at: http://flavors.me/bytuesday

and if you really enjoy the show (and why wouldn't you? with these amazing ladies on the airwaves!!!!???) podcast will but up in the next days for you to dowload and listen again and again to your heart's content. xxx miss varjack