Messages

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General Discussion / Re: Storm Poet Policy For IWPS and WOWps

« on: August 23, 2011, 10:22:43 PM »

and mike, wasnt Auntie May's Home Cooked Poetry Kitchen (or whatever that awesome name was), a psi certified venue at some juncture? despite never having sent a team?

lol, dude, I wish you were around when we were naming our show. But no, we never got registered/certified--and we actually only had like 4 slams, mostly just open mics.

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General Discussion / Re: Preselected, qualified judges for NPS?

« on: August 21, 2009, 02:05:20 PM »

Basically, you can run your own shows however you want. If you want to start a tournament with "expert" judges, go for it! But that isn't slam. "Random" judges is an essential fact of what we do. It represents the democratization of art, points out the absurdity of the very notion of "expert" art judges, and involves the audience in an important way.

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General Discussion / Re: Preselected, qualified judges for NPS?

« on: August 20, 2009, 03:21:58 PM »

No.

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General Discussion / Re: Slammers Breaking Through

« on: December 31, 2008, 02:48:25 PM »

Bao Phi had a poem in Best American Poetry a couple years back.

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General Discussion / Re: Your Madison NPS Top Ten?

« on: August 14, 2008, 01:22:07 PM »

1. Jeanann Verlee on the first night of prelims. "Unsolicited Advice..." was one of the best poems I heard all week.

2. My team, St. Paul--we worked hard as underdogs to bring original & honest poems, and made Semis in the process. In particular: 6 is 9--his poem, "Her Name," from prelims, where he gets into character as an old man with memory problems. The entire room was weeping.

3. Ian's pizza. The lasagna pizza was awesome--I never got to try the mac n cheese pizza, though.

4. Finals. Way better than last year--Boston especially wowed me with the quality of their writing.

5. Dr. Sheila winning Spirit of the Slam, and the beautiful performance of her poem with the empty spotlit mic. I cried harder than I have in years.

6. Boise's "Sirens" poem. Hilarious, inspired, and quite original.

7. Downtown Madison--there were tons of awesome restaurants & stores, and campus was very pretty.

8. Josh Healey (of Madison)--his poem before Finals, "Elegy for Peter Norman." Very elegant, moving, honest, and unique.

9. Anis' sacrifice poem on the 2nd night of prelims at the Brink. Beautiful.

10. Blair (of Detroit)--his tabledancing/Journey poem from the final night of prelims (against Charlotte, Eureka, & Nuyorican). So great.

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General Discussion / Re: Your Madison NPS Top Ten?

« on: August 14, 2008, 01:04:20 PM »

2. The Milwaukee Hip Hop DJ piece
Sometimes, you just shake your head and say, "Goddamit... I wish I wrote that!" Afrika Bambaataa for everyone!

Just so you know, that poet's name is Dan Vaughn.

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General Discussion / Re: What's the slam scene in Philadelphia?

« on: March 19, 2008, 08:17:38 PM »

Yeah, that sucks. UPenn & Philly Youthspeaks are way too good to not have a PSI outlet.

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General Discussion / Re: When Did You 'Fall In Love' With Spoken Word/Slam

« on: September 06, 2007, 06:25:56 PM »

I don't know...I'm still falling ever more deeply in love with Slam.

My first slam ever was my freshman year of college, a few years ago, and I had no idea what to expect. I just wanted to go rap for people. Some dude named Jaylee Alde was the feature poet...haha I remember actually thinking "Man, this guy doesn't even rhyme. Boring!" I was so clueless...But I liked some other kids who were slamming that night, and kept coming out.

I think the first time I ever heard Saul Williams was probably what got me interested in Slam/Spoken Word and even poetry in general, bridging it with Hip-Hop.

College Nationals 07 opened my eyes to a whole bunch of amazing poets and people. It was the first time I knew that Slam was the love of my life.

I can say for sure though that NPS this year, my first time, reinvigorated my faith in poetry and slam and the world in general. Indie Finals. Danny Sherrard. That moth. No turning back now.

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General Discussion / college slam news?

« on: April 14, 2007, 11:42:02 AM »

ACUI College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational took place last week as some of you know. I don't remember all the stats, but I know U Penn took first, UNM (defending champs and next year's hosts) took second, U Mich took third, and UC-Berkeley took fourth. The other semi-finalist teams were Region 5 All-Stars, Western Illinois University, UC-Davis, and University of St. Thomas (MN).

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General Discussion / SF Slam Rebirth was Fantastic!

« on: March 21, 2007, 04:31:42 PM »

Congrats! I'll have to visit when I'm out there this summer...

Sorry we're stealing Thadra back from you!

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General Discussion / Re: Member request archive

« on: March 03, 2007, 02:36:14 PM »

Michael Mlekoday

purchased membership today