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REVIEWS
Public
Press
on the 1/25/00 ¡SLAM!:
Local graphic designer John Picacio had this to say upon stumbling into El
Toro for his first ¡SLAM!:
"You blew UP last night! Puro Slam is a beautiful thing....keep pushing...."
Another quote from the Express-News perfectly sums up the night for both
*our* Spurs and *our* puro ¡SLAM!, under the headline "Spurs play everyone
to level Los Angeles"
"'Even I got in tonight,' said [Steve] Kerr who had three
points to his name. 'The walk-on got to play again.'"
I like your reports, and I've been educated by them. . .although our
open
mic has enjoyed great success for two years, slam is new to alot of our
crowd. Your enthusiastic reports have helped me try to promote the mad bar
slam in a fun way.
--Krystal Ashe, Mad Bar poetry, Chicago, Illinois
Just wanted to wish all of the best for the holidays & give you some
much-deserved props for making SLAM a success in S.A.!
Keep pushing,
-John Picacio, S.A. graphic designer and member of CASSA, the Communication
Arts Society of San Antonio
Is it just me or is something
historic about to happen for this blossoming S.A. scene. I know Rod is
serious about this art, and CROS and Wyle have been loyal to Slam since the
Reverb. Bottomline is, I'm hyped up about this...
-Charles Peters aka C'Angelo (Have you picked up or ordered your copy of
POETRY H2O from the local Borders yet? Why not?)
That's QUITE a scene you describe, totally unlike the Northwest
Passive-Aggressive Syndrome you get here. ("That was very Nice. 3.2")
Wild shit, brother-man.
Peace,
Gabrielle
(From: "Sandra Cisneros")-
Congrats [on SLAM coverage]!
Good for you, Ben! Maybe this good suerte will spread to you and to
all those around you and make the planet a happier place for all.
Adelante. S
This [the web page] is awesome, Ben -- I see now where all the
communiqués
were heading -- it's a model of organization and design not soon
equaled in this town. Your energy, ideas and creativity are pretty
amazing! Congrats (...Props, that is!)
-John Ewing
It's good to see and know that energy for expression that you both
convey
and revere. I find myself feeding off of the positive energy around me,
particularly in times of difficulty. Thank you again for feeling my work
and giving me the energy to forge ahead.
--Ron Horne, S.A. poet
Here's a special message from an anonymous slam compatriot regarding S.A.'s
puro slam and the Austin slam...
"special request from the austin crew: BRING SAN ANTO SLAMMERS to AUSTIN
and SHOW 'EM HOW IT'S DONE! have heard that the austin slam (after
experiencing puro slam, naturally) could be more thrilling."
I always am impressed my a group of artists who take their mission
seriously because something usually important comes from these kinds of
happenings--and I do think poetry is important. BUT, I no longer
participate in nightlife stuff and I found it very hard to listen to poetry
through a PA system. I like to hear the human voice when I hear poetry. The
PA system was not a very good one and I couldn't hear the poetry so I just
had to leave. I've reached that point in my life where I can't be around a
lot of loud noise. So I didn't really enjoy it but I know you are trying
very hard to get a poetry audience going and you are doing a good job of it.
--Gene W. Elder
Hey Ben, Just a note to let you know the Stanford Conference on Race
Presentation that I sort of provisionally titled "Liberation, Mobility,
and the Mission of Black Millennial Arts" went well! I talked about
SLAM and the film SLAM, showed clips from SLAMNATION and from SLAM and
had the great pleasure of seeing Garland Thompson (Slammaster of
Monterey) in the audience. I interviewed Garland in preparation for
the talk, and I read with care and pleasure your article on the
competition [National Poetry Slam in Austin, 1998] -- a beautiful job
of work, Ben! I had only twenty minutes to do my job and went overtime
by a good bit, I am told. But I plan to continue developing my
thoughts and my essay and will get with you when there is a
circulatable "product." I could not have done it without you, Ben!
--Houston Baker
KUDO from Califas...
"[Bryce Milligan] can have his civilized ORAL poetry.
We want uncivilized ¡ORALE! poetry!"
--Paul "Beast In the Field" Saucido
I've been reading (and renting) everything I can on SLAMS. I just
stumbled
across your site, and it really looked together! It's one of the best ones
I've seen. I'm very eager to have a SLAM here.
--Crystal, Gypsy Productions, Charleston, West Virginia
Some public San Antonio love...
As an outside observer about to be in, very in, as in moving to San Antonio
next year, it's not much of a mystery. People in San Antonio are hungry for
an outlet for spoken word, one that allows for anyone to come and anyone to
read, one that's not elitist, one that is actually energetic as opposed to
merely inert. From the few slams I've seen in SA, they're marked by a lot
of energy and a lot of enthusiasm. It reminds me of our first year in
Austin, where there was a lot of curiousity and a lot of people from
different poetic walks peeking their heads in to see what this is all
about. Austin has historically had a lot of channels for poetry, as well as
a populace colaescing into audiences pretty much open and willing to see
whatever weirdness might occur on any given stage any given night. (This
is, after all, the city that had the Butthole Surfers as cultural
ambassadors when I was first beginning to discover that there was life
outside the suburbs.) San Antonio's not the same kind of natural
destination for creative people (read: misfits and weirdos) that Austin has
historically been (e.g. our current slam scene has representatives from
Oklahoma, Seattle, New Orleans, Ft. Worth, Taos and [!] Australia as well
as born-and-bred locals), but it's got a lot going for it: a very diverse
and friendly populace, a counter-culture with a strong sense of
self-identity, a fearlessness about its self-expression. Texas now allows
touring slammers and travelling audience members (hint, hint) a chance to
see three very different slams over the course of four nights on one
stretch of easy-drivin' highway: the rambunctious, politicized festival
atmosphere of the Puro Slam in San Antonio on Tuesdays, the goofy laid-back
love-in and well-crafted ass-kick that is the Austin Poetry Slam on
Thursdays, and the boisterous, Bacchanalian amplitude of the Dallas slam on
Friday. Plus Wednesday's a good down time day for sightseeing, swimming,
and miscellaneous hoo-ha.
Texas: we're more than a big state. We're a good time.
Phil West
Vice-President, National Poetry Slam
Will Salas 'slam' for the arts?
By Susan Yerkes
Express-News columnist
San Antonio Express-News_S.A. Life section, 10/6/99
Isn't life entertaining? New York is consumed with righteous debate about a
cartoon painting daubed with elephant dung. The Gothic horror tale of
"Frankenstein," as retold by City Council's gothic activist Mario Salas, is
a cause célébre.
Surprised? Heck no.
This is, after all, the entertainment age. It's also the age of
"information" overload, of short-little-attention-span, when even the
nightly news is recast as entertainment, snappy sound bites rule even high
politics, and sports are a slam-dunk.
Which leads us to the Slam.
In case you didn't know it, San Antonio is home to an emerging art form
called the poetry slam - slams, as the most recent form of the venerable
poetry reading. High-energy, pop-culture "slams" bear roughly the same
relationship to traditional poetry readings as Chris Ofili's "Holy Virgin
Mary" bears to the "Mona Lisa."
You don't have to be a poet to slam. You show up, you perform your "poem,"
and randomly selected judges rate you for entertainment value. It's
entertainment.
Ben Ortiz, who has cultivated San Antonio's highly entertaining "Puro Slam"
performances through various venues for more than a year now, says the
audience has grown to the hundreds for recent performances. But Ortiz,
entertainment editor of the weekly Current, wants to make the Slam even
hotter.
He's invited Mario Salas to slam out a few bars of his "Frankenstein" at
the next slam, set for Tuesday at the El Toro Club on North St. Mary's.
"San Antonio's puro ¡SLAM! would be willing to contribute $1 and one bottle
of Shiner Bock toward the publication of 'Frankenstein: The Dawning and the
Passing,' so long as Councilman Mario Salas would be willing to read a
portion of the book at our spoken-word scrimmage against other local poets
who likewise are struggling artists in search of patrons," Ortiz offered in
an e-mail to media folks.
To deepen the political implications of the proposed event, he's throwing
open the Slam to members of the city's Ethics Review Board, recently
slammed by Salas.
"Mr. Salas will not be able to shout anyone down, nor will he be able to
keep members from citing newspaper or other media reports, if they choose
to slam," Ortiz says.
This could be a supreme political entertainment, raising the rough comedy
of City Council to an art, and garnering attention for yet another worthy
local art event.
Another hint: Since popular artist Robert Tatum, whose clever,
controversial cubist mural of the Virgin of Guadalupe created a flap in
'97, has supported the Slam with prizes in the past, perhaps he'd do a
special tribute to Ofili's much-more-celebrated (and considerably more
offal) art as a prize.
Think national media coverage! Think putting S.A. on the map!
"We're hoping Mr. Salas will seriously consider helping us lobby City
Council for funds to build the SLAMAMODOME spoken-wordatorium that could
conceivably host the National Poetry Slam, say, in the year 2005," Ortiz
says.
Entertainment indeed.
..excerpts from an article in the San Antonio Express-News Weekender,
8/27/99:
'Puro Slam!': Poetry as a high-impact sport
By Hector Saldaña
Express-News Staff Writer
Can you survive two rounds of slammin' poetry and still have enough left to
deliver a knockout punch? If so, "Puro Slam!" wants you.
...
Poetry slams are to poems what extreme sports are to cricket. These are
kamikaze urban literature performances that may leave you dazed, slimed and
confused, but usually better for it -- sort of like a hyper coaster ride.
Definitely a fun, occasionally pretentious, contact sport for the mind.
It's also a way to kill a slow Tuesday night. Luckily, you don't have to be
a poet to attend (or perform, for that matter); "Puro Slam!" is open to the
public.
...
Victoria Garcia-Zapata ... has participated in slams, but prefers the
spectator role.
'Slams are totally different. You don't have to consider any rules. You do
your thing and it's not elitist. What I like is that it is very diverse.
It's all different people and all different ages, which you don't see at
all poetry events. I would say, go with an open mind.'
This is definitely a people's show; nothing academic or hoity-toity. Judges
are culled from the audience.
Poets should come armed with three poems. And check timidity at the door.
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