[buy a copy] [em three press info & free downloads] [buy a copy] [em three press info & free downloads]em two reviews:
thanks to the beautiful megan newcome for typing these in for me... The Big Issue Jan 12 - 18 1998 em two: the difficult second issue Tina Jackson em is an eclectic ragbag of brightly coloured scraps from the frontline of new music and writing. The best bits are often the shortest snippets, like the nursery-rhyme malevolence of the poem He by Georgina Taylor, but the brave variety of em's contributions ensure there's something bright, shiny and new for perusers of any persuasion. Most praiseworthy about em is the way it makes a space for the imaginations of its writers to run riot: a page here, an extract there, a sign, a paragraph, sometimes simply a snapshot. Fast, funky and original, em is worth a flutter in anyone's language. Jockeyslut Feb/Mar 1998 For those lucky enough to have read EM ONE, they will already be familiar with the bang-on collision of music (perfectly presented here on a tape oh so neatly velcroed to the cover), prose, and poetry. And those who get their kicks form intelligent design wil be half way to heaven. Not strictly a "book" - more a must have fanzine showcasing the best young Britain has to offer in terms of music and writing, its intentions and content cannot be praised too highly. TrEmendous! The Big Issue January 19 - 25 1998 Cover Story: Small is Beautiful Tina Jackson To paraphrase French crooner Maurice Chevalier, thank heaven for the literary magazines. They're perfect forum for the short story and a great showcase for the avant-garde, the experimental, the new, fledgling writers just getting off the ground, and the snippets from the desk drawer of established writers. There are two exceptional new contenders in the lit mag scene - em, now in its second issue, and the brand new Billy Liar. Attractively small, square and chunky, perfect to pack into the pocket of something trendy - like the leg pocket on a pair of camo trousers or, at a pinch, the turn - up of a jean - they're packed with frontline creativity. If em was a record, it would probably be freeform bebop jazz as it plays on a theme of cool urban angst. It's threaded with keynotes of strung-out delicacy and vivid ingenuity: it can effortlessly transport the reader round unexplored avenues and every now and then it strikes a squalling, annoying, atonal not which jars crankily against the rest. But em is still the real deal: startling fragments of expression scrapped together into a clever reflection of the pick 'n' mix mish mash of contemporary culture. Genuine talents unearthed include Royston Swarbrooke ("Remember that one Charles Bukowski poem fully read allows one to be totally fluent with the entire cannon of his work"); Georgina Taylor and Howard Tinker, em also comes with a tape of excellent music from unsigned acts playing trip-hop, techno and drum 'n' bass music. Ornette Coleman would have approved. Time Out April 15 - 22 1998 Nicholas Royle Now on to its second issue, em writing and music, edited by Karl Sinfield, fulfills the promise of its debut. The design is funky and modern, the sounds on the tape Velcroed to the cover worth a listen, and while some of the text can appear a bit throwaway, other pieces get their hooks in. Jacqueline Lucas evokes the subtly erotic collusion between a young woman and an old Tel Aviv pedicurist in "The Dead Skin." DF Lewis and David Rose do what they do best: baffle, bewilder, entertain. Ashley Stokes's "Something Called the Modern World" hops from West Africa to Paris, Moscow to London, as confidently as it time-slips from 1851 to 2045. Islington Gazette Jan 98 Islington People Graeme Patfield Karl Sinfield is a graphic designer by day. But at night, he slaves over a computer to produce on of London's most unusual magazines. Karl, 26, devotes his spare time to collecting other people's stories and music. And he puts them all together in his magazine - em - from his bedroom in Upper Street, Islington. The first edition, em one was published in February last year, and its success spurred on Karl, pictured left, to write em two. The smart, glossy magazine - which looks more like a small book - comes complete with a one-hour music tape with tunes from bands from around the country. And Between the covers, it is packed with poetry, fiction and music writing. Karl says: "It just comes out when I can get my act together. The tape is a compilation of new music which I hope no one will have heard before. I advertised in the press for bands to come forward and they just came flooding in. "I do it because I enjoy it. I have always like short fiction and I did write some myself and I was in a band. But I decided I wasn't very good, so now I get other people to write it and I just put it all together." Orbis # 107 The launch issue included contributions from Hanif Kureishi and Michael Blackburn, no less, and several small press names star in No. 2. I really enjoyed the music (apart from the dirge) because it's a lot more innovative than much of the stuff floating around these days. Same goes for the text, and a lot of it goes al kinds of places you may never have dreamt of, though not my brain, I'm afraid, where some of the seriously silly bits are concerned. Evocative, exotic prose from nearly every one of the contributors; about to list them, they won't all fit in. So, some poetry: distinctly quirky, thanks to Norton Hodges, typical Big Bad Men, thank you, Georgina Taylor. There's a lot of energy and groovy photographs and adventurous graphics, which usually take into account that it's a help to be able to read the text. When people have worked hard to make something like this a success, they deserve twice as much. Zene #15 Paul McDonald Editor Karl Sinfield impressed everyone with em one, a chunky collection of snappy writing with a tape full of music Velcroed to the cover. I had the good fortune to review it and I seem to remember saying it deserved to succeed. Given the time, effort and money that must have gone into producing that volume, however, I secretly suspected that em two would never appear. Thankfully my suspiciouns are unfounded: Karl has done it again. More snappy writing, more music and more Velcroe. Again the music is an eclectic mix and, again, not all of it is to my taste. Sadly I've reached an age when Neil Diamond is beginning to sound pretty good. Thus artists like DJ Daze, whose high-energy jibber features twice on the tape, induces a similar feeling to the one I get when my neighbors car alarm goes off at 3:30 am. Bewildered irritation. Similarly, Kajue's discordant rap number, "Take the Pain" had me lurching urgently for the FF button: I couldn't (take the pain). Still the collection is more than adequately redeemed by the likes of Co-Star who contribute two chirpy numbers, and The Cats whose distinctive and arresting "I Wanna Make Love With You" is the best of the bunch. Thd editor seems to enjoy throwing at least one eccecntriciy into the mix and, this time, it comes from agentleman called FA Rawlinson. His "Dirge for a Cornish Miner' is a pleasing a capella curiosity. The vocal is "insistent" rather than sweet but it constitutes one of the half-dozen tracks I played all the way through and one of the two or three that I'll probably play again. The writing also has something for everyone and once more, not all of it was for me. Hanif Kureishi led the field in em one and while no-one quite as noteworthy features in #2, there are a few familiar names: the ridiculously prolific DF Lewis contributes a story, but then magazines that don't contain at least one DF Lewis piece are something of a rarity. My personal favourite comes from a writer I've never heard of, Jacqueline Lucas. Her story, "Dead Skin," is told from the point of view of a woman having a pedicure. Her chiropodist is something of a foot-fetishist and as he fondles her toes, it becomes clear that his work has an unhealthy sexual dimension. Given that the action takes place in Isreal and the chiropodist's name is Mendeleh (like Mengele) it hints at a sinister sub-text which is at onece intriguing and elusive. It is apowerful story form a writer who seems to have real talent. There's mature and interesting writing too from Steve Blackburn. His "Ten Minutes in the life of Xian Xian" alludes to communist China's anti-birds policy. It hits just the right note of sad irony as it, albeit obliquely, addresses a tragic period in the history of that country and the absurd excesses of crackpot Mao. It is a lucid and haunting piece. All in all em two is just as impressive as em one and, once more, the editor is to be congratulated. Unless Karl is an eccentric millionaire, however, he'll need to sell some copies of this issue if we are to see em three. At 7.99 (6 mail order) a pop this won't be easy. Perhaps he could flog some advertising space and get the price down. Certainly I hope he manages to keep it going because it is a worthy project. I'd say spare it's worth investing in something that, as we Neil Diamond fans say, is at the cutting edge of groovy. [I enjoyed the dub-tinged techno of The Immortalitists, the DJ Dave tracks, the lush trip-hop of Sugerglider, the uncanny African-tinged Kanhra, and the mellow jazz of Adam Pretty and Guillaume Vetu.] Highbury & Islington Gazette 9 Jan 1998 Em-pire of Words and Music Sean Orr Karl Sinfield is boldly embarking on the second phase of his mission to find anew forum for blending music and literature. The Islington-based editor has just published Em Two, a neatly packaged compilation of short stories, poety, and music. It is, believe it ort not, a successor to Em One, a similar compilation of words and music which attracted rave reviews from a variety of fashionable publications. The new package features work form a wide spectrum of relatively unknown writers (although Em One included a story by Hanif Kureishi) and deliberately steers clear of the current trend for all things chemical. The accompanying tape ignores conventions, drawing form a range that includes punk, minimal jazz, drum & bass and techno. There's even an a capella ballad in there too. "I try not to get too involved with the literary world and what's in vogue," explained Sinfield. "I don't want stuff that's fashionable one week and out of favour the next." Karl compiled, edited, and designed Em Two almost single-handedly, working on his PC long into the night after coming home to his house just behind Islington Town Hall, from his day job - creating manuals for computer equipment. "I'm aware that it's not exactly a cutting edge format," he modestly admits, although the design of the book/tape does show signs of originality; the typography, style and graphics of each literary piece are adapted to enhance the work. Georgina Taylor's 'He,' for instance, is a short, punchy, twisted revenge poem, and the impact is twofold as it is presented almost as a love note left on a table. "Mr. Punch Hears Singing," by Jonathan Carter, appears as a child's first reading book; huge, bold words which vary in size from page to page, changing the emphasis of each line. Of the musical contributions, Feel's "Kanhra" and a rolling drum and bass head-nodder from DJ Daze, "I Hear Ya," are both worth further investigation. Despite rave reviews in magazines such as the Big issue, I-D, Raise and Muzik (who dexribed it as "a superb forum for new writers and musicians"), Em One only sold around 300 issues. One of the problems is money: Karl funded the entire project from his own pocket, and does most of the distribution on his bicycle and through mail order. He is suspicious of big publishing houses, who would inevitably take creative control of the work, and the main book chains who, wven if they agreed to take it, take too large a cut to make it worthwhile. "It's all for the love of writing, music, and the advancement of the nascent careers of our contributors." explains Karl, and he's not joking; after the publication of Em One, the William Morris Agency scooped up several writers. But what's in it for him? "It's a hobby. Some people spend 4,000 a year on golf. I do this."  design & content © em writing & music all works © the respected artist(s) email the editor |
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