Kate Tempest: Voice of gritty Brockley

Kate Tempest is a Brockley performance poet, who recently won a Ted Hughes prize for spoken story. Transpontine and Eastlondonlines have already celebrated her rise and we've been meaning to showcase this Brockley talent for some time, but now the Guardian has forced our hand, by putting her on its front page today.

The article discusses how fundamental the "performance" element of performance poetry is to the form and we'd say that in this example, Brand New Ancients (starring the Deptford Anchor), the poetry definitely works best when the music kicks in:

Tempest's marketing team have been trying hard to do a Lily Allen on her by showering her in Brockley grit and the journalist notes:

[Child of] an impoverished London borough... Tempest grew up in Brockley ("what I've always loved about south-east London is that it's a bit shit and it's never going to be anything other than a bit shit").

One day, we will live in a society where the middle classes will be able to name-check the Wu-Tang Clan without fear of being labelled mockneys.

With thanks to Sanjit.