Poet laureate Simon Armitage and comedian Lolly Adefope love the buzz of performance. Here’s what we’re all missing
There can be no such thing as a socially distanced mosh pit, can there? This is the centre of a gig, a place where semi-legitimised frenzy and mayhem take place, where drinks are lobbed, shoes are lost, clothes are torn, human beings are borne aloft, and where entanglements of bodies move in unpredictable directions to the push and pull of invisible forces, like a glass in the centre of a Ouija board in contact with a particularly violent spirit. (If you’re thinking, “Blimey, poetry readings aren’t what they used to be,” then bless you.) True, spaces of two metres or more do occasionally open up in the mosh pit, breaches and rents in the crowd where the actual floor becomes visible, but they are momentary and quickly mended. The music stops, the crowd settles and finds its level, only for the music to start again, this time with a more urgent rhythm or tribal beat, and the upheaval resumes.
Live music was enjoying one of its most important periods, as a riposte to the near-collapse of the record industry
It’s been inspiring to see how people have kept the spirit of live comedy going online
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