Photo by Brian Manley
Most people know Tom Cheshire as the frontman for the ragged, booze-fueled punk outfit All Night Drug Prowling Wolves and bar rockers West End Motel, a band he shares with Brent Hinds of Mastodon. But Cheshire is also an accomplished poet and author who has written for many publications including VICE in New York City.
Recently, Cheshire teamed up with Safety Third Enterprises, a chapbook press run by Atlanta writer and music journalist Matt DeBenedictis, and Purge ATL to release his first ever collection of writings. Entitled Just a Little Piece of Heartburn, the work will feature 50 poems, songs and stories that Cheshire has composed over the years. In keeping with Safety Third’s more personal, handcrafted model, Just a Little Piece of Heartburn will be entirely handwritten by the author.
“The chapbook is all handwritten,” confirms DeBenedictis. “In fact until it came time to put together this collection, the poems had never been typed into a computer. Before that they existed as a pile of bar napkins and sketches done in the heat of nights of never slowing down. The poems hold the same outsider wit and traveling troubadour that marks Tom’s lyrics in West End Motel.”
Just a Little Piece of Heartburn will be released on August 18 and will be available in both print and digital versions, as well as audio. Below are streams of two of the pieces featured in the chapbook, “I’ve Got a Knife” and “Pitter Patter.” Listening to Cheshire’s smoky, gravel-throated voice read through these selections, you feel a sense of world-weary resignation in his tone. It’s not so much sad as it is confident about the oftentimes grim realities of modern love and life. And, yet, when he stumbles across a faint glimmer of hope spilled out on the page, he sounds genuinely pleased. His is a voice that’s suffered and lived to come out the other side. There’s hurt there, but also love and a whole lot of dark wit.
Tom Cheshire - I've Got a Knife
Tom Cheshire - Pitter Patter
Tom Cheshire will celebrate the release of Just a Little Piece of Heartburn with a party and reading at Youngblood Art Gallery on Sunday, August 21. The event will take place at 6:30.
More Info:
Web: www.safetythirdenterprises.com
