Merseyside Mayday Festival

St Luke’s Church ('Bombed Out Church'), Berry Street
1st May 2010

Reviewed by Richard Lewis

It’s the first of May and the sun is shining. For the first Merseyside Mayday Festival held at the bombed out church on Berry St, the elements have conspired in their favour. Urban Strawberry Lunch have generously provided the space for the event as well as advised, and helped with the setting up for the event’s inaugural year.

As the festival programme states, ‘This isn’t a day to stand listening to politicians and bureaucrats pestering us for votes and telling us what to do’, which is a relief, it has to be said as there seems to have been quite a lot of that recently! The festival has been created as co-organiser - and fellow Nerve contributor - Adam reasons, to be "a celebration’ of worker’s resistance and solidarity", rather than "marching from A to B". The festival, which has no official union affiliation, has been funded entirely from donations and people giving their time freely.

This includes the bands who were playing - the acts I saw including Raw Bone, Wrecked Career and Mashemon) - as well the Liverpool Socialist Choir and the Senator Sound System. The food stalls were also staffed by volunteers, special mention goes to Food from Nowhere whose cuisine was excellent. Sean, from the Merseyside chapter of the Anarchist Federation, remarked that the festival was taking place at an interesting time, as with the backdrop of the election and parties virtually all tied, there seems to be ‘a crisis of faith for the old way of doing things.’

Mike of the Solidarity Federation states that the festival appealed to his organisation as it promotes "a positive message that resonates with people." This seems to be true as the turnout for a debut year is very good, no doubt aided by an excellent PA system that can be heard halfway down Bold St! Aside from the bands and the stalls there is also an open mic stage with speakers discussing their own experiences, as well as poets and acoustic troubadours. The stalls cover a broad spectrum, ranging from the Liverpool CND, The Angry Women of Liverpool, the Liverpool Antifascists and the Liverpool Guerrilla Gardeners.

By six o’clock things are still going strong, as intrigued shoppers wondering what all the noise is wander up the steps. Surely after the success of this event, the festival will become a permanent fixture in Liverpool’s cultural calendar. Here’s to May 1st 2011

Printer friendly page

Sorry Comments Closed

Comment left by Nqe on 9th May, 2010 at 8:50
NICE !!!