Prog writer Martin Kielty aka The Boozer Cruiser has released a new “prog poem” No Liars, in collaboration with White Willow/Donner mastermind Jacob Holm-Lupo, which is premiered below.
Based around the mantra “No liars were harmed in the suppression of this truth; no liars were harmed in the building of this illusion,” the story sets a billionaire against a young woman in an exploration of current events including the Ukraine invasion and the global financial imbalance.
“As ever, I was led by the music of Jacob Holm-Lupo, who composed a piece that explains his feelings about the Ukraine invasion,” Kielty says. “It crystallised for me a wide range of thought-threads I’d been processing for some time into the creation of two characters who can’t admit they’re trapped in a world that scares them.
“No Liars is not just another anti-war expression. It’s an anti-war-structure expression. Our basic survival instinct, powered by fear, has led us into a world where billionaires hide from their fear by exerting it on those of us further down the ladder. Effectively, they’re victims too. I wanted to express that idea in a very personal way.”
The story depicted in the video was inspired by a first-hand experience on a Milton Keynes street recently, Kielty added. “I was witness to a scene of incredible violence and I wound up trying to calm a young woman who’d been one of the victims. It occurred to me I’d never seen genuine terror up close like that before. I felt like she’d suddenly been thrown from a world of TikTok and Strictly into a new, scarier existence; and that, incredibly, it might be the making of her.”
He found the inspiration blended perfectly with a “heartbreaking and melancholy” piece Norwegian-based Holm-Lupo had written to express his feelings about the Ukraine war. “It hits very close to home for him and his family. I felt the need to add some anger – and who’s angrier than the most scared of us? Thus the angry billionaire trying to justify a young woman reeling in terror, interpreted starkly in an intense performance by Kelly Phillips.”
No Liars is the fourth Boozer Cruiser “prog poem” following The Withy, The Ghost of Terror Bay (featuring Chrissy Mostyn of the Blackheart Orchestra) and Echo Echo. Kielty and Holm-Lupo have several more pieces under development and aim to release a compilation later this year.
