Other Voices started life in 2012 and quickly established itself as a firm favourite of performers, audience, and critics alike at Edinburgh Fringe (as part of PBH’s Free Fringe). The idea was to platform the voices less heard, expanding the Allographic standpoint into a cabaret vibe, transforming a tiny cavern tucked in the heart of the “most haunted pub in Scotland” into a spoken word boudoir in a swish of satin and roses. With a different line-up every day, we managed to demonstrate that there’s no one way to be an intersectional feminist, and no one way to be a spoken word artist, disproving, as we did so, the assertion that there “just aren’t enough women of calibre” to flesh out fully balanced show line-ups at Edinburgh Fringe. (Yep, that was an actual quote…) We’ve seen everyone from first-timers on the open mic to the likes of Lee Ridley (Lost Voice Guy from BGT), Vanessa Kisuule, Hollie McNish, and Dean Atta, all before they were famous! (And Shane Koyczan, who, in my defence, I didn’t know was already famous – that was a really strange day…)
