William Blake: social justice, religion, racial tolerance and rebellion. In his entirely unique show, hip-hop artist Testament sets out to explore the relevance that Blake’s work and themes can still have today. The performance is structured around a personal, semi-autobiographical story of Testament’s own life and the impact the poet had on him. He also explores some of the same issues of religion and ideology, of racism and social justice, from a modern perspective – particularly strong examples of this are a parallel piece inspired by Blake’s ‘London’, and the scenes in the prison workshops.

Though Testament was the only person on the stage, this wasn’t a one-man show: World Champion scratch DJ, DJ Woody, created the textured, innovative and chaotic sounds throughout the piece and manipulated the projected images live, from above the stage. Artists Jehst, Soweto Kinch, Shlomo and Ty appeared in the recorded projections as the characters from Blake’s invented mythology – Orc, Los, Urizen and Tharmas – who interact with Testament as surreal visions to give inspiration and pose questions. Testament also creates conversations onstage by using different voices to switch character – just one of many displays of vocal athletics in the show. Though talented, Testament (aka Andy Brooks) was also modest and likeable and forged a good relationship with his audience from the start.

Overall, the show is pretty eclectic, as was the audience, ranging from those up for a rave to those after some serious literary criticism. There was a lot thrown into the mix, and the result was an unusual performance that combined hip-hop with poetry and gentle narrative drama with big social issues, leaving everyone with an entirely new and improbable perspective both on Blake and on hip-hop. It also left my brother thoroughly enthused to hum and beatbox all the way home.