Leeds’ Small Distractions Club brings literary salon to The Social for inaugural London event 

What was the initial impetus behind Small Distractions Club? Tell us a bit more about why you decided to set it up. 
I love books and I love music. As with a lot of people, over lockdown I found these core interests rising to the surface, where I might have lost touch with them over the years. I think the last five years have been a slow but steady excavation of that, really.

I started posting about the books I was reading in 2022. After a period of illness at university (shout out viral meningitis), my attention span was affected quite significantly, so I got back into reading by choosing short books - hence the name Small Distractions. (Off to a cheery start). I was thinking about reading a lot because as a hobby it really pulled me through that period of isolation.

I’ve always loved music memoirs - I think reading about musicians’ interests and lives is the best way to get under the skin of their music - and this special interest gave me the idea of talking to musicians about the books they read. I started with my friend and co-conspirator, Lily Fontaine of English Teacher (she loves sci-fi and Derren Brown, by the way), and it all snowballed from there really. These interviews can be found on Substack - they’re sporadic, though, because I hate transcribing and refuse to use AI. I work at Brudenell Social Club - the best venue in Leeds (and the world) - and spend a lot of time talking to people over the bar about books, so I started a book club there in May. All these conversations, and the turnout for book club, has led me to think that there’s a real interest in that liminal space between books and music.

As well as a monthly book club in Leeds, Small Distractions has expanded to encompass live literary salons, the first London edition of which is being held tonight! What do you look for when choosing texts for the book club, or speakers for the salon? Are there particular themes or perspectives which you’re looking to focus on? 
I guess the idea for the salon came from these endless conversations about bands and books. I reached out to Leeds Literary Festival and asked if I could do something celebrating the two. Around the same time I bumped into author David Keenan and Lee Brackstone (head of White Rabbit Books) and managed to convince them to get involved; that’s when it all came together. We wanted it to be a mix between a poetry night and a party. I’ve never been big into poetry - I’ve always felt like it wasn’t necessarily for me, like I didn’t understand it enough - but I’ve been slowly working on that. I wanted the salons to be a space for people that don’t usually go to poetry nights, who might not feel like it’s for them either. 

The set up for the book club is a little different. Whenever I’ve tried to join a book club in the past, I struggle to stick with it - if I have a busy month, or I don’t like the book, I fall behind and end up not going. I wanted to prevent that from happening, so each month I choose a selection of optional readings: one novel, one non-fiction piece (literary criticism or cultural commentary) and a few poems. The idea is that you can pick and choose how much you read - if you’re having a busy month, you can read a poem or an essay and still come along without having read the novel. Sometimes we choose a theme for the month, other times I’m led by one particular piece I think we could get our teeth into. So far we’ve looked at pride, disability, and themes of the home, but general themes of gender, sexuality, class and power tend to come up.

In your experience of the salons so far, how does the writing shared differ to what’s created in the context of the speaker’s bands?
I think the delivery of the written work is a key difference - we see frontpeople of bands far more exposed, without a band behind them, or without a 30 minute performance to move through. It feels like a very intimate space, with the whole room cheering them on. Holding them in small venues also means the crowd and the speakers really interact - it’s a very levelling experience.

Some speakers are published authors and poets, while others are musicians who have never shared their writing beyond lyrics; it’s stuff that occupies a different space to their musical output. I want the salons to facilitate a sharing of work that they previously didn’t know what to do with. It feels vulnerable and important - to get a reaction from a room of people, responding to something undefined and unpolished. People have read a range of things at the salons: poetry, prose, an extract of a screenplay. A lot of people have been hesitant, or felt like they don’t have enough writing, or that the writing they do have isn’t good enough. Watching them silence a room has been such a good feeling.

For you, what is the relationship between the literary and music worlds? 
I’ve always loved coming across literary references in songs; it feels like you’ve been let in on a little secret. Everyone has their own unique backlog of books and music, creating this web of connections. Both music and literature occupy such a personal space in everyone’s lives - the arts are where we all find our solace (our small distractions), and so often, one section will bleed into the other. As I’ve said at the salons, your favourite bands are influenced by their favourite books, and your favourite writers are influenced by their favourite bands. The things that your favourite artists use to distract themselves are in turn a key part of their art, and to tap into that space is to open up a whole other aspect of the art that you enjoy. 

The inaugural London edition of Small Distractions Club’s literary salon will take place tonight (3rd November) at The Social. 

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