Tim Turnbull's Tales of Terror

Tim Turnbull doesn’t need gimmicks to scare you: his words are enough. A mixture of poetry, song and storytelling Tim Turnbull’s Tales of Terror presents a variety of chilling and intriguingly macabre material.

Darkly seductive Turnbull pulls the audience into a world where everything is slightly askew.  Mythology mixes in with the everyday creating an otherworld where terror and destruction lurks around every corner. The Gods are there in Turnbull’s work, but his preoccupation is clear: destruction and horror lies within rather than outside of ourselves. Repeatedly (as with his look at horrific plastic surgery and a very modern cult of Dionysus) Turnbull fixes his gaze on hedonism and excess, lacing his words with black comedy.

If Turnbull doesn’t quite have the voice to pull off the songs (he gets by through sheer charisma rather than vocal ability) then his performance ability perfectly matches the rest of his material. There’s a beguiling disjunction between the stories Turnbull tells and his comforting, Yorkshire tinged delivery.  

It’s in the extended moments, however, where Turnbull displays his ability to command an audience, using only his voice and his words to compel. Reading from a book of "Terrible Tales" he narrates a story which twists and turns through psychic horses, evil goats and new age remedies creating the perfect atmosphere of suppressed menace. With supreme confidence Turnbull leaves just enough to the imagination of those listening to properly thrill.