A More Than Helpful Nudge Awake...

If this blog were a workplace, then I would currently be walking in to the office hanging my head in shame. I’ve been unfeasibly absent from these pages for unreasonably long and I thought it about time I rectified this situation before it got out of hand.

Exploding me out of my stupor have been two on-going projects from two excellent friends of mine that I have had the privilege of witnessing in recent days and, to be honest, it would have been outright rude of me to not have mentioned them on here.

The first is the Oikos Project, which is currently still taking shape on a playground down near London Bridge as Martin Kaltwasser and his team of hardy volunteers put the last touches to a unique building in London, a theatre made entirely from reused and salvaged materials.

Project-managed by our very own Ben Melchiors, this is one of the most beautiful projects I have seen in recent memory. The idea is a holistic one as builders, playwrights and producers all collaborate to make the whole concept bloom as one.

Once this ode to the humble pallet crate is complete it will house two plays and an audience of around 120 people at each performance. The two plays by Simon Wu and Kay Adshead, Oikos and Protozoa, both examine the ways our society would adapt and survive if or when the worst happens. As a juxtaposition to the landscape and buildings around it, both the theatre and the plays should be a stark reminder of the unsustainability of current times and the dangers lurking should we ignore this.

Oikos will run from 26th August - 18th September with Protozoa on from the 23rd September - 9th October. Tickety things here...

Talking of stark reminders, there are few people out there at the moment more passionate to hold that mirror up to us or more lyrically equipped to get her message across, than the incredible Kate Tempest.

Possibly the hardest working poet/MC in London at the moment, every performance I catch of hers touches a nerve and fills the heart. Having travelled the country playing pretty much every British festival known to mankind, she is returned and has just released an accompanying video to her poem, Line In The Sand, which premiered at Rich Mix this week.

Despite her nervousness at how the words would deliver on film rather than through her electric live performances, the tone of both the direction of Joe Roberts and the aesthetic atmosphere matched the touching truth and passionate belief of her poem and I am reminded one more of her awesome talent and how it deserves a wider and wider audience.

The film will hopefully gain a small release around about the same time as the much anticipated Sound of Rum album. The world generally will feel a slightly better place when they do...

Update: Some Deep Throat style, anonymous reader has given us the link to Kate's film so without further ado...

Summer Hiatus

Well, it all went a bit silent and dark out there on my cultural radio for a bit.

I can only apologise for the delay in my most recent updates but I have begun a small hiatus from working life and took initial advantage of such time to maneouvre by surrounding myself with beauty in scenary and company up in the Lake District.

Rejuventated and returned, I feel like I have a veritable cultural artillery to unleash, before I head once again to a dusty plain in Spain, and, to begin at the beginning, I will start with a free festival coming up this very weekend.

Celebrating Sanctuary is an event that is at the heart of Refugee Week. Despite rabid tabloid headlines regarding immigration this and asylum seekers that, the reality is that the majority of refugees bring massive contributions to our society, especially in this epicentre of multiculturalism we call London. Refugee Week is about considering this and celebrating this.

Celebrating Sanctuary brings a whole host of amazing musicians, performers and poets together on one bill. Many of these will be acts you've yet to be conscious of but will soon be blown away by.

Headlining are Sierra Leone's Refugee All Stars whose story is one of triumph through adversity and whose music is a manifestation of the positivity that courses through these incredible musician's veins.

Alongside them are musicians from as far afield as Somalia, Tibet, Afghanistanand Bosnia and, from much closer to home, the incredibly talented wordsmith, a cappella lyricist and all round phenomenon that is Kate Tempest.

If you haven't seen the girl in action yet, be prepared to be astonished.

All of this and more will be happening right by the Oxo Tower in Bernie Spain Gardens and is, thankfully for my broke ass, FREE.

Medea at Midnight

                            Photo by Allan Titmuss

With every passing year it seems, changes abound more abunduntly and more rapidly. To grab our attention, things apparently need to be bigger, better, newer, different, more outrageous, more involving. .

However, it is a rare occasion that something both pushes the envelope and entices in equal measure. With the advent of partipatory, promenade theatre there have been ever more daring performances, ever increasing boldness of location and new levels of audience interaction.

Taking all this to seemingly new heights is a production in association with LIFT and The Arcola Theatre. Hotel Medea, having been put on by The Arcola last year and currently on tour in Brazil, will be returning as a site-specific performance.

Leaving by boat from the QEII pier, near the living embodiment of human horror that is the O2, the journey will begin at midnight and go through the night until 5:30am, meanwhile, the full force of the melodrama of Hotel Medea will be scored live by DJ Delores as the marathon story unfolds around London.

This is going to be intense, powerful and, undoubtedly, a unique way to experience theatre.

I'm just buying my tickets now and I wouldn't want to have to try and put the experience into words for you...

Romper Causing a Rumpus

Now, being more of a culcha whore than a party whore these days, it is not often that I am moved to write on this page regarding another 'fundraiser'.

So I'm not going to start now. What I am going to write about though is an event that has been bubbling under the surface for a while now in the braincheese of some of our most respected compadres.

Brought to you by the estimable Mr Genochio, the irrepresible DJ Malaka and the irreplaceable Drusus Germanicus, Rumpus avoids the usual fuss and bluster and cuts straight to the chase.

Featuring a stream of performers from all parts of the artistic spectrum including the full-on swing powerhouse that is The Smoky Taps, the searing roundhouse kick of mayhem and mystery that is Reverend Zero's Medicine Show and those dashing gentlemen of action, Flay and DeVille.

This is without even mentioning the veritable ukulele hero Desmond O'Connor and chillout space designed by and featuring the kings (and queens) of Kitsch, The Immaculate Extremists.

If you're not bloated from indulging in all this then the gluttony will continue into the night with a range of DJs playing anything from Gypsy to Electroswing to Dubstep.

Taking place at Cable, near London Bridge, and for the unreasonably affordable price of £8, let the wild rumpus begin!

Celebrate the Tate

Believe it or not, the Tate Modern is 10 years old this year. Yes, it's 10 whole years since the former Bankside Power Station was reborn to great acclaim as one of the world's best homes of modern art.

I can't help but think back to what I was doing in 2000. And cringe a little. We're all a lot older and wiser now. Kind of. Right?

Anyway, as much as I am fond of riffing, scatting and circumnavigating the point, let's get back to the issue here.

In honour of this auspicious birthday, the Tate Modern are holding a free festival this weekend from Friday 14th to Sunday 16th May.

Working with the apparently 'visionary' curators Maurizio Cattelan, Cecilia Alemani and Massimiliano Gioni, there will be more than 70 international, independent art collectives creating projects in the famous Turbine Hall.

Some of these collectives include White Columns (New York), Cinemateque de Tanger (Tanger), Kling and Bang (Reykjavik) and no.w.here (London) and the opportunity to see them will be extended to midnight on Friday and Saturday.

From the information I've seen this looks as though it will be a veritable feast of contemporary art and performance and allied with the knowledge that most of you are in a permanent state of hunger for creative juices, this is surely a match made in heaven...

More Than A Home For Dogs

I'm coming back to a theme that is always close to my heart here. How frickin' awesome and talented the people I call my friends are.

They're also, mainly, massive show-offs...which is lucky for the rest of us who thus have the opportunity to see the manifestations of such efforts.

One such opportunity is on the horizon and drawing ever closer as part of the Scratch Festival at that veritable and giant mine of cultural performance and exhibition, the Battersea Arts Centre (BAC).

The Scratch festival as a whole will be displaying an array of different artists in every corner of the canyon of a space they have there. To narrow this premise down, a Scratch "is a new theatrical idea developed by artists and shaped by audience feedback".

Featuring in one of these Scratches is our resident cynical font of knowledge and creator of beautiful visuals, Justin Beardsall. In collaboration with composer Caroline Devine and Dancing Brick, "A L I C E" will be a piece lamenting the decline of analogue technology, harking back to a more innocent and clunky era and celebrating these icons of our childhood.

8-bit computer games, VHS, cassette tapes, that creepy girl with the doll and chalkboard. Ah, joy! Halcyon days indeed and, frankly, I couldn't think of a more capable pair of hands to bring this back to life than VJ Meno's.

Right, I'm off to spend 45 minutes listening to preternatural screeching and vibrating lines of colour just so I can play Arcadians on my Acorn again...

May 5th and May 6th
7:45pm
BAC

Tickets £5 (plus there is a 3for2 offer)

Rise of The Jabberwocky

With the days stretching out ever longer and the sun rising higher and clearer in the sky, one can't help but cast at least one eye to the summer. And summer, as we all know, means festivals.

One such festival that I guess would come under the 'boutique' umbrella is the cute and welcoming GocStock. I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to attend last year and it was evident that the seed of friends gathering and enjoying surroundings, company and music had been cultivated and bloomed here.

This year, having outgrown their previous site, KitKaboodle, the organisers, have picked out a beautiful new venue in Kent, Eridge Park. Set against a backdrop that spreads over 1000 acres and under a canopy of royal oaks and beech trees, GocStock will be bringing it's all pervading sense of fun, silliness and escapism to this corner of England's garden.

The theme for this year is the Lewis Carroll nonsense poem, Jabberwocky and costuming, mudlarking, fairy-hunting, prancing, dancing, lollapaloozing and hullaballozing are all suitably encouraged.

I know how many of you prefer getting your hands dirty when it comes to festivals, both metaphorically and, well, actually and GocStock seems to embrace such kind's of do-ocracys. Ideas for performances, projects and pieces embraced and welcomed by she with the moniker Goc.

For those of an impatient nature or for those who simply might wish to get a taster of what's to come, there will also be a GocStock warm-up party at the Amersham Arms in the much underrated area of New Cross.

GocStock Warm-up party - 29th May
£5 in advance, £6 on the door

GocStock Festival - 18th -19th June
£35 (£30 for concessions)

Go, be merry. And for less than the cost of a decent bottle of single malt...

Enter Stage Right

A little theatrical interlude here as I was just in the mood to extol the virtues of one of the best plays and, indeed, lead performances I have witnessed in a good long while.

Jerusalem had a fine run at the Royal Court Theatre, located in the home of the urban tractor, Sloane Square and I was fortunate enough to stumble upon this. Given the huge success it had here, it has now been given a full west-end transfer to the Apollo Theatre on Shaftesbury Avenue.

There is a whole cast of great performances, including Mackenzie Crook, but it is impossible to really notice anything other than Mark Rylance's outstanding portrayal of the pikey pied piper Johnny 'Rooster' Byron, a lunatic, drunkard, drug-dealing raconteur in the finest English sense of the words.

At turns both a hero and an anti-hero, it's a performance that is throroughly enticing, engaging, powerful and thought provoking. It never lets up for a second and the whole play grabs you and hangs on, like a small, yappy-type dog with something to prove, until it's bitter end.

Jerusalem is a celebration of a particular kind of England that is loved and loathed in equal measure. Never dull but evidently being eroded by 'progress' and gentrification.

Go see, celebrate, cerebrate before it is too late.

Until 24th April
Cheaper tickets are available from Lastminute.com and occasionally from the Tkts booth in Leicester Square.

Bach To Life

Apologies for the pun above but since we are also approaching the season of mystery bunnies and chocolate eggs it did seem somewhat appropriate.

To prepare us for such, there is a free performance of the fairly intense Bach piece, St John Passion at St. Pauls Cathedral. Religious overtones, I know but, sung by the Cathedral Choir, it will be undoubtedly beautiful.

FREE

Etherial Brilliance

I don't know about you but I have definitely been smelling some Spring in the air in the last week or two. Certainly there is light at the end of the bitter winter tunnel we've had so far this year and the first buds of colour and light are in the ether.

On such a note, it seems appropriate to highlight the annual return of the Southbank Centre's Ether Festival which this year features an absolutely stellar line-up plus takes the opportunity to hand out some major musical kudos to Edgard Varese, oft referred to as 'The Father of Electronic Music'.

The Ether festival is no mere list of normal gigs and always injects a level of individualism that is seemingly beyond most other London festivals.

Amongst the cast of musicians such as Gil-Scott Heron, Stereo MCs, Chrome Hoof and Lou Reed there are also re-workings of Varese's small body of surviving music with a whole raft of different interpretations, as well as theremin workshops, short films and a rare opportunity to see and hear a live performance from acclaimed video artist/film director/deliciously warped mind, Chris Cunningham.

Frankly, I want to go to ALL of these but if anyone of you out there has a preference and would enjoy my esteemed company then hit us up and let's get out into the ether...

London Gin, Bombay Sapphire and some Cake for afters...

Woah. Now that was what I call a weekend.

The Gin Palace went off like some kind of sophisticated, slick rocket on Saturday night with outstanding music and performances from the likes of The Smokey Taps, The Jumblebox Consortium, Miss Leed'em and Count Fettucini, not to mention the sartorial standards maintained by the crowd and the captivating cocktails from the bar.

On Sunday I was then most fortunate to be able to witness the incredible Manganiyar Seduction at the Barbican in an absolutely mindblowing display of musical talent, intricacy and, well, Celebrity Squares.

From poignant beginning to the raising, explosive crescendo this was an experience that makes you forget where you are and anything else that might be happening around you. In it's conception, immediacy and effect, magnificent.

As we now plough headlong into the week, an immediate chance to relive some of this weekend presents itself at Passing Clouds in Dalston as The Smokey Taps return for their Cakewalk Cafe night. One of the tightest swing bands you will hear this side of 1940 aligned with surely one of the best live voices I have ever had the privilege to witness, The Taps will be raising the bar for Wednesday nights.

£5 on the door, £3.50 with appropriate 20s/30s dress.

Documentary Theatre

Modern theatre is seemingly constantly evolving, engaging audiences and capturing imaginations in new ways. We've had a raft of interactive productions and sandbox plays and now a new genre seems to be on the horizon.

Documentary musical theatre.

In a new production by Victoria Brittain at the Southbank Centre, that pillar of British theatre, Juliet Stevenson leads a cast telling real stories and exploring real issues around the so-called 'War On Terror'.

'Waiting' features stories of women from places as diverse as Senegal, Palestine and the Midlands, unfolding through song, an original score and the sopranos Anna Dennis and Carole Wilson.

Hoping to provoke thought and argument through this unusual medium, helpfully the performance is followed by a formal debate with a panel including Baroness Heleana Kennedy QC, Riz Ahmed, Vanessa Redgrave and Moazzam Begg.

Friday 12th March and Saturday 13th March
Tickets £15 (concessions 50% off)

Totally Non-Heinous!

The most excellent and always superbly attired, Mr Edwin Flay brings us the next instalment of his excellent adventures through the world of cabaret entertainment.

Thursday 25th February sees Flay and DeVille moving to pastures new at The Royal Vauxhall Tavern to present an evening that will amaze, astound and allure in equal, overflowing measures.

All while you look your most foppish and dandyish with that martini in one hand and hat doffed with the other.

Tickets are £10 in advance or £12 on the door.
Doors at 7pm

East Innit Blud

Having made a brief allusion to this in a previous post I thought I'd fully big this up now that more details have been released about it. Drum roll please....................The East Festival!

This is a six-day event that celebrates, promotes and educates about the creative, multi-cultural, diverse jumble that is East London.

There are 4 main themes across the 6 days which are the Asian Sub-Continent, Travel, Architecture and Minimalism. Hmm, so covering random bases there but some of the events planned across venues including The Barbican, The Rich Mix Gallery, The Whitechapel Gallery and The Bethnal Green Working Men's Club look frickin' awesome and are, invariably, FREE.

And all on many of our doorsteps. By which I obviously mean, my doorstep.

Yesblud!

Huzzah!

So, there is blessed news on the cultural battle front! The incredible Shunt are being permitted to remain in the vaults under London Bridge for a further year!

The Theatre Company itself had found alternative premises in a huge, old tobacco factory but have successfully fought to keep the vaults open despite the looming shadow of the ridiculous Shard building which is being plonked on top like some gargantuan, fetid, severed digit upon a deliciously, disguised cake.

This is being viewed as a new project and will be a different kettle of fish to the previous incarnation of the vaults but give their track record should be squeezing out plenty of superb little nuggets.

The new venue for the theatre company is currently running an extended second season of the critically acclaimed production, Money. Taking place in an immense space with part of the intention being one of disorientation, this is not for the feint hearted. Go boldly, soldiers...

Old School

For those of a certain masochistic ilk, and by certain I mean Victorian, the Ragged School Museum has just the thing for you.

The first Sunday of the month offers an opportunity to step back in time and sit in on a Victorian school lesson.

Get schooled, the old school way. Bring you're own cane though if that's your bag...

Happy Happy Talky Talky

Chatter, natter, banter, scuttlebutt, oration, chitchat, hot air, exhortation, powwow, dialogue, shootin' the breeze...we all love to put those words out there.

Riffing and scatting all over our pain...

Bonnie Greer will be doing the riffing and the exceptional singer Cleveland Watkiss, the scatting as they bring a free performance to the Tate Britain of Greer's new novel, Entropy.

Friday 5th February 18:30 Room T7 Tate Britain
FREE

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Just a little further West of here, the ever reliable V&A are playing host to a series of evening talks from some true British legends over the next few weeks. From the comedic giant that is Terry Jones to the theatrical genius, Alan Bennett these talks will be a rare opportunity to grasp.

Some will be talking of their own work and some will be talking about areas of interest and knowledge that they have. Either way, there should be quite a few insights amongst all the babbling...

London Mime Festival

Try not to shout about it but London's oft amazing Mime Festival is already underway and I thought I'd list a couple of evenings that look likely to continue in this vein of amazingness.

Combining two aspects that have become two of the unlikeliest zeitgeist things around into one incredible performace, Circus Klezmer present their colourful and frenetic show at The Queen Elizabeth Hall on the 23rd and 24th January.

Tickets are £12-£18.

The other host venue for the Mime Festival is The Barbican and the stand-out performer there would appear to be Jeanne Mordoj as the bearded lady in Eloge du Poil.

Frankly, this looks really exciting so anyone who similarly gets excited by circustry, beards and Frenchness, let me know and I'll get on it.