Proper Tea

                       Picture from the Taschen book 'Japanese Beauties'   

For those of you fortunate enough to be able to set your own agenda during the day, a sneaky freebie for you here.

We British have our own obsession with that esteemed and often life-resolving beverage, tea. However, the Japanese have taken the whole thing to a higher aesthetic plane, as is often their way.

In keeping with the precise, delicate and not-a-little beautiful way of Japan, their ceremony around tea gives a whole different perspective to the milk-and-sugar ways.

Go see for yourself at The Way of Tea, a demonstration of such subtle beauty.

Friday 9th April
2pm and 3pm
FREE (just drop in)
Mitsubishi Corporation Japanese Galleries in The British Museum

Chiddy Chiddy Bang Bang

What a beautiful morning to wake up to today! Suddenly everything seems right and good with a little more Vitamin D in the world.

And to cheer the mood yet further, it appears that one of my 'new favourite bands' Chiddy Bang are bringing their (shockhorror!) original and good hiphop to London! Ah, good times...

For those who are uninitiated in the talents of this Philadelphia duo, make sure to grab yourself a copy of their debut Opposite of Adults EP, and prepare yourself to revel in some superbly choice samples and cuts.

If this should so tickle-your-fancy, then these few words to the wise.

Scala. 27th May. 7:30pm. £10.

Who's in?

Hope for Haiti

It's all flooding out after a weeks absence and the news keeps rolling in.

This time it's a little something for all those kids who are south of the river, y'poor souls ye...

Although it might be out of the headlines, Haiti is by no means out of the woods. Not by a long shot. Total worldwide donations are hovering around the 750 million dollar mark which is an incredible response but still far short of the estimated billions of dollars it will take to rebuild this most stricken of countries.

Every small bit counts.

With this in mind, I know there have been a myriad of events towards this goal but given that they have all been, on their own merits, excellent evenings, what excuse is there, if you're in the area, not to go?

The Hope For Haiti Sunday Session will take place at the superbly monikered establishment, The Jackdaw and Rook on Balham High Road and will feature a whole day of aural pleasures with the likes of ToyFace, Kabuki Mono and Zac Rogers plus a raffle and an auction with super things for you to win and money raised for those without such opportunities.

Enjoy and play your small part.

Two birds, one stone.

2pm Sunday 18th April
FREE entry

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...

Resuming Radio Contact

Ah, now that's better. Feeling refreshed and rejuvenated not just with the advent of Spring but after a superbly relaxing and excellent time in that bastion of inexpensive and effortless krautcool, Berlin and a memorable weekend to welcome me home to that centre of expensive and try-hard britcool, London.

So, to get the ball rolling again here I thought I'd indulge a little passion of mine that, well, I know is not everyone's bag. Jazz.

Controversial.

Nice.

Arriving on our shores in June though is a ever-rising legend on the jazz scene and using the opportunity to have the first major Jazz residency at the Barbican, Wynton Marsalis will celebrate 80 years of American Big Band with a series of concerts that should entice even the hardest of indiekid hearts.

The standout evening of this run should be the opportunity to check out some of the best swing bands and dancing from both the US and the UK at A Midsummer Night's Swing, in the newly renovated and revitalised Stoke Newington Town Hall.

If nothing else, it is a grand opportunity to get out there looking like the goddamn money...

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.

Hackneyed History

Photography by George Best

A bit of a local one for local people this one, but fascinating to all if you are around my hood on Saturday morning.

The St John at Hackney Churchyard and St Augustine's Tower are a bit of a Hackney landmark and by far and away the oldest building in the area having originally been part of a church built there in the 16th century. If you really want to kick it old school then there has been a church, founded by the Knights Templar, on this site since the 13th century.

Having relatively recently received lottery funding to renovate and re-open to the public, it is now possible to take a little tour and find out a little bit of history to something that one might otherwise idly and ignorantly stroll by.

This Saturday, there is just such an opportunity as local historian Sean Gubbins will enlighten on the myriad of society over the centuries buried in the churchyard, as well as a climb up the miniscule stone stairs to the top of the tower where a frankly spectacular view over East London and way beyond awaits...

Saturday 27th March
11am - 1pm
FREE

Hot Off The Press

This very moment, I have just received word of the annual series of gigs that take place within the courtyard of that oft underused building, Somerset House.

The home of the Taxman, this building and it's open air square are increasingly being used for more inspiring means. A staple of this is the opportunity every summer for Somerset House to make for a superb music venue. I am often want to recall seeing Orbital there in what ranks right up there in my favourite all time musical experiences.

Having said that, the line-up for Somerset House is often mixed, and toppling towards disappointing. However, this year, they must have employed at least one person with a half-decent taste in music as there are sporadic highlights.

These are...

Friday 9th July Air

Tuesday 13th July The xx

Sunday 18th July Soul II Soul

If any of you imagined throngs out there in webland fancy a jaunt along and a singalong, then I am able to get priority booking if you get off your behind by Friday.

Come along now...

Folksy Antifolk

                                                        Photo by Sarah Cass

I'm not sure I've ever really understood the use of the term 'Antifolk', although I am aware that Kimya Dawson and Jeffrey Lewis are two bastions of this particular institution.

I am also aware that they make funny, touching and acutely self-aware music that I personally feel is almost impossible not to relate to, so frankly their genre could be called 'Antijew' and I would still love it.

In one of those happy happenstances, they are both playing, together with The Bundles, at one of my all time favourite London music venues, The Union Chapel and at the eminently reasonable fiscal subtraction of 15 English pounds.

I'll be there gladly paying Kimya Dawson for being Kimya Dawson. If you're sat next to me, it could hardly make it worse now, could it...?

19th May 7pm
The Union Chapel
£15 + unavoidable bastard tax of £1.50

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