Lucky Soldier by Vinyl Jacket
Lucky Soldier, by Northumberland five-piece Vinyl Jacket, sounds a little like The Futureheads. The Futureheads minus the searing post-punk guitars and with their collective balls trapped in a collective vice. Not a bad thing we can assure you. They’re just on the right side of quirky; expect the phrase ‘off-kilter’ to be banded nonchalantly about. Anyway, they’re getting tons of radio play and tons of press, so you’re likely to hear a lot more of them in 2012. Excellent, we say.
22 Feb 2012
What to do as recommended by everyone else
1. Sit in a Hackney warehouse and figure out that whole Requiem for a Dream thing [Le Cool]
2. Court like its 1939 at the Old Fashioned Dating Company [Run Riot]
3. Watch the contenders of the Oscar’s ‘Best Foreign Language Film’ at the Tricycle [Flavorpill]
4. Listen to classical music at a classic boozer [Don’t Panic]
5. Hear Christian Wolmar discuss How the Tube created London [Ian Visits]
6. See Formula One cars in Westminster [Tired of London]
22 Feb 2012
Help London Transport Museum save their latest art project from saccherine overdose
Nice art project at the London Transport Museum. Go here, fill in your postcode, answer the question “Where do you hope to be?” and your words could appear on a massive map of London representing the hopes and desires of the city’s commuters. This map will form part of an exhibition starting in May.
And your contribution is sorely needed. Judging by the examples on the artwork above the whole thing is in danger of being taken over by happy, outgoing folks intent on being even more happy. It won’t do.
Snipe’s contribution simply read:
“Down the pub.”
More info here.
22 Feb 2012
Go bittern hunting on Hampstead Heath
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There’s a bittern chilling out on Hampstead Heath right now. This is unusual. You should go see it.
What will you need?
*Some binoculars.
*A vague idea of what a bittern looks like (see above – it’s a fat-necked golden heron).
*A promise not to blame me if you go to see it and it isn’t there.
Why should you go?
*Bitterns are rare birds. Perhaps only 500 winter in the UK each year.
*They are secretive birds who like skulking about in reeds – but the one at Hampstead Heath is quite outgoing so this might be your best chance.
*You’re an interesting and generally cool person who seeks to engage with the natural world because you realise that it enriches your spiritually impoverished urban life.
When should you go?
*Soon. The bittern has been at Hampstead Heath for a couple of weeks now. It was still there yesterday and has been showing well.
*But it’s coming towards the breeding season so it will probably be going off on the pull sometime soon.
*Check out the Hampstead Heath updates here for daily sightings.
Where exactly is it?
*It moves around a bit, but your best bet is the Bird Sanctuary Pond, which is number 15 on this pdf map.
*The bird has been sleeping in a tree by this pond, and your correspondent saw it with his own eyes from the footpath at the pond’s south edge.
Why should you go again?
*David Attenborough would want you to go – are you going to let David Attenborough down?
RSPB – Bitterns
London Bird Club Wiki – Daily sightings
Photo – Wikimedia Commons
22 Feb 2012
Watch a three-year timelapse video of Blackfriars station being built
Bloody builders always sat around doing nothing.
Via @jamesglavin
22 Feb 2012
How London politics works (Part 3)
Ken Livingstone cutting TfL’s revenue to save Londoners some money is a “swindle” that will risk the very future of the transport network.
Boris Johnson cutting TfL’s revenue to save Londoners some money is a prudent triumph that will secure the very future of the transport network.
Ken’s promise to cut fares year on year is an “unfunded sham” which he won’t be able to keep.
Boris’s promise to cut council tax year on year is a prudent and totally funded promise, which he will most definitely keep.
Ken promising to build expensive and unfunded transport projects is “pretending the tooth fairy will come” by waving “magic money” about.
Boris promising the exact same expensive and unfunded transport project three years later is not pretending the tooth fairy will come and is not waving magic money about.
Or to put it more simply: Ken’s unfunded giveaways = bad, Boris’s unfunded giveaways = good.
For further guidance read How London Politics Works part 1 and part 2
21 Feb 2012
It's not just water. London is suffering a ketamine drought too
Londonlovesbusiness pose the question, in a piece which reveals that of those who admit to taking drugs at work, 10% take ketamine. At work.
21 Feb 2012
People who object to a new Dalston tower block should sod off to Bedfordshire
That’s essentially the argument made by skyscraper journalist (they exist) James Newman in the Telegraph. In his own words:
“If a 50-metre tall tower next to a railway station in central London isn’t suitable then where is it suitable?…It’s enough to make you wonder why people bother to live in the big smoke of London at all, let alone quite firmly in central London if they are so against urbanity. There are plenty of small-scale, sleepy English hamlets that would welcome them with open arms.”
Yes, well, there are lots of jobs for everyone in all those sleepy hamlets I’m quite sure.
Meanwhile OPEN Dalston reports that English Heritage have objected to the tower block because it will spoil the area.
This argument nicely illustrates one of the biggest issues in London right now. Rent is viciously high because, in part, of a shortage of housing. But local people and conservation groups objecting to new developments make building big new flat complexes extremely difficult.
In Dalston’s case the new tower is not really going to help lower rents, because the plans don’t include affordable housing. The penthouse flats will be marketed at £1m apiece, says OPEN Dalston. This, rather than the fact it’s going to spoil the view, is what’s really objectionable.
But as a matter of wider policy we should absolutely be encouraging tall buildings in zone 2 with a good proportion of affordable flats inside, even if sometimes that will upset the locals.
James Newman at the Telegraph – If you don’t like London rising up, then perhaps you should move out
OPEN Dalston – English Heritage object to Dalston Kingsland scheme
OPEN Daltson – Dalston Kingsland tower block – affordable housing abandoned
Snipe – Housing benefit cuts might be unfair to some Londoners – but so’s the status quo
21 Feb 2012
Polar bears and tigers in City Hall
Who knew that the Met has a wildlife crimes unit? Here’s a short video on how the World Society for the Protection of Animals and the Met are fighting for London’s bears and tigers, wherever they may live.
20 Feb 2012
Pólyfónía Remixed by Apparat Organ Quartet
Pólyfónía Remixed is an extended EP of nine re-workings of tracks from Apparat Organ Quartet’s hugely likeable second album. Included is today’s MPFree: Robotaki’s rather jolly treatment of the already enormously jolly single, 123 Forever. Other artists lending a hand include fellow Icelanders FM Belfast and London based producer/remixer Dreamtrak. Pólyfónía Remixed is out February 27th.
20 Feb 2012
Snipe Highlights
Some popular articles from past years
- Hope and despair in Woolwich town centre
- Summer Camp: Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days
- 9 poems about London: one for each of your moods
- An interview with Desiree Akhavan
- Nice map of London's fruit trees shows you where to pick free food
- Silencing the Brick Lane curry touts could be fatal for the city's self-esteem
- Nice Interactive timeline lets you follow Londoners' historic fight against racism
- Number of people using Thames cable car plunges
- The five best places in London to have an epiphany
- Peter Bayley has worked for 50 years as a cinema projectionist in East Finchley
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