Bad Street by Twin Sister
The sassy, strutting Bad Street is the first single to be taken from Twin Sister’s debut album In Heaven, released September 27th via Domino. It smacks of a new found confidence, more streamlined and focused than some of the songs on the Long-Islanders previous two EPs, Vampires With Dreaming Kids and Color Your Life. Their influences are thinly disguised – Talking Heads, NYPC, some of the DFA stuff – but who cares when the results are this infectious.
15 Jun 2011
Mike Tuffrey attacks Lembit Öpik’s "infeasible" 24hr tube plan
Lib Dem Assembly Member Mike Tuffrey said today that Lembit Öpik’s proposal for a 24 hour tube was “completely infeasible” and insisted that he was the “serious choice” to take on Boris and Ken next year.
Tuffrey made the comments following the launch of his campaign to be the Lib Dem’s Mayoral candidate in 2012.
Speaking to The Scoop outside City Hall he said:
All the experts tell me [a 24 hour tube] is completely infeasible. What I’m saying on transport is we need to speed up the investment so that the daily commute, the peak hours which is when millions of Londoners are suffering on their commute is improved. That is what we need to focus on.
Lembit Öpik has promised to hold a referendum on running the tube 24 hours a day, but admits that it could lead to commuters paying considerably more to fund it.
The current and former Mayor have both ruled out a 24hr tube on cost and maintenance grounds, and even a proposal by Boris to run tube trains later at weekends was quietly dropped last year.
Tuffrey was today joined by former Lib Dem Mayoral candidate Susan Kramer and a host of other senior London Lib Dem figures.
His campaign team distributed a list of key supporters including a wide range of councillors and London Assembly candidates.
When the BBC surveyed London Lib Dems recently, they failed to find a single senior figure willing to back Lembit’s bid for Mayor.
A wider survey by Lib Dem Voice also found just 10% of London party members willing to endorse Öpik for Mayor.
Lembit insists that only he has the “recognition factor” to be Mayor, and while his campaign activity has been minimal, he has at least produced the most memorable video of the Mayoral race so far.
15 Jun 2011
Facebook lost over 100,000 users last month in the UK
That’s according to the 5th paragraph of this story, based on data which is not publically available. The piece stresses that these things are tricky to measure, trends are hard to discern, and that it would be foolish to jump to any conclusions. But seeing as my housemate’s mum just joined, fatally damaging its credibility, I have no hesitation in jumping to conclusions and stating definitively that FACEBOOK IS OVER. [Via Slate]
15 Jun 2011
Portent alert: Tonight the moon will be red like blood
Soothsayers have announced a total lunar eclipse tonight. It will occur at moonrise, (2130ish for Londoners), in the south east. The moon will turn copper coloured and very low in the sky, as if it’s bleeding and falling and dying. This news is particularly striking:
“It will be interesting to see if the low altitude of this eclipse combined with the ash from the eruption of the Grimsvötn volcano in Iceland will make the eclipse much redder than usual.”
Strange things are afoot this night. If it’s cloudy watch coverage here.
15 Jun 2011
What's your favourite London noise? British Library's soundmap has a whole bunch of them
Only 9 days left to upload a sound, any sound, to the UK soundmap, a project from the British Library aimed at creating a map of the UKs noises. London is represented by plenty of Tube sounds and ringing bells at the moment, but future historians are being denied the full picture. For example there’s not a single recording of someone throwing up and getting in a fight at Old St roundabout. There’s still time.
15 Jun 2011
London agenda for Wednesday 15 June
1. Three fun things in one: Amy Grindhouse presents ‘Welcome to the Dollhouse’ at the Book Club [Le Cool]
2. Watch the Literary Death Match with Brass Eye writer Jane Bussman and judges like queen of LOLs Emma Kennedy at Concrete E1 [Run Riot]
3. Loll in the salon while Manjit Kumar explains Quantum Theory in 30 minutes, Rough Trade’s Lucy Tesco plays her favourite new music and headlining author Margaret Heffernan tells us why ‘Wilful Blindness’ is ruining our lives at Adam Street [Flavorpill]
4. Have a 9pm picnic with astronomers at Blackheath Park to watch the lunar eclipse [Ian Visits]
5. Watch Mayor’s Question Time [Tired of London]
15 Jun 2011
Passport to London: If the Scots, Welsh, and Northern Irish can do it, why can’t the Metropolis run its own affairs?
Head north, and thereʼs something stirring. Even further north than Cockfosters. Last month, the Scottish National Party won a convincing victory at the countryʼs polls—and promised a referendum on independence.
First Minister Alex Salmond has four years to win Scotland over to life on its own – and land a few blows on Westminster politics in the process.
A question: why canʼt London have a bit of what theyʼre having? Isnʼt it time for us to break away too?
London is a wildly different place to the rest of England, never mind the rest of the UK. Weʼre more socially liberal than the rest of the country, we live in communities that are far more mixed. Weʼre less likely to drive, and more likely to spend huge amounts of time stuck on public transport. Weʼve more in common with New York or Paris than Newcastle or Portsmouth.
Take a look at the voting figures in last monthʼs AV referendum, with a string of inner London boroughs backing a change which was a step too far for the rest of the nation.
Opponents might sneer at “luvvy land”, but thatʼs the point. In London, weʼre different. Did you put yourself down as “English” in the census?
Look at the two men weʼve elected to run the place. A newt-loving man with a raspy voice who loves winding up American diplomats on one hand, a floppy-haired fop on a bike with a bizarre line in Latin anecdotes on the other.
Both, in their own ways, engaging ambassadors for the capital. And seen as dangerous threats by their own party leaders. Because that is how many in the rest of England see London—as a threat. Read below the line on any comment piece on the possibility of an English parliament, and within the first few comments someone will sound off about how London leeches off the rest of England, takes all the jobs and investment and produces nothing in return.
Yet if London kept the tax revenue earned within its borders—or at least had more control over raising its own budget – weʼd be able to make a much better job of running our transport network, for example.
The Tubeʼs current woes can be traced back to the last government trying to sell off its maintenance” — bitterly resisted by Ken Livingstone before he rejoined the Labour Party. He was right, Gordon Brown was wrong – but London had to pick up the bill.
In the old days, Ken used to taunt the Tories with unemployment figures on the roof of the old County Hall. But Labour wouldnʼt even give him the power to empty Londonʼs bins, so we still have 33 different recycling policies. And the Conservatives wonʼt even give Boris Johnson the Royal Parks, so keen is the UK government to hang onto the prestige of chasing dogs out of flower gardens.
So if they donʼt trust us, why donʼt we just go it alone? Turn the Houses of Parliament into a museum and ship the MPs and Lords off to Birmingham. Shift the rest of the BBC to Salford. Install Waterloo Sunset as our national anthem. And the royals have some nice pads around the country they can move to – although President Boris might be a step too far…
Fanciful nonsense? Maybe. But over the next few years, with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland asserting their own identities, London is going to have to work out what it wants.
Perhaps weʼre not yet ready to stick border posts up on the M25. But itʼs likely the UK will be a different place in a decade or two. Does London want to be part of an England which is getting increasingly resentful of the Great Wenʼs power?
Or does it want to go it alone, celebrating the the fact that it is different, and giving the likes of Liverpool and Leeds a chance to breathe and fight for their own futures without us getting in the way?
Weʼre not likely to be occupying Trafalgar Square any day soon. But sooner or later, some difficult questions will have to be resolved about the relationship between London and the rest of England. It might be a good idea if we came up with some answers now, before they get made for us.
14 Jun 2011
Finally, London gets its own M&Ms store
It will open in Leicester Square on July 7th. The most exciting part:
“The M&Ms characters, led by Red and Yellow, will be brought to life throughout the store.”
Call me a corporate stooge, but I really want to go. [Via Culture Junkie]
14 Jun 2011
Speeding cyclists will "end up in the canal" warns old lady, menacingly
“Ms Comins, 78, said she now avoids walking along the towpath close to her home at City Road Basin at commuter times for fear of being hit by a speeding cyclist.
She said: “Some cyclists are not only a danger to walkers but a danger to themselves.”“
The implication is clear – slow down cyclists of Regent’s Canal. You don’t want to be having any “accidents” now.
Full story: Islington Tribune
14 Jun 2011
Boris sorry after aide sparks Bryan Ferry cash furore
Mayor Boris Johnson’s office has apologised after an aide accused a London council of using taxpayer’s money to fund a concert by Bryan Ferry at the O2.
Director of marketing Dan Ritterband claimed Greenwich Council had been due to pay up to £60,000 to the former Roxy Music frontman to perform at the opening ceremony of a sports industry convention.
But Greenwich denies it – and insists the money was due to come from the mayor’s budget instead.
City Hall maintains that it wasn’t using taxpayers’ money for the show either – but has apologised to Greenwich for Ritterband’s comments.
Ferry had been due to play at the opening of the Sport Accord convention at the Indigo2 venue in Greenwich in April – but the 65-year-old had to pull out because of illness.
At a London Assembly budget meeting last week investigating how much the mayoralty had spent on Sports Accord, Ritterband came under questioning from Labour’s John Biggs and Conservative Brian Coleman on the concert.
After Coleman said that he had been assured by Ritterband and Boris Johnson’s press chief, Guto Harri, that the mayorality would “no longer pay celebrity appearance fees out of public money”, Ritterband said Greenwich had offered to pay the money.
“It was Greenwich Council and [O2 owner] AEG who decided to get together, and it was their offer to put on the opening ceremony,” he told the meeting.
“So potentially, the people of Greenwich might have something to say about that,” he added.
“As far as the GLA money goes, that was not used on the opening ceremony. A part of Greenwich taxpayers’ money would have been going to pay for Bryan Ferry, but that wasn’t our call, that was the people of Greenwich.”
On the web recording of the meeting (watch 28 minutes in), an unidentified voice can be heard saying: “More fool them.”
But Greenwich is adamant it was not due to pay any money – and insists the GLA was contracted to pick up the tab.
“Greenwich Council did not spend any money on Bryan Ferry, nor any other entertainer, for the Sport Accord opening ceremony held at the IndigO2 on 5 April 2011,” a spokesperson told The Scoop.
Indeed, Greenwich points to a clause in the contract for the event which specifically states that neither it nor AEG were due to pay any money. It concludes: “All event costs shall be borne by the GLA.”
A spokesperson for the mayor told The Scoop: “In order to meet the costs of hosting this vital event, sponsorship worth more than £440,000 was secured by the Mayor, a proportion of which funded entertainment at the opening ceremony, which was generously hosted by AEG and Greenwich Council at the O2 Arena.
“None of the budget for entertainment was picked up by the taxpayer and we apologise to Greenwich Council for any confusion caused. The GLA and Mayor are extremely grateful to all the sponsors for supporting the SportAccord.”
City Hall said the conference, which saw almost 2,000 of the world’s top sporting officials, IOC members and business leaders meet, was estimated to add £3 million to London’s economy.
It’s not the first time Dan Ritterband has talked his way into trouble at the London Assembly. In 2009, he was thrown out of a meeting after claiming members were not listening to him.
(Story updated at 4.35pm to include comment from the mayor’s office.)
Wednesday, 12.55pm: Dan Ritterband has also now apologised to committee chair John Biggs – read his letter here.
14 Jun 2011
Snipe Highlights
Some popular articles from past years
- Number of people using Thames cable car plunges
- 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
- Summer Camp: Roll out those lazy, hazy, crazy days
- A unique collection of photos of Edwardian Londoners
- 9 poems about London: one for each of your moods
- Margaret Thatcher statue rejected by public
- London has chosen its mayor, but why can’t it choose its own media?
- Peter Bayley has worked for 50 years as a cinema projectionist in East Finchley
- Random Interview: Eileen Conn, co-ordinator of Peckham Vision
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