ISSUE 33 FEB-MARCH 2010 nottingham culture

Hot Chip Cassetteboy Mark Steel Rebecca Dakin Cagefighting special Matt Aston The Swiines Red Rack’em Local graffiti artists Nottingham events listings Star City The Future Under Communism 13 Feburary - 18 April

High Pavement / Weekday Cross Open: Tue - Fri 10am - 7pm Nottingham Sat and Bank Holidays 10am - 6pm NG1 2GB Sun 11am - 5pm Lace Market Tram Stop Galleries closed Mondays, except Bank Holidays. Shop and Café open. We are open Good Friday, Easter Weekend and Easter Monday. Cover: Valentina Tereshkova, Tereshkova, Valentina Cover: v Kosmose. Sovety a scene from RIA Novosti Photo by FREE www.nottinghamcontemporary.org LeftLion Magazine Issue 33 contents February - March 2010 editorial Welcome to our first issue of 2010. I’ve noticed a few comments floating about recently about how now we’re in a new decade we are supposed to be ‘living in the future’. Obviously that statement is a paradox in itself, but I think the crux of the beef is that you still can’t buy Back To The Future hoverboards and James Bond jetpacks in Argos. There’s a simple solution to cure this disillusionment: watch 2010 (the sequel to 2001: A Space Odyssey) as I did this week. It’s highly disappointing and after it’s finished you’ll be glad to get back to your humdrum life again.

Anyway, as usual we’ve got a tangfastic packet of Nottingham Culture for you within these pages. On the literature front we have interviews with escort-turned- 13 16 14 author Rebecca Dakin, who charmed us all with her reading at our Circus Extravaganza last year. We have May Contain Notts Aston Thriller Music Reviews words with comedian, author and all-round boffin Mark 04 The news diary that treads the dog 12 How Matt Aston, one of the best new 21 Glades, Here’s To Tragedy, In Steel about why we still get called ‘scabs’ twenty-five dirt of reality into the white Axminster theatre directors in the country, turned Isolation, Lisa de’Ville, Mas Y Mas, years after the miners’ strike. Local theatre director Matt of local media a Saturday job into a creative career Becky Syson, Theorist, Wigflex and Aston pops up to tell us about working with Billy Ivory The Engines of Armageddon and Stephen Lowe. And Internet terrorists Cassetteboy Steely Don are in the house to inform us why they enjoy playing with LeftEyeOn 13 05 Comedian, novelist, political activist the noises Alan Sugar and Nick Griffin make. The winners of our abstract photo and all-round nice-guy Mark Steel 22 Kick Out The Hams competition explains to us why some people still Plucky young boggers The Swiines, For those of you with an interest in local sport, see our think we’re ‘scabs’ and why they want to give centrespread on mixed martial artists. At first this comes Nottingham a slap across as very brutal and disturbing viewing (and frankly Hot Rocks most of what you see on TV is), but the competitors I met 07 Mercury Music Prize nominees Hot Artist Profiles 14 surprised me with their wit, openness and general friendly Chip play Rock City this February and, We talk spray cans and throw-ups Event Listings nature. I’ll retain an interest in those fighters from now hence, grace this mag with an with Kid30, Kaption One, Tali and 23 Where to go and what to do in on - though I won’t be stepping into a cage with them interview Onga B Hoodtown over the next 59 days anytime soon. 15 Sampley Red 08 A Canadian In New Basford Red Rack’em is, erm, red hot right 28 Noshingham We’ve had a lot of feedback about our music coverage Everyone’s favourite ex-pat is feeling now. He spills the beans on Big Chill, Our new-ish food section is back recently too - mostly positive - but the negative titbits surprisingly positive about our city. For Radio 1 and his former career as News with a main course of JamCafe, are usually the most interesting. For the record we are a change Bunny Ripple and Le Bistrot Pierre not just a music magazine; we’re trying to cover a wide range of cultural things going on in Notts, including our bleeding brilliant local music scene! So while the likes of Compact Diss Fight Club Rocky Horrorscopes 09 16 We hang out with three of the best 30 Red Rack’em and The Swiines are interviewed in here (as Audio cut and paste specialists Plus The Arthole, Notts Trumps and well as Hot Chip) you’ll have to go to our website to read Cassetteboy pop in for a chat mixed martial artists in Nottingham, LeftLion Abroad and realise they’re not the psychos the other 500-plus interviews, reviews and features we’ve we thought they might be done on local musicians over the years. While you’re there You Go, Girlfriend have a listen to their tunes on our podcasts (leftlion.co.uk/ 10 Escort-turned-writer Rebecca Write Lion podcasts) and come see some of them at one of our live Dakin talks us through her old job, 20 events (more info about our next one on page 23). And and her dislike for Stratford’s The cream of our creative writing forum crop, with book reviews if you want us to listen to your band, visit leftlion.co.uk/ Pizza Hut sendusmusic and follow the simple instructions.

So no more moaning about us not giving your band a triple page spread every issue, okay? If we did that, we’d have credits to bump other cool stuff and members of the local arts, Editor in Chief Photography Editor Daddio theatre or literary scene might start picketing outside our Jared Wilson ([email protected]) Dominic Henry ([email protected]) Lee Whitehead houses too! Hang on a minute - that could be quite fun... Stephen Wright Editor Theatre Editor Peter Zabulis [email protected] Al Needham ([email protected]) Adrian Bhagat ([email protected]) Podcast crew Technical Director Contributors Paul Abbott Sound of The Lion Alan Gilby ([email protected]) Rob Cutforth Timmy Bates LeftLion’s podcast of plenty Bod Fonda Rosa Brough Sound of the Lion is the LeftLion Sub-editors Drew Healey Will Forrest podcast devoted exclusively to Charlotte Kingsbury ([email protected]) Shariff Ibrahim Kristi Genovese new music from Nottingham. It Nathan Miller ([email protected]) Sarah Morrison Jon Hall began hosted by Hello Thor’s Tom Beane Noodler Dan Hardy Whalley, but then he got all famous Art Director Jamir Rhodes Christopher Hough and moved on to BBC 6 Music. So our Music Editor Paul David Blenkey ([email protected]) Aly Stoneman Robin Lewis Klotschkow and Doledrum promoter Kristi Genovese took Andrew Trendell Stuart Rogers up the mantle of feeding your tabs with a fresh selection Marketing and Sales Manager Lauren Walker Sam Vtekk of local vocals each month. Show #3 (online now) features Ben Hacking ([email protected]) Anthony Whitton Oli Ward one track from each of the albums reviewed on page 21. Jim Wheatley Listen up at leftlion.co.uk/podcasts Art Editor Cover image Frances Ashton ([email protected]) Jeffrey Bowman (mrbowlegs.co.uk) Sparring partner Luke Skillington Film Editor Illustrators Ashley Dilks Alison Emm ([email protected]) Adam Poole (goatskin-mountain.co.uk) LeftLion.co.uk received twelve million page Doodle bug Rob White (thearthole.co.uk) views during the last year. This magazine has Ash is one of the founding members Literature Editor an estimated readership of 40,000 people and of the epic Drop in the Ocean music James Walker ([email protected]) Photographers is distributed to over 300 venues across the festivals and is now involved with David Baird city of Nottingham. If your venue isn’t one of its successor, Hockley Hustle, which Music Editor Matt Dalton them, please contact Ben on 07984 275453 or goes from strength to strength. He’s Paul Klotschkow ([email protected]) Debbie Davies email [email protected]. widely revered amongst the ‘Lion Christopher Frost crew for being one of the finest purveyors of the Sunday Rebecca Gove-Humphries This magazine is printed on paper sourced Roast. His talents don’t end there though; he regularly from sustainable forests. Our printers are ISO contributes illustrations and designs for the mag at a Want to advertise in our pages? Email [email protected] 14001 certified by the British Accreditation minute’s notice and has also been known to juggle fire Bureau for their environmental management and throw a frisbee really, really far. or phone Ben on 07984 275453 or visit leftlion.co.uk/advertise system. leftlion.co.uk/issue33 3 MAY CONTAIN Nottingham in Top 10 Cities... with Nottingham’s ‘Mr. Sex’, Al Needham DK Eyewitness Travel Guides made Hoodtown one of the Top 10 cities to visit in 2010, along with Istanbul, Reykjavik, Vancouver and Nara. NOTTS NJM December 2009 - January 2010 Good news. This year could be quite a big year for this city - what with Naddinghayam: the Movie, the 5 December British Arts Show and all of our local sports teams The EDL demo in town gets moved looking like they’re on the up. next to the Castle, presumably because Kowalski they couldn’t concentrate on defending England next to a German market, Does this mean they’ll be some sort of exchange with a massive reindeer head singing system set up? So we can do swapsies and go and Christmas songs at them. Wetherspoons stay in the other places for a bit? I’m up for a bit of got a record bar taking that day, you Nara action. This is definitely what lists like this know. should be for if not. theonelikethe 8 December Su Pollard, Mother Nottingham herself, That is surreal - as much as Notts is good it’s kicks off on a disabled driver after hardly in the same league as Istanbul a car accident in Bournemouth and timmy nearly gets collared by Babylon after a swearing binge that would have shamed Notts’ Most Powerful and/or the people in the smoking area of the Influential People Thurland on a Friday night. “She was quite a spectacle in her pink and black Ken Clarke, people! Is he the only Bilderberger from striped leggings, a short black skirt and Notts? bright pink pillbox hat,” said the victim. Stillman Cor. I know people who would quite happily pay to be sworn at by Su Pollard Thomas Helwys, co-founder of Baptist dressed up like that. denomination. William Booth, founder of the Salvation Army. Herbert Kilpin, founder of AC 9 December Milan. Alright, alright; I would quite happily Denzileo pay for that experience.

P Brothers, Son Records and the Out Da Ville 10 December people in their time, for putting each other on, Forest supporters across the city find bringing people through and making waves on their heads on the verge of exploding, their scene. Geiom, Spamchop and Shortstuff who such is the urge to scream “I told you are making quite a noise and getting some justified so, you mongs”, as Munto Finance are attention. Shane, for mekkin films. revealed as – well, we still don’t really floydy know, but they sell Notts County on for 14 January a quid to the ludicrously oily Peter Trembling. Hey, County fans Peter Trembling demonstrates his ability to focus upon John Peace - Experian Founder, Nat Puri - – give me your council house in Bestwood and in five years time, the real problems at Notts County by, er, announcing the search Industrialist, Prof David Greenaway - Notts Uni, I guarantee that it’ll be in the Park. for a new song for the team to run out to. Dunno why, because the Prof Neil Gorman - Trent Uni, Richard D. Fairbank current one - One Vision by Queen - is pretty apt, as it contains the - Capital One Founder, Chairman (check out his 16 December lyrics “I’m gonna tell you there’s no black and white” and “I had name for a banker: Rich Fairbank and not changed The FA announces that Nottingham has breezed into the next a dream when I was young, a dream of sweet illusion... but a cold by deed poll, brilliant). stage of the World Cup city selection process, while Leicester wind blows, and a dark rain falls…look what they’ve done to my NS and Derby are told to pick their knickers up off the floor and jog dreams”. on. If there has to be a new stadium in Nottingham, May Contain Good call on Shane Meadows (although he is from Notts suggests only this; that a tinkler large enough to cast a 16 January Uttoxeter so would he count?) That actress who shadow over our neighbouring hamlets be attached to the roof, A local DJ raises nearly two grand for the Haiti Earthquake was in Minority Report. with the words “SUCK THIS, YOU VERMIN. GO ON - SUCK IT AS Fund by running round the Square in his underwear. A few Daley Thompson IF IT BELONGED TO YOUR FATHER-BROTHER” spelled out in hours later, nearly a thousand sucky girls do exactly the same 200-foot neon lights. thing, for nowt. Vernon Coaker, Jesse Boot, the chap who invented HP Sauce, James Baillie, The Middleton Family of 17 December 18 January Wollaton Hall, Alan Sillitoe, Sat Bains. It snows dead hard and Nottingham looks like a Christmas An instructor at the David Lloyd Fitness Centre is forced myhouse-yourhouse card. For a day. Then it all melts, and it looks like a massive bird to sign the sexual offenders register for appearing stark has shat all over the city and we all have to walk around like naked at the windows of his house in Arnold and doing a few, Sir Paul Smith. penguins with a diarrhoea problem for weeks. er, groin stretches at young mothers with kids. I feel sorry for Seamus Flannery the poor bastard myself - when you work at them places, you 30 December do everything in front of tinted glass. He obviously just forgot. Sir Lee Camp. Documents released by the Government under the 30-year it’s alan rule show that Brian Clough was considered by the Labour 19 January government as a potential ally to keep Margaret Thatcher out Amazing sights abound in Rise Park when Gary Lineker - no, of power. Let’s hope that when the foul hag finally stops nicking Nottingham WILL be (potential) sadly not that one - is airlifted to hospital, after a car crash, by our oxygen, the Hallowed Brian appears at the gate and boots her a helicopter that lands in the middle of the street. People in Top World Cup Venue directly into Satan’s chip pan, like that scene in 300. Valley look out of their windows and go; “Eeh, look at them posh bastards wi’ their ‘ellahports, thinking they’re summat.” Bloody hell, can’t even rely on Derby to do one 31 December thing right. Oh well, best be giving the Dutch/ Halo, which used to be Mode, which used to be McClusky’s, 21 January Belgian bid our full backing now. which used to be Madisons, is now known as ‘boarded Clumber Park announces that it is one of twenty historic Albert Herring up’. Where will our youths who hanker for crap RnB and people locations that have been added to Google Maps’ Street View, desperate to get their hands up the skirt of some scratty madam, which is great news for wheelchair-bound doggers. Could they do As it turns out, the only bidding cities not included who thought it was a good idea to get the names of their children the car park behind the Racecourse next, please? on the shortlist are our eternal rivals, Derby, tattooed upon their jubblies, go now? Oh yeah, everywhere else on Leicester and Hull, which suggests that someone Upper Parliament Street. 25 January on the organising committee might possibly have Students at Nottingham University announce plans to establish been born in the City Hospital. 6 January a British Quidditch league, despite the fact that they can’t fly NJM May Contain Notts, whilst taking in the sweet, sweet air on its or cast spells and are reduced to throwing a ball about with a midnight perambulation up Mansfield Road, is taken aback by the broomstick jammed against their groins. Talking of which, I would I’ll be sad to see the City Ground go, but it’s slowly sight of a man brandishing a live peregrine falcon on his arm like to announce plans for a Nottingham Rollerball team, seeing as dawning on me that it will have to at some point in at midnight. Surrounded by a gang of youths staring at him in it’s going to be dead popular in forty years time and we don’t want the future and I’d actually quite like to see the new awe, and taking pictures with their mobiles. Here’s a suggestion to be left behind. Owners of motorbikes with spiky wheels, or who stadium, so bring it on. for the Council – install a potentially violent animal petting zoo in possess the ability to punch someone in the face when they’ve Alan the Square at weekends, so that the youth can feed a polar bear or got a helmet on, meet me on the Forest on Sunday mornings. I’ve From the comments on the Derby Evening stroke a panther instead of trying to shove a pint glass into each already bagsied being Jonathan, though. Telegraph site: “Yes that’s right there is loads other’s brains. more to do in Nottingham - get shot, get drunk, get pregnant, urinate in the street and then see a 13 January show.” :D Some good news for Notts County, as they are announced as Adrian the 23rd most popular team to play on Fifa 10. But then again, everybody wanted to be Gon on Tekken 3, because you could be a two-foot orange dinosaur and absolutely shame your mates by farting in their faces.

4 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 LeftEyeOn leftlion.co.uk/lefteyeon Check out the winners of our abstract photo competition...

LeftLion readers chipped in over 130 photos for our LOMO themed abstract photo competition, with the chance to win their own retro Russian LOMO camera. We were well chuffed with what you sent in - see the weirdness in full at leftlion.co.uk/abstract Send us yer Notts... The judges’ top four are pictured, having racked up a stack of points for abstract interpretation and on-the-fly camera skills - top, then left to right:

Tower Explosion (winner) - The Woodlands Flats in Radford, multiple exposures, lens zooming and cool composition, all done in-camera and on the fly. It’s all going on. (Stephen Wright / Flickr: -SW-)

Sky Mirrored (runner up) - a different in-camera take on a well photographed abstract landmark, clouds confined to the mirror and not the sky. (Peter Zabulis / Flickr: PeteZab)

Aspire and Glowing (runner up) - a slanty persepctive of the 60m high Aspire sculpture on the Nottingham University Jubilee campus. (Christopher Frost / Flickr: gails_man)

Sperm Sun (runner up)- an everyday object snapped on the fly with an old camera, this [email protected] intriguing piece of rusty metal spotted lying in a skip could easily make it to a gallery. (Daddio) leftlion.co.uk/issue33 5 14 track CD album in stores now “The system that meets the wants of the few by denying the needs of the majority is in its twilight years” www.dealmakerrecords.com

City centre entertainment, Nottingham illuminations and special offers… A great night out!

Friday 12 February Light Night Nottingham City Centre From 6pm ‘til late Saturday 13 February After Dark From 5pm ‘til late

www.mynottingham.gov.uk/lightnight words: Paul Klotschkow

Over the course of three albums rammed full of delirious grooves, beats, funk, and electronica, with an unashamed pop side and clever wordplay, Hot Chip have grown to be one of the UK’s most original bands. Their second album The Warning was nominated for the Mercury Music Prize, whilst top ten single Ready For The Floor saw them up for a Grammy. They have just released their new album One Life Stand and are about to embark on a hectic UK tour. However, their keyboard player, guitarist and percussion man Owen Clarke still managed to squeeze in time to have a chat with us...

Hello Owen, how are you? For instance on the new album there is a track called Slush. It we got to meet him; that was cool. I also remember once when I’m good, thank you. I’ve been at the record label this afternoon. ended up being a very simple and elemental song, quite stripped we were unloading this massive electric piano to take in to the I had rehearsals this morning at 10:30am, the band have been back. But getting there was very difficult. We did about thirty Rescue Rooms, it was super heavy. We were all struggling to going through stuff we haven’t done in a while. Last week we versions of that song before we got to the point where we were carry it. Then this massive guy with a ginger ponytail came rehearsed the new stuff for the tour. happy with it. It’s a bit like a farming process, you develop out of the Rescue Rooms. I swear that he was about seven feet. strands and work on them until you get one you are happy with He said “I’ve got this one” and carried it in all on his own. The Your new album has just come out. How would you say the and cultivate that. Rescue Rooms giant! band has evolved since your debut Coming On Strong? I was struck recently by the first record. I was in a pub, and the How do you go about recreating your music live? “It’s a bit like a farming process, you develop song Playboy from that album came on the jukebox, and it took This time around I think that we have produced a very succinct strands and work on them until you get one me by surprise when I heard it and how good it still sounded. pop record. Things are very stripped back this time as opposed We’ve spent such a long time working on the latest record, so to having lots of things going on, which we have had in the past. you are happy with and cultivate that” I’ve had these new songs in my head for ages. To hear the older This means that we have to play less on stage, which is turning song and put it along the new stuff made me feel proud to hear in to a bit of a challenge. For the last record we toured for two There was a misunderstanding that Ready For The Floor had them together as it still held up. The first record seemed so years and by the end of it, it was so full on and full of energy due been written for Kylie Minogue, but she rejected it. If you had excitable in comparison though. I feel that the evolution of the to the momentum that we had built up. We don’t have that this the opportunity to write a song for one act, who would it be band has been a natural one, we have never exploded or made a time around. Due to the new album we are much more dynamic and why? giant leap ahead. It’s been a gradual process. and elemental, so we need to find that energy straight away. This is a tough one. It’s hard to think of one person. It would have to be someone who has songs written for them. I know he How does the songwriting work in the band? The venues you play are getting bigger. Does this affect the writes his own songs, but to write with David Byrne would be The band started with Alexis (Taylor) and Joe (Goddard) and way you approach playing live? fun. I saw this video on YouTube where he performed Whitney they started to grow and move in a more electronic direction. Well, the first gig that the band ever did was a strange one. It Houston’s I Wanna Dance With Somebody, and to see someone Due to this they needed people to play the growing number of was at the Union Chapel supporting SMOG and it was rubbish. like him do that song was great. Alternatively, writing a pop instruments, so the band fell in to place because of that. Those We had all these strange organs, various Casio keyboards, drum song for Tom Waits would be interesting. two are the main songwriters in the band. It was really on our machines, and guitars and the venue made us sound bad. It second album, The Warning, where the songwriting started to was an old church so it was full of reverb, like when you talk in Do you have any final words for the LeftLion readers? evolve a little bit more. Alexis and Jo still brought in the songs, a church the sound bounces around - it was just like that. When I’m not fond of final words. I would like to say that the band but the rest of the band were incorporated more into it. On Made you play in larger venues sometimes that sound can still suffer. really do enjoy Nottingham - the crowds always seem so In The Dark the band did do some songs together, but that But because the room is full of people there is a joining of energy. excitable. It seems to be a city where people love to go out and approach didn’t work this time around. On One Life Stand Alexis I know that sounds hippyish. You are providing something for have a great time. Our next Nottingham gig is the day after and Joe brought in their demos, which were in various stages, people who want it and want a good time, so the room is full Valentines Day. Maybe you could take a date along and break up either coherent songs or just ideas. Then the production brought of energy and that makes a big difference. I guess it is like a during the show. Then make up afterwards... that’s always the things together. modern-day church, but with everyone dancing. fun part.

When the band is in the studio, how are the songs recorded Do you have any fond memories of playing Nottingham Hot Chip play at Rock City on Monday 15 February. One Life and put together then? previously? Stand is out Monday 1 February. It depends. Some songs are already fully formed by the time I know that people always say this, but I mean it. I always like hotchip.co.uk we get to the studio and other times the band will work on the visiting Nottingham, I get a good feeling when I am there. Who arrangements. We set up banks of keyboards and stations and is the curly haired one from Squeeze? Chris Difford maybe? Read more interviews like this at feed in rhythms and some songs end up playing themselves. Anyway, he was playing a gig every day or something travelling leftlion.co.uk/music Other times, certain songs have to go through various versions. around in a caravan. He had been playing earlier in the day, so leftlion.co.uk/issue33 7 OurRob RobCutforth looks is back feeling upon incredibly the entire positive decade about with aNottingham special personal in the letter new decade.to everyone We’ll who readssoon knockLeftLion. all thatAnd sillinessif he doesn’t out of get him, a card eh readers? off you, Baby Jesus will cry...

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And we Guv’nor!beautiful’. Chim However, chim it’scheroo! absolutely impossible homethe city. watching Mark. My. daytime Words. TV and eating as totally didn’t feel to ignore - and thank the Baby Haysoos it’s not many bon-bons as she wanted. She wasn’t like a couple of are low. Buy low, sell high, right? Everyone Wea Gehry sold thebuilding. house I’m in sureCalgary it will and grow moved on me. burdenedAnd as if all by that the isn’tproblems stupendous most women dicks when we were the only ones to show knows that. With that in mind, I bought acrossLike a bigthe green,pond. lacySure, fungus. there was a housing experience,enough, Nottingham like having has to been decide picked what shoes up giftless. stock in Lloyds TSB and RBS, ready to cash boom just after we sold, and Canadian toas buy a host or wherecity for shethe 2018should World go forCup. drinks in when they pull themselves out of trouble. moneyOnce you was step worth in, you as realisemuch as what Aunt a special Sally’s onIf England a Friday actually night. She get couldn’tit. And if afford to do The best thing about the Noughties was The government owns them now, and surely dog’splace ass-bandagesit is and why it thanis precisely actual what money - but anythingForest actually. Her life build was a new completely stadium simplified probably the fact that I developed the three they won’t do anything to screw me over. Of Nottingham needed. It’s free, it’s popular, the when none of the fans appear to want hey ho, a little problem like that wasn’t going and stress-free. She totally didn’t feel like nerdiest health conditions a person could course, I’ve only just found out today that art is fantastic and it just feels like a big city one. And if the World Cup committee to stop two dynamos like us. We moved over a stir-crazed loser - in fact, she was an possibly acquire: Astigmatism, Carpal both banks are going to be broken up and anywaygallery. Notand to bought mention a housethe fact with that money it’s 100% absolutedoesn’t change delight its to mind be around. later. But hey Tunnel syndrome and Plantar Fasciitis, yob-free. OK, maybe 92% yob-free, but that’s ho, even with all those ifs and buts, sold off in pieces, so I can probably kiss that borrowed from the in-laws. Fortunately since which means I have to wear glasses, a wrist money goodbye, but that’s OK; it’s another still pretty good for Nottingham, when you Leicester and Derby got the proverbial football being played at the City Ground, you nothing makes sense anymore. A place then, there’s been a mortgage crisis and the I didn’t view my being made redundant as strap and special shoes. All I need now is valuable life lesson learned. consider it’s in the middle of town and serves shaft. Even ugly, stinking Milton Keynes was can’t say it hasn’t been exciting. I’m sorry, I where Yates’s serves Dom Perignon instead price of our house has dropped to the point a setback either; it was an opportunity in some orthodontic headgear and eczema and booze. The Hockney exhibition has been going picked over Derby, and the beautiful thing don’t mean to be so flippant about County’s of asskickings, where Nottinghamians don’t where we are in negative equity. So really, disguise! I picked myself up, created my own I’ll have the full set. It’s good though, it’s like for quite a while and no one’s spray-painted about that (besides the Schadenfreude) is plight, I’m sure Sven will sort things out there. Here’soverreact hoping to a fewthe inchesTerrific of Tens snow are and just where as it’s“bollocks” like they across never The gave Big us Splash any money yet; that’s at all! business,the fact that did if afurther couple cuts of contracts, to the list areshut to the beingI mean, back look in at high his track school record; again, he’s which nothing as if exciting.David Gest gives tips on how not to be an pretty good going if you ask me. I didn’t even businessbe made, down,Nottingham accepted simply more cannot money be cut from anynot reliable.regular readerIs that myof my coat? column Why, willthank tell you. you, annoying, gormless jerkoff. Beinghear “Aah a homeowner kid could’ve may painted be a that,big innit” once thebecause in-laws that and would took leave on a thepart-time whole of job. the All East was totally not a difficult time for me. Merry Christmas. responsibility,while I was in there.but this is an English semi- theMidlands extra sparewithout time a World allowed Cup me venue. to write Suck on Even the Post have taken to reporting positive RobIt’s notxoxo right I tell ya. Things are just too good... detached home. It’s made of brick and athat number, Derby. of sitcoms and send them off to Mycrime wife statistic eventually stories. got I haven’tanother seen job anda Granny- concrete!Meanwhile, Not Dktravel.com that flimsy hasvinyl, named chipboard producers. 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88 www.leftlion.co.uk/issue32leftlion.co.uk/issue33 Our Rob looks back upon the entire decade with a special personal letter to everyone who reads LeftLion. And if he doesn’t get a card off you, Baby Jesus will cry... Words: James Walker

Dearest Reader, sitting in front of his fire smoking his pipe If there is one while the Big Bad Wolf disemboweled his thing my wife If there is anything better than receiving foolish colonial brothers in their houses of and I are not, it’s those yearly family Christmas letters, then sticks and straw. In the four years we’ve traditionalists; I don’t know what it is. Why, who doesn’t owned the house, we’ve only had a few so, it was with want to hear about how Aunt Sally’s dog small problems. The fence blew down, a pipe this in mind that came through ass surgery, or how Uncle burst and flooded the front room, the boiler last Christmas Internet phenomenon Cassetteboy are actually a duo - Michael Bollen and Steve Frank’s kidney stone issues have sorted crapped out, the sewage pipe broke and we suggested to Warlin. Their formula is simple: they find a well known public figure, take themselves out, or especially how cousin backed up, the roof’s caving in and the walls her family that everything they have ever said out of context and mash it back together again Jimmy just got a new job making twenty are as damp as Bruce Forsyth’s underpants. we forego the grand a year more than you do, even though grossly capitalist in video or song format so that they look like an incompetent, egotistical, sexual he was born the same year you finished Uni? Luckily, English contractors are so reliable Christmas deviant. Then stick it on albums and YouTube for all to see. We like their style, so and skilled! We only had serious problems tradition of Christmas letters are great. Aunt Sally with just over half of the ones we had to exchanging we had a chat to Michael... certainly isn’t writing to you to remind you deal with. You would’ve thought that the gifts. The festive how crappy your life is - she’s just keeping house issues would’ve been spotted by our season should How did this all start? How would you like to be remembered? you up to date on her family’s exciting and surveyor wouldn’t you? I’m sure he did his be about family, Fifteen years ago we made a compilation tape for our friends. Between the music we put funny I guess it would be nice to be remembered for Cassetteboy, because it’s so silly. It’s just a couple little snippets of TV and radio shows. As we did more tapes, gradually the funny snippets took of friends who made some funny tapes once, and the tapes got more and more complicated until fruitful lives! I’ve certainly had an exciting best though, I mean, he only charged us a not frivolous over from the music. We looped certain words or sentences and constructed our own jokes from the whole thing got way out of hand. Suddenly Charlie Brooker and Jonathan Ross were tweeting and fruitful life, so I thought I would write grand for a whole afternoon’s work. Peanuts, and boringly phrases. This was all done on old ghettoblaster tape decks and we broke quite a few through over- about us, we were appearing at the Victoria and Albert Museum dressed as Posh and Becks and you a decade’s worth of Christmas letters, really. We should be happy he showed up at bourgeois use of the record, play and pause buttons. Eventually we started using computers which allowed were invited on stage at Glastonbury, drunk out of our minds and hitting each other with inflatable all in one. Aren’t I just the most thoughtful all. conventions us to do much more complicated editing, making words from individual syllables, and to write our hammers. person in the world? forced upon us by own music to go between the jokes. We released three albums and two compilations during the The latter part of the decade was even better society. Together noughties, and have now moved on to video editing. Any particular favourite moments? Boy, what a decade it’s been! I married than the beginning. There were a few years we will stick it to The best times have probably been on stage, when you can actually hear the laughter that you’ve myself a nice English girl, quit smoking, there when we were too stable. Our jobs The Man, yeah! You’ve recently come out and revealed your identities. Why? strained and sweated to create. Standing in front of hundreds of people, wearing a monkey mask bought my first house and I finally completed were secure, we ate out, we went to the pub It was totally We kept our identities secret for fear of getting sued. Our entire act is based on copyright and a naked suit, whirling my fake, luminous penis around while a cut-up of Deal Or No Deal the two college diplomas I’d been working and we made pension contributions. It bored not because we infringement and slander. All of our source material is stolen from films, TV and radio and we make plays. You get a moment of clarity and realise exactly what you’re doing, then burst out laughing, on for years. And that was just 2000! After a us to tears. Thankfully in 2008, we were were a couple celebrities say things about sex and drugs that they would never normally say. Then I wrote a wondering how on earth it ended up like this. few years of living in Canada, my wife and I both relieved of our mundane nine-to-fives of broke-asses. comedy novel, so we decided to reveal the link with Cassetteboy, in case our fans were interested didn’t think our lives were thrilling enough, thanks to that silly old Credit Crunch. Even They, being in the book. Of course, there’s no guaranteeing that any of the names we have released are our If you could have anyone in the world as your Valentine, who would it be and why? so we decided to move to England. We were better for my wife, marketing was the last freethinking actual names, so we could still be undercover. Hmmm. It’s hard to think of an answer that isn’t tragic, sexist, or both. So I’ll settle for someone young, we didn’t have kids, England doesn’t thing any company wanted to pay for when non-conformists who’s witty enough to think of a funny answer to that question. And who’s got massive knockers. get cold winters and, gee whiz, won’t my they were laying people off, so she didn’t themselves, were What’s the book about? Earth Inc is a sci-fi comedy romp, set in the not too distant future, about the power of corporations, Michael’s book Earth Inc is available from Picnic Publishing now. Cassetteboy’s third album Carry friends think I am so cool and worldly when work for months. Not having any money only too happy loss of privacy and the growing gap between rich and poor. I’m not making it sound very funny, am On Breathing is available to buy from online record stores. I come back with an English accent? Pip pip, meant she could spend her ‘career break’ at to agree. And we I? It’s absolutely packed full of jokes though. I’ve read supposedly funny books that just have a host cassetteboy.wordpress.com Guv’nor! Chim chim cheroo! home watching daytime TV and eating as totally didn’t feel of characters running around for 200 pages, but no actual gags, and I didn’t want to write one of many bon-bons as she wanted. She wasn’t like a couple of are low. Buy low, sell high, right? Everyone those. I like to think there’s at least one proper joke on every page. We sold the house in Calgary and moved burdened by the problems most women dicks when we were the only ones to show knows that. With that in mind, I bought across the pond. Sure, there was a housing experience, like having to decide what shoes up giftless. stock in Lloyds TSB and RBS, ready to cash How long did it take to write? boom just after we sold, and Canadian to buy or where she should go for drinks in when they pull themselves out of trouble. For some reason I thought writing a book would be easy… boy was I wrong! It took bloody money was worth as much as Aunt Sally’s on a Friday night. She couldn’t afford to do The best thing about the Noughties was The government owns them now, and surely ages. But finishing it definitely gave me the confidence to attempt more ambitious things with dog’s ass-bandages than actual money - but anything. Her life was completely simplified probably the fact that I developed the three they won’t do anything to screw me over. Of Cassetteboy. I probably would have been too daunted to start a massive project like The Bloody hey ho, a little problem like that wasn’t going and stress-free. She totally didn’t feel like nerdiest health conditions a person could course, I’ve only just found out today that Apprentice video, had I not finally finished the book. to stop two dynamos like us. We moved over a stir-crazed loser - in fact, she was an possibly acquire: Astigmatism, Carpal both banks are going to be broken up and anyway and bought a house with money absolute delight to be around. Tunnel syndrome and Plantar Fasciitis, sold off in pieces, so I can probably kiss that How long did it take to do that video? borrowed from the in-laws. Fortunately since which means I have to wear glasses, a wrist money goodbye, but that’s OK; it’s another I don’t know how many hours, but I was working on it on and off for two months. I think I watched around 45 episodes and most of those two or three times. After a while I actually started to talk like then, there’s been a mortgage crisis and the I didn’t view my being made redundant as strap and special shoes. All I need now is valuable life lesson learned. price of our house has dropped to the point a setback either; it was an opportunity in some orthodontic headgear and eczema and Sir Alan… where we are in negative equity. So really, disguise! I picked myself up, created my own I’ll have the full set. It’s good though, it’s like Here’s hoping the Terrific Tens are just as The Bloody Apprentice works really well because of the visual element. Can you see yourself it’s like they never gave us any money at all! business, did a couple of contracts, shut the being back in high school again, which as exciting. making more visual recordings or is this an editorial nightmare? business down, accepted more money from any regular reader of my column will tell you, We’re pretty much only going to work in video from now on, partly because we’ve run out of ideas Being a homeowner may be a big the in-laws and took on a part-time job. All was totally not a difficult time for me. Merry Christmas. for albums. Video is more limiting if you’re worried about the visual element being seamless, but responsibility, but this is an English semi- the extra spare time allowed me to write Rob xoxo obviously we’re not bothered about that. The success of that video shows that if the jokes are detached home. It’s made of brick and a number of sitcoms and send them off to My wife eventually got another job and funny, people don’t mind if the picture jumps around all over the place. In many ways video is less concrete! Not that flimsy vinyl, chipboard producers. None of the scripts were picked between us we started making enough Read more from Rob at canuckistani.com limiting, because it gives you a whole other way to do jokes – some of the funniest bits in that are and fibreglass my condo back home was up, of course; in fact no-one got back to me money to do silly things like invest in the the reaction shots. made of. English houses are the ones the at all, but it was a fun exercise nonetheless. stock market. I thought to myself, hey, this is third Little Pig would’ve built. He’d be the perfect time to invest while all the stocks What’s the most difficult part of editing? To be honest the whole process is a massive pain in the arse. One of the worst parts is when you’ve nearly finished, you just need a word like “because” or “but” to finish one last sentence. So you have to sit and watch an hour-long programme yet again hoping to find that one word. Then you don’t find it, so you have to re-work the final sentence and then watch the whole programme again looking for a different word.

The Nick Griffin vs Question Time video came out really quickly. Did you have any reservations about targeting people like him for fear of retribution? I didn’t even think about it at the time, but I have had some rather nasty threatening messages since posting it online. I do have another Nick Griffin piece ready that I haven’t released yet, but I don’t think a few threats are going to stop me.

What do you hope to achieve by your work? With an election coming up I suppose there is a point to be made with the political pieces. Anything that makes people think twice about voting for the BNP has got to be a good thing, although I think our videos will probably just be preaching to the converted. That said, I think we’re more likely to release David Cameron videos this year than Gordon Brown ones. The other pieces are just entertainment really. You could look at something like The Bloody Apprentice and say that it’s striking a blow for people who are fed up with shallow reality TV, but fans of the show enjoy it just as much, if not more. Our aim has always been just to make people laugh. The British public always like a bit of smut and innuendo.

Your work seems to be kind of political slapstick. Is humour necessary for making serious points today and, if so, is there a danger that this trivialises serious debate? If you look at American TV shows like The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, you can see that comedy doesn’t have to trivialise serious debate. Those programmes are very funny, but they also make complex political points. The jokes attract viewers who probably wouldn’t watch a straight political show, so yes I do think humour can be an effective means of communication.

8 www.leftlion.co.uk/issue32 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 9 Interview: Al Needham You Go, Photo: Dom Henry Girlfriend

After nine years as a globe-trotting escort, Nottingham resident Rebecca Dakin has knocked it on the head and written The Girlfriend Experience, an eye-opening autobiography about her former career. Now she’s on a special date with LeftLion and sets the record straight about her old job, while we sit there and wonder if it was a good idea to show up in that old Notts County shirt... What made you want to become an escort? turning to drugs and alcohol. It’s not something I’d recommend Why didn’t you write it under a pseudonym? I didn’t really know what I wanted to do when I left college, for younger girls. Because I’m not ashamed of what I’ve done. And because I’ve and I needed to earn some money fast as I was in quite a lot of finished doing it. I’ve closed down that chapter of my life. I found debt and still living at my Mum and Dad’s. There aren’t many So what is ‘The Girlfriend Experience’? writing it very therapeutic; I tried to understand the dynamics of businesses that you can set up and run on your own with no For me, it means a hired girlfriend. It’s a bit more of an my family and the reasons why I went into such a job. outlay; I only spent £7 setting an advert up online. My first job intimate encounter and doesn’t seem so much of a commercial made me £700 and it was a buzz; it didn’t feel like a big deal transaction. It’s like a blind date, where I was genuinely What kind of feedback are you getting from your at all. interested in the person I was spending the evening with. former clients? It’s been really good, actually. One said he read it with Did you realise what you were letting yourself in for? You must have dealt with a lot of married men. Didn’t apprehension, intrigue and much fondness. The danger now Well, I’d been very promiscuous in my youth and didn’t really you worry about being involved in the shagging-up of a is that people think they know me really well having read it. have an issue with having sex with people I didn’t know. When relationship? Clients I’d seen for a long time suddenly feel like they’re on a I looked into it further and started working, I realised it could It wasn’t all married men; probably about fifty/fifty. And no, different level with me - a more personal level. On the other actually be like a real date, and that people would spend quite a I never felt guilty - there had to be problems in the first place hand, one client has just written to me saying how disappointed lot of money to take me to some really nice restaurants. I thought for the guy to be calling me. If he was going to cheat and look he was that I hadn’t written about him… getting paid to eat would be pretty good. elsewhere, he was going to do it no matter what. In some ways, I’ve held a lot of marriages together that would otherwise be lost Ever fallen for any of them? What did your Mam and Dad think? through affairs; I wasn’t ringing them up all the time asking why I never fell in love with any of them. There was this one guy who They were very disappointed and exasperated, but they didn’t they hadn’t called. was single, and we quite liked each other and met up three or try to talk me out of it. They just accepted that I wasn’t going four times, but it just didn’t work out. I’ve had a few guys that to be normal like the other three children, and thought “she’ll “My friends admire and respect me for have fallen for me and I’ve had to stop seeing them; it’s quite a have a go and will come back with her tail between her legs in a fine line. I never kept in touch with people between dates - the couple of months”. It’s not a taboo subject - my Mum’s a foodie having the balls to do what I did - they only contact was to arrange a date. like me, so I’d tell her about the restaurants and the hotels I find my work stories a bit more went to. How above board were you? Did you pay taxes, for example? interesting than theirs” Of course I did. I was registered as a self-employed escort, How did you feel when people asked you about your job? so the Inland Revenue knew exactly what I was doing for a Did you lie or sugar-coat it? Most books and films on escorting are either unbelievably living. It was like any other self-employed business; when I Most of the time I just told the truth, but I found it really positive or relentlessly grim. What’s your reality? wasn’t going out on dates, I was spending time looking for uncomfortable. The minute you say ‘escort’, some people just I had some amazing experiences; I’ve travelled the world and work, updating my website, and so on. I could go a couple of think ‘prostitute’, and then I had to try and explain that there been to hotels and restaurants that I could only ever dream months without having a job - I’d get enquiries, but there wasn’t was a little more to it than that. of. I had a great time and met a lot of interesting people, but anybody that I wanted to see. it’s not the same for everyone; I can only speak from my own What’s the difference between what you did and the average experiences. And what was the scabbiest place you were taken to? one-night stand? I like Pizza Hut, don’t get me wrong - but I got taken to the one Well, obviously I was getting paid, but I spent quite a lot of time Did you exchange gory details with your friends? in Stratford in London and there was piss all over the floor of the getting to know the person via email and phone conversations Oh yeah! I’m a woman - we do all the nitty-gritty. A lot of my toilets and it was disgusting. For a dinner date that was... yeah... to check we were compatible, so I knew a little bit before I friends admire and respect me for having the balls to do what I not great. arranged to meet them. I always told somebody where I was did, they find my work stories a bit more interesting than theirs... going to be, who I was with and when to expect me back. The Girlfriend Experience is available in bookshops now, from So why write a book? John Blake Publishing. Wasn’t it a dangerous job at times? I’d read Belle de Jour and I wasn’t impressed. It fuelled No, because I always made sure I had my wits about me - unlike misconceptions about escorts and that it was just about men thegirlfriendexperience.tv certain girls that go out and get really drunk at a weekend, wanting sex. That wasn’t how things were for me and I wanted wander off from their friends and sleep with a random guy. But I to set the record straight. There are many different levels of consider myself incredibly lucky to be unscathed after nine years escorting; you can just have sex with men, or you can have of escorting; lots of other girls lose it and end up hating men and longer dates that offer more of the companionship side of things. 10 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 OFF YOUR NEXT

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Until recently Matt Aston was producer and programmer at the Lakeside Arts Centre. Whilst there he directed several successful productions including the acclaimed Retirement of Tom Stevens by Billy Ivory, The Kiss by Glyn Cannon and Empty Bed Blues by Stephen Lowe. He’s currently considered to be one of the rising stars of British theatre, but he’s not exactly a luvvie - as his Christmas production of children’s favourite Flat Stanley pays testament. We spoke to him about his career so far...

Are you originally from Nottingham? No, I’m actually from Walsall. I came to read Communication Studies at Trent Polytechnic in 1992. I thought it would be media studies related but it was mostly sociology and psychology. Over two and a half years I didn’t do a stroke of work and then in the last six months had to work hard to get a degree. I was going to move to London or go back home but at the end of 1995 I got a few running jobs at Carlton Studios and I ended up staying here.

So how did you get involved in the theatre? After I finished university I was on the dole and doing odd jobs for the best part of a year. Then I got a Saturday job at The Nottingham Playhouse minding the stage door. That turned into a three-month contract on a community project and as one contract ran out, another would appear. I used to sit in on rehearsals and sit backstage and watch how everything worked and then this job came up as a producer. At the same time I put together some half-hour mini-shows that I directed. I got to know directors and actors and more about how things worked. Then the African arts producer left so I ended up getting that job, putting on hip-hop shows which was pretty bizarre. After that I got a job as front of house manager.

You’ve played a big part in establishing the Lakeside Arts Centre as a theatre venue in Nottingham... When the Lakeside was first built I was approached to work there on secondment, to help open it for the first few seasons. I programmed a lot of stuff that I produced and directed, starting with Kenneth Alan Taylor in Krapp’s Last Tape and luckily that worked out really well. The programming was always done in conversation with my boss Shona Powell (Director of the Centre) but she never really stopped me doing what I wanted to do and luckily they were mostly happy with what I did. I think she appreciates the relationships I have with writers.

Were you interested in the theatre before you came to Nottingham? I went to audition for Oliver! at the Birmingham Repertory Theatre when I was eight. I learned all the words to the Artful Dodger song Consider Yourself and I queued for two-and- a-half hours. It was my go next and then they said “Sorry we’ve got to clear the house” so I didn’t get to audition and It was the only press night ever where I didn’t go down to the dealing with platonic love, friendship, war, loss and getting I was absolutely devastated! As a teenager I used to go to bar to chat to the critics. Billy said we had to go backstage old. It’s about his Dad being in the RAF and together with the theatre quite a bit with my Mum. I can’t act and I’m not to talk to the cast but I wouldn’t do it, as I knew that would Tom Stevens it is part of what will become the Southwell formally trained or anything. To be honest I never thought I’d make them more nervous. Fortunately they turned it around Trilogy. Early next year I’ll be directing a new play about D.H. work in theatre but I had a vague idea that I wanted to work and the second half was probably the best hour of theatre I’ve Lawrence by Stephen Lowe, which will be the second half of in telly or film. Theatre for me is not just about good actors and ever seen. I’d like to turn Tom Stevens into a film, but Billy’s a Empty Bed Blues. It will continue the themes and use the same good words, it’s also about that moment that you can’t capture bit reticent about that because it works as a stage play and he set, so maybe in the future they’ll be shown together. As Billy on television or in a film. doesn’t want to spoil it. says “A proper writer is Stephen - good with words”.

How did you come to direct Billy Ivory’s first play, The What are you working on at the moment? Are you ever tempted to follow other creative types and Retirement of Tom Stevens? I left the Lakeside in July to work as a freelancer, with an move to London? He came to see a play of mine and he really loved it. He told agreement to come back and do four or five shows. At the A lot of people have said the streets are paved with gold in me he’d got this script that he’d written ten years ago and moment I’m working on A Day In The Death of Joe Egg at the London, but I find things are a bit incestuous there and people his producer and his agent and everyone else told him it was Playhouse. I’ve never seen it produced but we did a reading all want to do the same things. In Nottingham you can be a stage play rather than a film, so he offered it to me. The and that’s when a play comes alive for me. The play is really just as creative, if not more so, than in London. You get to rehearsals were hell and Billy was really stressed. We had two dark, the story of a couple raising a child with cerebral palsy. work with great people here - to me Billy Ivory, Stephen Lowe nights of previews which went well and they were followed by Laura McEwen, who also worked on Smile at the Lakeside, is and Amanda Whittington are three of the best writers in the the press performance. The first half of that night was probably doing the design and I’ve cast the lead - Mark Benton. He’s the country. I’m certainly not going anywhere for a while yet. the worst hour I’ve ever spent in the theatre, with the actors all Nationwide Building Society guy in their TV adverts. over the place forgetting and fluffing their lines. I looked round A Day in the Death of Joe Egg plays at Nottingham Playhouse to Billy and he was clutching his seat and clenching his teeth. In May I’ll be directing another play by Billy Ivory. I’ve been from Friday 19 March to Saturday 3 April. Bomber’s Moon plays He was looking rough as he had this football superstition trying to get him to write another play and he came up with at the Lakeside Arts Centre in May. where, because the preview had gone well, he was wearing the idea for Bomber’s Moon about a year ago. It’s a play the same clothes for every night of the play. Read more theatre reviews and interviews at leftlion.co.uk/theatre

12 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 words: Jared Wilson Steelyimage: Adam Poole Don

Words: Jared Wilson Image: Adam Poole

Whether he’s presenting bizarre solutions to social problems on Five Live’s The Mark Steel Solution, casting an eye over historical figures for The Mark Steel Lectures on BBC 2, writing for the Independent, churning out an alternative history of the Labour Party or presenting one-off stand-up diatribes about the city he’s in, Mark Steel is always enlightening and always entertaining...

When you last played Nottingham, the crowd berated you for undermined the sense of collectivism throughout the NUM. So are we going to get a Tory government after the not knowing that we’d burnt down our own castle in protest Bloody hell - I’m going back to things I’ve not really thought next election? against the Duke of Newcastle’s opposition to the Reform Act about for twenty years here... It looks like it, doesn’t it? I sort of still hope that Labour do of 1832... manage to win, but the real motor of change is from below. I remember that with great affection. It was a Sunday night and Last year you did Mark Steel is in Town, with a whole set about I think what’s really lacking in society at the moment is the gig was packed. It was also the night that Lewis Hamilton the place you were performing. Seems quite a challenge... organisation to protest. There are still a great many people who won the world motor racing championship. I don’t know about I think most comics like to do something about the town in their feel some sort of resentment about the way that society is run - ‘berating’ but it was great fun. I think I said something like, “You sets because it shows that you’re thorough and interested. But as the Facebook Rage Against The Machine campaign proved. started off brilliantly in the 1300s with your Robin Hood but from obviously I took this idea a lot further than most. I have to do I wouldn’t exaggerate it - it’s just a song - but there’s no sense there on you went all downhill. You had the castle where the it all again now, as we have a new series in the pipeline. The of strategy or organisation with the people who are angry about royalists launched the civil war and then you were terrible in the first one is in Dartford, in Kent. Funnily enough, it’s harder to the people that run society, so nothing much happens. It will miners’ strike.” Then someone shouted out about the burning get started with those sorts of places but the really nondescript all start to come together when people become more than a down of the castle. What a truly excellent thing for people to places are, in some way, the fun ones because they’re more disparate group of annoyed people and start to become a unified heckle about at a comedy gig! challenging and satisfying. You think there’s nothing interesting group that can discuss strategies and so on. Then the world can about a place, but then you scratch around and realise there is. start to change, in some way or another, at least. We wanted to ask you about the miners’ strike. At football matches against Yorkshire teams, we always How do you research all the places? You did a lecture on our very own Lord Byron. What are your get called ‘scabs’... I go to the town and have a wander about. Then I get any books favourite things about him? Really? That’s something, isn’t it? Well, if Gillingham play at that have been written about the place. It’s amazing how every Just his utter zest for life. His was a life of someone who just Crystal Palace they get “you all live in a caravan and you’re single town has a local historian who, for absolutely no benefit thought that every aspect should be up to the maximum. No all a bunch of pikeys” and all that sort of thing. It’s just that a to themselves, has spent three years of their life writing up matter what it was: if he was going to have a love affair, it was place gets labelled with the easiest possible stereotype. When something like The History of Railways in Didcott. They are going to be the most emotional love affair ever. If he was going Manchester City came down to Nottingham the week after magnificently tedious! I read one book about the history of a to have a one-night stand, it was going to be the most traumatic, Harold Shipman was convicted, they all started singing “Did a signal box in Kent - a whole book about just one signal box! I ridiculous, eventful one-night stand. His was just the most doctor kill your Gran?” The sheer ability to sink to those sorts of had to buy that because you think that this bloke’s going to be astonishing life and embodied passion. If he’d been around now depths I thought was genius. quite jokey about it, but he’s not. It really is just the history of he would have backed Rage Against The Machine for Christmas this signal box and nothing interesting happens at all. Anyway, number one, too... Do you think we let the country down during the I do a bit of that and then spend a couple of days looking at the miners’ strike? internet and look at all the news stories. Then I go back there Read a longer version of this interview at leftlion.co.uk/literature Well, that’s a complicated question. The strike started in South again for another visit. But there are loads of things about every Yorkshire and the pickets were bringing people out from other town that are quite distinct, really. marksteelinfo.com areas. I think the pickets were having some effect at that time in Nottingham, but there was a massive police presence which When can we expect the new series? had a real impact on the ability of anyone to try and bring the I think it starts in April - I hope it’s not earlier than that because Nottingham miners out. In the seventies there were local wage I’ve got to write the bloody thing! It’ll be on Radio 4 again - I’d agreements that had been accepted by the Union. Nottingham love it to be on telly but that depends on the telly people letting miners were able to produce more coal - even though it was me. It’s going to be on some download system or something, worse quality - and therefore they were actually paid more not the ‘listen again’, but something where you can actually than others. So they got got a sense of feeling better off and not download it. being a part of the Union as much. I think those wage bridges leftlion.co.uk/issue33 13 If you are a Nottingham-based artist and would like to be profiled in this section, please email ARTIST PROFILES [email protected] Some people seem to have a grudge against graffiti. But here at LeftLion we appreciate a bit of colour on our streets, and while none of us particularly like seeing someone’s name or a tag of a penis thrown up everywhere, we do admire a well-worked piece on an otherwise blank wall. So this issue, for your reading pleasure, we got in touch with four of the best of the current crop of Nottingham’s (legal) street artists. Kid30 (aka smallkid) Kaption One Describe your work … What drives you as an artist? On walls I mainly paint characters. My canvas When I started, my work was work is a lot more varied. I have a different pen driven by being part of a youth style and a paint style and the subject matter culture that was very free and is based around personal experiences, different anti-establishment, where I people, animals and things that are interesting could express myself how I me at the time. wanted to. From this I turned my artwork into something positive What inspires you? that is artistically and publicly Being really curious about odd things and recognised and accepted within having small man syndrome. the community. This gives me a driving force to keep being What’s the best thing about being a creative. street artist? Your clothes get ruined with paint, your car gets What’s the best thing about ruined with paint, you spend wasted weekends being a street artist? travelling and aching from going up and down The diversity of the art form. It ladders. You get beef from other writers, your comes in all shapes and sizes work never stays up for long, you hang around and never gets stale. The people in grotty areas, you think about painting all the and the experiences keep me on my toes. time. You’re skint and hanging around in the freezing cold and loads of people seem to be better than you! Tell us about a recent project or goal… A few weeks ago my friend Alex Rubes and I held a live illustration and graffiti event at the Tell us about a recent project or goal… Refectory Gallery on Carlton Road. It was a free event that hosted graffiti artists and illustrators My highlight of 2009 was painting at Glastonbury with the rest of the Oxygen Thievez from around the whole of the Midlands. It was a big success, though at the cost of an almighty crew and working on the biggest collection of zombies ever in one space at The Big Chill hangover. Fun! Festival. My goal for 2010 is to put on a personal exhibition, which I have been working on for a while now, based around some of my canvas work. I’m off to Australia in January and AD-What’s good about being a Nottingham-based artist? February to escape the cold and to hook up with people there for a few projects. I’m looking Not the weather! I’m Notts born and bred. Artistically there is plenty going on for a city of this forward to painting more walls in different cities and trying to keep true to myself and size and the diversity of people and venues makes it a good place to work in. my art. Which other artists do you admire? What’s your favourite colour? I always admire the other members of my crew, Oxygen Thievez. I also have admiration for any I’m well into my colour combinations, like greys, whites and pinks or greens and yellows. I artist who is passionate about being creative and keeping it real. don’t really have a favourite colour though, but if I had to choose I’d say gun metal grey. I’ve not made this up it’s an official colour that is used in the Royal Air Force for painting planes! If you were allowed to paint anywhere in Nottingham, where would you choose? I’d paint the whole area where the old Broadmarsh ramps used to stand. While I’m at it, I would If you were allowed to paint anywhere in Nottingham, where would you choose? build a few new ramps and it would be like the good old days. I would like to paint a really high wall on a cherry picker, as I’ve never done that before. oxygenthievez.com The cooling towers at Ratcliffe-on-Soar Power Station would be cool - the bigger the wall the better! So ifVERT you have got a big spare wall and you want it painting, drop me an email and I’ll come and paint a massive monkey on it! smallkid.co.uk Onga B Describe your work to newcomers... I like working with letters and forms, abstracting their shapes and turning Tali them into different, sometimes What can people expect unrecognisable, objects. I like to see when they see your work? craftmanship in art, so I try and push An adventure into the myself. Techniques and delivery with realms of expanding letter paint is also important to me. I have shapes, creating different worked with organic shapes, but connections, angles and right now I like straight lines. I also textures. I try to explore do a lot of collaborative painting with the third dimension and my crew, Must Try Harder. This is beyond. generally a concept conceived by one artist, and then we all input further What inspires your work? ideas, building the concept together The fact that there’s always like a giant jigsaw puzzle. something else out there to be discovered. I like going What drives you as an artist? on adventures and meeting Perfecting ideas, trying new things and trying to improve on my own techniques with the other others artists who are on a artists I’m working with at the time. A location, a colour, a concept and the media in one form or similar wavelength. another all inspire me.

What’s the best thing about being a street artist? Tell us about a recent project or goal… That you don’t have to take yourself so seriously. There’s a whole lot of fun to be had, just As always, we all Must Try Harder. go out and get it! What’s good about being a Nottingham-based artist? What’s your favourite thing? There are some good people making a lot of big moves in our local scene right now. At the moment I’m loving my new trainers. What’s your favourite colour? If you were allowed to paint anywhere in Nottingham, where would you choose? At the moment I like Montana electric blue, but it changes a lot. The trams. It would be great to put a little colour back into the city. If you were allowed to paint anywhere in Nottingham, where would you choose? I’d love to paint all boards or hoardings put up in the city that cover building sites or disused spaces. Or just give us a tram! flickr.com/musttryharder

To learn more about Nottingham’s Street Art scene, check out Kid30 and Kaption One’s conversation online at leftlion.co.uk/art

14 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 words: Beane photo: Debbie Davies

Danny Berman - aka Red Rack’em - is a busy man these days. After a summer of festival appearances and putting out production on a plethora of underground labels, he can count Gilles Peterson and Rob Da Bank among his fans. He also has his club-rocking, genre-busting international DJ sets and a huge fortnightly podcast to take care of. And this year is set to be even busier...

What brought you to Notts? from Chez Damier and ten-year-old garage from Zed Bias. My set Your Smugglers Inn podcasts go out fortnightly on Notts- I was a non-linear TV editor in the late nineties, having the time got recorded and hosted on the Big Chill website so it’s great to based internet radio station myhouse-yourhouse. How of my life in Liverpool working for the dodgy cable channel L!VE have a permanent record of that night. You can check out that set important has that been for getting your name out? TV. I’ve actually been News Bunny, but that’s a different story. at leftlion.co.uk/redrackembigchill It’s been going for a couple of years, and gets over 700 I got a job editing corporate films for Boots and Experian so I downloads a fortnight, which has helped me build an moved here in 1999, but I wasn’t really cut out for the corporate What do you think was the turning point for you in busting international audience. Sourcing two hours of brand new quality life and got the sack after a month. Years of unemployment, out of Notts? music and guest mixes every fortnight isn’t easy, but I‘ve been dance music and low-quality housing ensued. I’ve released a wide variety of music in the last few years lucky enough to build up a really strong network of labels and on many different labels that all have their own promotional producers contributing tracks and also listeners who want to Why are you called Red Rack’em? reach, which has brought me to the attention of a much wider hear new music. The most satisfying thing for me has been the I was inspired by artists like Yam Who, Red Astaire and audience. It’s been a bit of a snowball effect. I played at community side of things - artists remixing each other’s tracks Blackbeard so I put out a lot of unofficial hip-hop remixes from Snowbombing, Glastonbury, Bestival and Big Chill, which means after hearing them on the show, and certain labels are using 2004 to 2006 and that style was dubbed ‘pirate soul’ by the my music is being promoted to hundreds of thousands of people. it as an A&R hub to find new tunes to sign. I also really enjoy press. Bootlegs were called ‘booties’ in the shops. Booty is pirate My remixes of The Revenge, Tricky and the Joubert Singers have promoting other DJs on the show with the guest mixes, which treasure. I loved Tintin books as a child. I can’t say any more been really popular - Greg Wilson, one of the biggest names on brings a fresh new twist to the show as well. than that about it as this is a family magazine. the disco/edit scene, played my remix of the Joubert’s gospel disco classic Stand On The Word in nearly every one of his DJ Is any new material set to drop in 2010? Will we be blessed You’ve played in nearly every venue in town. What do you sets in 2009. with a debut album? make of the Nottingham scene? Well, I’ve got loads more singles on the way and a couple In the early noughties, I used to go out all the time to nights like “I wasn’t really cut out for the corporate of albums on the go. I have got another Red Rack’em EP on Detonate, DiY, Pure Filth and in more recent years I went to a lot Untracked out in February which has been getting Radio 1 play of the early dubstep parties like Heavyweight Rocksteady plus life and got the sack after a month. Years from Gilles. Then I’ve got EPs coming out on Detroit house label disco/house night Basement Boogaloo and the early Futureproof of unemployment, dance music and Undertones, Ctrl//Alt//Delete’s new label Shift plus the hot new parties. But I don’t really go out much in Nottingham anymore as house label Home Taping. I am away playing gigs most weekends and I really feel my age low-quality housing ensued.” Album-wise, I’m working on the Marlinspike album right now when I go out these days. which is a hybrid of 2-step garage and Detroit house/techno with My take on Notts right now is that it’s probably just as exciting That remix got you a lot of airplay on Radio 1... vocals - I’m hoping to get that finished mid-2010. for people under twenty as it was for me when I was going out I have had a lot of support for my Red Rack’em, Hot Coins and I’ve also just had the Hot Coins album (which is on the new all the time in 1999 to 2004. But it does seem like there’s a lot Marlinspike projects on Radio 1 from Gilles Peterson, Rob Da wave, post-punk disco tip) signed to a very exciting new label, less variety on offer these days in terms of venues and musical Bank, Mary Anne Hobbs and even Zane Lowe. Gilles invited so I will be putting that together in the next few months as well. styles. I think the types of music being offered to young people in me to play at the Worldwide Awards in January and I went So that’s this year taken care of… the whole of the UK these days are increasingly commercial and on straight after Jazzanova to a full house at Cargo in London, everything seems really dumbed down. which was an amazing experience and my set was broadcast on Smugglers Inn is broadcast fortnightly, Wednesday nights I found it inspiring when I played the last set at this year’s Big Radio 1 the following week. 7-9pm at myhouse-yourhouse.net. The podcast is available from Chill at the radio station as a lot of the massive crowd were redrackem.com - or search iTunes for ‘Smugglers Inn’. under twenty and they were all going mad to vintage house myspace.com/redrackem

Red Rack’em is playing at the LeftLion Trinity Square Extravaganza on Saturday 13 February. To learn more about Nottingham’s Street Art scene, check out Kid30 and Kaption One’s conversation online at leftlion.co.uk/art For more info visit leftlion.co.uk/trinity

leftlion.co.uk/issue33 15 FIGHTIt’s a concept that, to most people, evokes brutality, sadism and horror. Two men enteringCLUB a cage and beating each other bloody until one can’t stand up anymore. That’s not a TV sport, it’s ancient Roman stuff - that’s the end of civilisation, right?

But, the rising popularity of mixed martial arts, in both the US and now the UK, is undeniable. Many see it as the natural heir to boxing as TV’s top combat sport and after a little investigation you can see why. For starters boxers can actually compete in it if words: Jared Wilson they are so inclined - but against wrestlers, kickboxers, karate masters and dozens of other fighters from various disciplines. It’s photos: Matt Dalton, Dom hard on the eye at first, but also exciting, intriguing and competitive - and there is no match fixing to be had here. Henry and Lee Whitehead Nottingham is currently the home of some of the best in the business and already a well-trodden route to the American- based Ultimate Fighting Championship (the leading world MMA body and already a multi-billion dollar business). Thanks to trailblazers like Dan ‘The Outlaw’ Hardy and Paul ‘Semtex’ Daley - there is a tangible and growing scene in our city and behind those bigger names stand a host of up-and-coming fighters. Read what some of them say about the sport and it might just change your preconceptions...

“I’ve gone from being a scumbag going nowhere, to a good fighter and a family man. I don’t go out anymore, there are better things in life than that. The sport has changed my life!” ‘Judo’ Jimmy Wallhead

Jimmy Wallhead is a 25-year-old member of the happened to me are my losses - I’ve come back mentally Do you have any pre-fight rituals? East Midlands-based Team Rough House, a feared stronger and won eleven out of my last twelve. Yeah I have, but not as many anymore. At one point I wore the The coaches around me are amazing and study the other same shorts for five fights running. I do a lot of stretching, hit a “There needs to be more education and more workshops MMA crew known for producing well-respected fighters I’m up against. They know everything about them in few pads and then squirt water into my face to keep my head out there for the kids. You tend to find that people who do welterweight fighters. He currently holds three advance - when he’s going to jab, when he’s going to shoot - cool. titles (House of Pain British Champion, Cage they could probably tell me how many times they blink during Michelle ‘Warrior Queen’ Baron Gladiator British Champion and Clash of Warriors a bout. What music do you come out to? combat sports are much calmer and nicer people for it.” Some promotions don’t let you come out to anything with World Champion) and is ranked in the top ten What background do you have in combat sport? copyright for obvious reasons. But for the last few fights I’ve welterweights in both the UK and Europe. His I started judo aged seven. I’d watched The Karate Kid and come out to The Contender theme from the Sylvester Stallone How did you first get into this? No. When I was younger maybe and when I worked on Michelle Baron is a 28-year-old boxer from loved it, but my mum took me to judo by mistake. There was TV show. It’s pretty epic and gets me going. Boxing is something I’ve been into since I was about two nightclub doors - as I felt I had something to prove. But now professional record currently stands at nineteen Bestwood. She trains at Majestic boxing academy a guy called Rocky there who used to work with my dad years old. I remember it was a treat to stay up late and watch I’m much calmer. If I saw someone getting bullied or beaten up wins and five losses. down the pit and he got me to stay. Within a few weeks I was While out in town do you find yourself sizing up other and her current fight record is a mixed bag with it on TV with my parents - and growing up I remained a good then I’d have to intervene, but I wouldn’t try and hurt anyone. winning in competitions and ended up winning seven titles people and deciding whether you could have ‘em? observer of it. I was bullied when I was younger and when I How often do you train in an average week? one win, one draw and one loss. and eventually competing in European championships. Not at all. You can’t tell anything from a man’s size - looks can got to about fifteen I decided I wasn’t having it anymore and If you could fight any celebrity who would you choose? I train at least once a day when I’m not fighting. But in the be deceptive. What would you say to people who think ladies shouldn’t knocked a boy out in school after he bashed my head on a wall. David Beckham - he needs to man up. I don’t like footballers build-up to a fight I take twelve weeks out and then increase How did you first get into MMA? be fighters? So, after that, my parents sent me to some classes to get my anyway and he’s too much of a girl. I wouldn’t really fight him the schedule to two or three times a day. Sunday is always my After I stopped judo I went off the rails and got in with a What do you do when you’re not training or fighting? Times change. Women never used to be allowed to go to work. anger out. though; I’d probably just give him a bitchslap. day of rest though. bad crowd. But eventually I started training again and was Training and fighting is pretty much all I do to be honest. If we were fighting men then I could see problems. But I don’t offered a fight on my previous credentials. At first I was awful, Though on off days I spend a lot of time with my daughter think women should try and be masculine, there’s no reason to What crosses your mind before you head out to the ring? Anything else you want to say to our readers? Is this a full-time job for you now? throwing windmill punches, but I won a few like that as well playing princesses and watching films like Enchanted and The do that. Just be a lady and treat it as a sport. I always hope that I won’t break my nose as that wouldn’t look Thanks to my coach Barrington Brown, Nash at King of The Yes. I’ve been full-time for almost three years on the British as getting my ass kicked a couple of times. Then Dan Hardy Little Mermaid. nice. I get nervous about people watching me - I’m probably Ring and Clayton Byfield, founder and director of Done With It. circuit and picked up two British and one world title. That and Owen Comrie came to me and said: “You’re a bit of a How often do you train in an average week? more scared of tripping up on the carpet on the way in than I I think us fighters could all do with more support from got me noticed in America and I’ve just signed a deal with nutcase, you’ve got a lot of aggression and you don’t have If you could fight any celebrity who would you choose? I do my running in the morning before work. Then I work nine am of the fight itself. But once I’m in there and the bell goes I Nottingham as a whole. And the reason I’m supporting anti- a company called Bellator. So now my fights will go out to any MMA skill, but we can work on that. Come train with us.” I don’t really dislike many people to be honest. Is Alex Reid ‘til five and go to the gym afterwards. I take every Saturday off just switch off. gun and knife charities is because we’ve had too much street 150million in America on NBC, CBS and Telemundo. It’s a I never looked back. It’s just spiralled ever since. I’ve gone considered a celebrity yet? I’d fight him. I spent a bit of time and then on a Sunday I do a long run. It all pretty much stays violence in this city. Last year one of my friends, Bernard pretty big deal… there’s a lot of money at stake. from being a scumbag going nowhere, to a good fighter and with him in Vegas and he’s a good guy. A bit weird at times, the same for me in the build up to a fight as well. Do you have any pre-fight rituals? Langton, was shot and killed on a night out and left behind Bellator are different to all the other MMA promoters - the a family man - I’m expecting my second kid soon, I don’t go but he’s been in this sport since the beginning. In theory The day before I always have a Dead Sea salt bath. Then on two kids and partner. There needs to be more education and others just do single fights - whereas they do eight-man out drinking anymore, there are better things in life than that he should be the best MMA fighter in the UK. But for some How do you mentally prepare for a fight? the morning of the fight I always get my hair done. But these more workshops out there for the kids. You tend to find that tournaments. The promoters don’t choose who gets the title and I’m happier than I’ve ever been. It’s wicked! The sport has reason it’s never quite clicked for him. He’s a tough dude and I I’m usually quite relaxed. Mentally I think the best thing to do are just because they make me feel better rather than for people who do combat sports are much calmer and nicer shots, you have to beat everyone else to get one. changed my life! respect him as a fighter and the exposure he’s got on Celebrity is to stay calm and be confident in your own abilities. I’m a superstitious reasons. people for it. Big Brother can only be good for the sport. But yeah I’d give Christian as well, so I pray a lot. How do you mentally prepare for a fight? What crosses your mind before you head to the ring? fighting him a go. What music do you come out to? For more information on the charity Michelle supports visit Just by training hard. Training is harder than the actual bouts – It’s a lot of tunnel vision. There’s are nerves and fear and I’ve What background do you have in combat sports? A track called Done With It, a charity song by various donewithit.co.uk the fights themselves are fun. But training is miserable and you lost fights because of those. But you grow and learn to control Find out more about Jimmy at jimmywallheadmma.co.uk Aside from the boxing I did Muay Thai, but I fractured my shin Nottingham rappers against gun and knife crime. have to do it every day. your fear and use it as a positive. When you realise he’s scared in an accident. I also do a bit of Brazilian Jujitsu with some I don’t even watch my old fights as it would be cringeworthy. as well and probably has more to lose than me - he’s a pretty friends who come down from Chesterfield - we show them our While out in town do you find yourself sizing up other Obviously you gain experience throughout your fights, boy and I’m an ugly looking bastard - then you’re ready. boxing techniques and then they show us some of theirs. people and deciding whether you could have ‘em? but mentally you grow as well. The best things that have

16 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 17

“For the last few minutes before a fight I’m just buzzing to get in there, but that’s the fun of it. If you didn’t have that feeling then it wouldn’t mean anything.”

Mahmood ‘Persian Pride’ Besharate

Mahmood Besharate is a 31-year-old taekwando specialist from Beeston who trains at the Cobra Gym and Sport Nottingham. Until recently he fought in K-1 tournaments where he won nine fights and lost three. He then switched to MMA where he won his first, and to date only, fight.

How often do you train? Usually twice every day. I do jogging, thai boxing, sparring, wrestling, running and loads of work on my cardio. I always take Saturday as my day of rest. Mahmood and Michelle are both scheduled to fight at King of The Ring 14 Is this a full-time job for you? at Rock City on Sunday 28 February. For more information search for ‘King I wish it was, but I need to work on the side as well. I’m an engineer by trade, but right now of the Ring’ on Facebook. Tickets are priced £10 - £25 and are available to I’m out of work so it gives me even more time to train. buy from Sport Nottingham on 08700 347022. How do you mentally prepare for a fight? A week before I try to cut everything down and concentrate on my techniques. I’m quite a relaxed guy, even before a fight - but when I step into the ring it’s a totally different story.

What background do you have in combat sports? I’d been doing taekwando for over fifteen years. In 2006 I was in a fight against someone who was really aggressive. I was beating him and so his brother jumped into the ring and tried to knock me out. After that I decided it wasn’t the sport for me, so I trained with Owen Comrie and started to win quite a few fights. In MMA you can use all different types of styles as tools and it makes it more exciting - you constantly learn a lot of new things.

What crosses your mind before heading out to face your opponent? For the last few minutes before a fight I’m just buzzing to get in there, but that’s the whole fun of it. If you didn’t have that feeling then it wouldn’t mean anything - you can use those nerves to make you perform better.

Do you have any pre-fight rituals? Not really. I just try to relax as much as I can because once you’re there you’ve got to go through with it.

What music do you come out to? I’ve had quite a few different tunes, but my favourite is Jesus Walks by Kanye West. That’s my knockout tune!

Who are your favourite other sports people? Floyd Mayweather Jr is my current favourite. From the old school I used to love Bruce Lee - he was my biggest inspiration when I was a kid! Oh and Masutatsu Oyama was an amazing guy.

While out in town do you find yourself sizing up other people and deciding whether you could have ‘em? No. I’m not into trouble and I’d just walk away from it. Most of us don’t go down town drinking anyway - it would be bad for our performances.

What do you do when you’re not fighting? I like having fun with girls. But I try not to let it get in the way of my training.

They say love and hate are intertwined. Is there anything erotic about fighting? No. I don’t really know how to answer that. But no, there’s nothing sexual about fighting for me.

If you could fight any celebrity who would you choose? I can’t really think of any. I get on with everyone as long as they’re cool with me.

What about Floyd Mayweather Jr? Nah man. He’s in a different class to me - he’s gifted! Even if I trained for another 200 years then I wouldn’t be able to catch him. And I’m not going to live that long.

Anything else you want to say to our readers? Thanks to all the people who helped me out to get me where I am right now. My Thai boxing coach Owen Comrie, Nathan Leverton from Shootfighters, my condition coach Guy Baker and King of The Ring promoter Nash Somani. I couldn’t have done any of this without you.

leftlion.co.uk/issue33 19 Write Lion Friday 5 February sees Write Lion present poetry from Leicester’s Word! at The Arts Organisation. They’re really good (fi nd out more at myspace.com/wordleicester). Come on down and introduce yourself. It’s free entry all night and you can even bring your own booze!

We’ve also got our fourth Write Lion podcast out in early February and interviews with the authors reviewed below online at leftlion.co.uk/literature

As You Pass Shots Of The City I’ll have mine fried thanks by Cathy Grindrod by M_B by Bella Bartok

What will you make of these circles the sun has made, Mopping up Yolkless, each in its own perfect halo of light? A small room in Shoreditch cracked with intent of human destruction. A spider might stop, flinch, make itself small for shadows; Where things got trashed Sparrow’s spoken of the uncommon, it’s softness remnant of a fish choose just one, welcome its limits; Where the dirt of the cloud of the city polished metal, a heron, gaunt on guard, dive into its centre, clean; Particles of poisonous detritus of feathers that shine under street lights, a kitten pat its paw inside each one all morning long. Settled like fallout reveal no lack of lustre within that of a crow. And you? What will you make of these circles the sun has made? White linen peppered and flecked The siblings of those smaller shrink inside their shell, Crawl through them then, nose them apart. With cancerous black canker kicked from the branch, inadequate souls. Look, they are reforming, unfazed, even as you pass. I still find bits, here & there Let us eat.

A Little Lost A white rat from Camden Dream Musings II by Amy Elizabeth Watches TV from the curtain rail by Sara While I, pressed between layers Words echo and bounce in my throat, Curled like an ammonite And so she departed these shores, tumbling upwards and grazing my tongue. Tried to make sense of the will to save life This plane.. Like acid it spills and breaks; I dressed in the grey ground floor light Her grounded terrain.. into a foreign voice. Lived in the pages of ‘Breakfast At Midnight’ Ever - loving - maintaining her sane… My eyes sting as rivers ebb and flow, Penned by young Buster and Spike And where is she now? along the burning banks of my cheeks, While Great Ormond Street’s children Four springs later? pouring salt into the wound. Slipped under the knife From where the presence departed. When you died, I died. Life’s not been a bed of roses.. My name around your neck. This is where I mastered That life supposes… Your hands around mine. The art of not talking Life’s not been the easy path… Stalking movements of London’s undone Monumental cenotaph, Big Issue kings of the charity shun Life’s still here in all its faces. Evaporate Drearily huddled in Attica masks by Steve Pape People still meandering and settling in their places.. Knowing neither praise nor disgrace Love moves; forward, back, erases - Whirling their standards all over the place We watch the elect individuals But replaces I tried not to touch them, except on the tube To the universal spaces Step slowly forward into history Where, it was still OK to touch The faceless crowds That my terrain leads me eventually… Beholds and graces... Hollow eyed immobility This is me on my backside on Liverpool Street This enigma of human identity Knocked down by some old Irish bother As noiseless as morning shadows Watching the foolscap dance over A sonnet from Sven the Snowman Unblinking, mad-bright into the sun The looming black whales of Bishopsgate to the beautiful women of Nottingham The centre of a limitless territory I crunched that rock salted road by Lord Biro Surfacing out of dreamlessness Shattered crystals, like sharp settled snowstorms Nerve centres reminds us of pain Danced Sunday’s light to the siren’s whirring wail If you’re fed up with These comfort humming’s, While the masters, tucked away watching the soccer Of womb like existence In their Barbican beds Hazily encircled, the curse is cast Slept like cotton wool babies and would prefer Imagination with a gleeful glare a friendlier game The lonely solitary woods we cross Polly and Sam lived on Charteris Road Simultaneous sighs of relief, Sam’s splintered childhood was seven years old come and play with As recognition dawns I held his young hand to lattice London’s streets me and my snow balls Gracious beauty, walking the earth Seven Sisters, Jamaican Dumplings, Talmud, Tagine Emotional crisis, yet something divine Into Finsbury Park where his Mum liked to eat round the back of Words do not evaporate Where we picked at the manacled mind Ye Olde Meadow Lane. Words seep invisibly in And I learned that old chestnut, to be cruel to be kind Mother love or sex love? Sam, I’m just passing through London What have I to do with you?

Mr. Bloody Sunshine Make Less Strangers The Sky, Head On Adam Watts Steven Wilcoxson Cathy Grindrod Self-published, £4.99 Weathervane Press, £7.99 Shoestring Press, £8.95

Mr. Bloody Sunshine is a fantastic This third publication from recently Cathy Grindrod was Derbyshire Poet debut novel from another of formed Weathervane Press proves Laureate from 2005 to 2007 - but we Nottingham’s fine repertoire of self- conclusively that they are serious won’t hold that against her. Her fifth published authors. Dean works as about publishing local talent and, collection The Sky, Head On has just a droid in the soulless franchise perhaps more encouragingly, in been published by the Beeston-based machine, serving pizzas to people taking risks. Shoestring Press. who can’t comprehend why there is no large stuffed crust option. I say this because Make Less Strangers Characters in these poems are seeking is a debut not only by an unknown escape, their experience of life is often The monotonous drudgery of his and young author, but one which does weighed up and revealed through mundane day-to-day life relents only not conform to the usual narrative observation of the natural world, while during those beautiful moments structure. Set in the endless happy evocative images of flowers echo from one poem to the next – as of adrenaline-pumping intensity when he goes out on a kill; as hour of sex, self harm and substance ineffective herbal medicine, photographic subject and sexual such, the pace of the story jumps and shifts according to the abuse that was early noughties Nottingham club culture, we are metaphor: “A girl stands waiting / waiting at a bus stop / arms protagonist’s state of mind. taken through a fractured narrative that rapidly cuts between full of cornflowers / that uncompromising blue” and “waking characters as they collide on their hedonistic pursuits. chilled / she finds herself alone / inside a foxglove field.” Adam Watts articulates a whole range of cynical observations through Dean’s often hilariously pessimistic rants about On occasion the meanderings are quite beautiful, such as the Cathy’s poems have appeared in a number of publications and people and society, which I somewhat worryingly found myself short sharp listing of details which punctuates the narrative. anthologies through the years. Her skill at capturing intense completely agreeing with. Like a British working-class echo of At other times Wilcoxson is too adventurous and abstract, emotions with a reflective, original voice shines through in this American Psycho, Watts’ graphic imagination is at times truly potentially losing the reader’s attention. Overall, however, this is latest collection. Look out for Beeston Lock, The Nottingham horrific - an essential quality for any good purveyor of horror. All an admirable 169-page gamble that reads like the bastard child Mechanics on North Sherwood Street and a painting from signs point towards a bright future for this young novelist. of Quentin Tarantino and Bret Easton Ellis. James Walker Nottingham Castle all making an appearance. Aly Stoneman Jamie Rhodes mrbloodysunshine.com weathervanepress.co.uk shoestringpress.co.uk 20 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 You can now listen to one track from each review on our Sound Of The Lion podcast. Visit leftlion.co.uk/sotl and gerrit in yer tab! If you want your tunes to appear on this page visit leftlion.co.uk/sendusmusic

The Engines of Armageddon Glades Here’s To Tragedy The Engines of Armageddon Glades In The Shade Of 14th Album (Self-released) EP (Self-released) EP (Self-released)

The metal world is not exactly strong Glades’ self-titled debut EP is an I’ve heard an old wives’ tale that right now. The charts are awash interesting listen. The band list The super tight skinny jeans increase the with X Factor idiots, you can’t walk Album Leaf and Foals among their blood flow between the heart and the into a shop without your ears being influences. But they may wish to brain, and having a fringe over one assaulted by Lady Gaga and the consider adding Clap Your Hands Say eye causes poor depth perception. metal section of any big music shop is confined to a few tiny Yeah to that list, as opening track I’m Here’s To Tragedy are more proof that rows at the back next to the bargain bin. But the Engines of Not A Climber bears similarities to the American group’s emo, like smoking, is bad for your health, but highly addictive. Armageddon are a world away from Simon Cowell’s protégés, 2005 debut album. The sound of Yannis Philippakis is evident This EP is a hotbed of infectious emo-tronica. Clearly schooled sounding like Hells Bells blasting out from the speakers on though on second track From A Different Town; this punchy by AFI’s Davey Havok, singer Six proves an expert in emo opener Prologue. The band chop and change styles so fast dance punk definitely wouldn’t be out of place in a packed crooning. “I’m gunna send shockwaves through your core” he that it’s often hard to keep up with them, moving from early out Rescue Rooms. The three-track EP reaches its climax with warns with a heart full of unnerving and perverse intent. The Metallica-style thrash guitars, through to long, drawn out and perhaps its best offering. Though its title One Day Bloater title track conjures images of a glammed-up Enter Shikari. With slow solos and numerous fade-ins accompanied by growling Bill May Explode may seem to have little to do with the song, stadium rock choral anthemics and unpretentious guitar work, singing. Songs like Shock and Awe and I Am A Suicide you’ll be humming the guitar hooks for hours after. The band’s In The Shade of 14th could ride comfortably on the airwaves Bomber show how accomplished this band already is, with range of artistic inspiration for this musical taster has served of their teeny emo peers. I Wish I Had A Girl Like Vikki Blows all three band members clearly being talented musicians. Full them well; they produce a polished sound that sits up well is a 100mph drag race against the likes of Pendulum and The marks to them for coming up with an album this rewarding next to their contemporaries. Glades is a promising start from Faint, while Spellbound is a shimmering bubble of pop rock. first time around. Engines Of Armageddon are willing to bring the Nottingham and Leeds-based quintet, and you’d be well Final track Caught In The Firing Line creates a slow burning all different styles to the table in an effort to produce a rarity advised to have a listen. This should be a definite purchase haunting sensation, urging the listener to “embrace only the of late - a really exciting and individual metal album. As long in the new year for anyone of an indie disposition. If you wear shadows” and “deny the warming light” before copping a feel as bands like this are willing to try new things, the genre may Belle and Sebastian t-shirts with pride and have a well stocked of its mate’s girlfriend in the Market Square. It would be easy have a bright future after all. Lauren Walker Modest Mouse back catalogue, then buy it right now. Drew to cringe yourself into despair and pout a MySpace pose if the Heatley. songs weren’t punctuated by sharp electronic flourishes, flair Available to buy from Amazon or from the band’s website and an over-reaching passion. Andrew Trendell enginesofarmageddon.com Available from the band at gigs or to download from iTunes. myspace.com/gladesband Available from the band at gigs or through their MySpace. In Isolation myspace.com/herestotragedy Virus Lisa de’Ville Single (Self-released) Reverie Mas Y Mas EP (Self-released) In Isolation are a four-piece band La Bala based in Nottingham, boasting Album (Self-released) It’s usually the dark and mysterious a fizzying blend of contemporary things in life that are the most and eighties indie with new wave La Bala, the third record from cross- intriguing and seductive, and this and post punk. Virus is their latest cultural musical conquistadors Mas is certainly the case here. Lisa single, and this slab of angular Y Mas is a deliciously rich mixture de’Ville is something of a veteran of guitar rock, available as an mp3 download, is anything but of Latin rhythms, sensual rumba, the local music scene having played in various bands including stark – it presents a slick and well-produced homage to new flamenco styles and fiery vocals. Black Vinyl Heart. But now she is striking out on her own romantic synth pop with a guitar-driven twist. Perhaps most The album is wonderfully against the grain compared to any and as a showcase for her vocal talents and heart-wrenching surprising and distinctive are Ryan Swift’s vocals which other music coming from Notts, no doubt due to its recording songwriting, this EP hits the mark. Lisa has a beautiful teleport us back Tardis-style to the days of Simon Le Bon location - the trio travelled to Havana in Cuba to collaborate soaring voice which has the potential to cut your heart in two lounging around on the deck of an enormous white yacht in a with a host of musicians and artists. In this respect they have it reaches its zenith with a haunting howl on Darkest Hours. flapping linen suit, or ABC’s Martin Fry flashing razor-sharp succeeded, creating a truly unique, warm and inviting record. The raw, naked emotion on show is enough to melt the souls cheekbones and offering himself up for Cupid’s target practice. Travelling through a far-ranging spectrum of Latin-influenced of the most hardhearted people. Dark and twisting finger- Don’t let this fool you though, for Virus is not pure eighties styles and encompassing a cornucopia of instrumentalists and picked guitar melodies creep and crawl all over this EP, giving pop. The track boasts a range of synth sounds that would put guest artists, La Bala reflects the efforts made to capture the it a rather autumnal and sombre tone. Blue glides along on a Nick Rhodes’ paltry efforts to shame, all pinned together with music and attitudes of Cuban life. It’s sung almost entirely in simple yet sublime slide-guitar line that is one of those touches cascading guitar riffs and pleasantly evolving and slightly Spanish and never before has a record made me want to learn that turns a song from good to “Oh my god this is great”. mournful harmonies. The song avoids obvious pop structures a whole new language in order to fully appreciate it. But even Although Lisa comes across as introspective on this EP, you save for a rousing chorus which pulls it all together in style. if, like me, you lack skills en Español, the sensuous nature of get the feeling that she is no pushover and has an edge that Perhaps the only downside is that complete with retrospective the vocals and the gorgeous flow of the lyrics still make it a is only shown to those that truly deserve it. This EP proves vibe the lyrics, too, seem oddly dated, without the sharp joy to listen to. The overall feel of this record is one of unity, that the dark side is always the more attractive option. It is modern insight which might transform the track from an collaboration and connections, and just begs to be enjoyed a case of the sweetest songs being those that tell of saddest evocative homage to something truly thought-provoking. On in the company of friends; so cook up some delicious food, thought. Paul Klotschkow the other hand, this song screams radio-friendliness and is sure get some booze in, invite everyone you know and enjoy this to win them some notice. Watch this space... Bod Fonda sensuous, warm Latino record. Sarah Morrison Available from Lisa’s website or at her gigs. lisadeville.com Available for download from iTunes. Available from all major download sites, at gigs and through the inisolation.co.uk band’s website. Theorist masymas.co.uk World Ful of Robotos Becky Syson WIGFLEX003 Weave Your Dreams From mild-mannered Metal Mickey Shortstuff - Regression / Taylor - EP (Arboretum Records) to the terrifying T1000, the human Squeege (Split 12”, Wigflex) race’s relationship with robots has Some of the best times ever are those always been a strained one. So acting Having a blossoming electronica label long summer evenings spent just like the audio equivalent of Will on Notts’ doorstep is very significant. lazily hanging out in the garden or Smith in I, Robot, Notts born-and- Being too young and too far away in the park with friends and loved bred producer Theorist presents this from Sheffield I was never privy to the ones. Listening to Weave Your aural attack on a world of androids. early days of the Warp label, which is Dreams offers a similar sensation for Best known under the name Zero Theory, his classic hip- now considered the stuff of legend. me. Whether it’s through magic, trickery, brainwashing, or just hop beats on local rhyme heavyweight Cappo’s Get Out 1 Now, however, I have the chance to follow an excellent label incredible songwriting (on evidence I suspect it’s the latter), and 2 albums are legendary. These were followed up by a from its humble beginnings, rejoice at their triumphs and Becky Syson manages to bring those feelings of warmth and proper vinyl EP release on Breakin’ Bread which, if you can’t smile as their artists garner more much-deserved attention. optimism to her music. This is exactly the kind of thing you get hold of the homemade originals, you should definitely The first side boasts Shortstuff’s track Regression, which is want on these cold, dark and dreary winter evenings. buy. Theorist wastes no time with pleasantries, enquiring on dominated by a great beat. The track starts simply enough Becky seems to radiate positivity and this comes through opener The Battery “How would you feel if you were the until the melodies all come in one at a time. Xylophone-like loud and clear in her music. For instance, the EP opens up only human in a world full of robots?”. No time to think as a sounds play off one another until a warbling synth fades in with Nancy Song, a story of lost love, but taken from the mighty drum track comes crashing in, rousing a war cry in the and becomes the song’s central theme. It’s a great hook for a viewpoint that it’s not lost forever as there are still the happy listener before cinematic strings swirl through and there is dance night floor filler. Taylor’s Squeege opens like Pac-Man on memories and the possibility of seeing that person again on some reprieve. The album continues in much the same vein, an incredibly pleasant mushroom trip – a computer blip motif ‘the other side’. How heartwarming! There are points where reflecting the otherworldliness of a struggle between man and introduces the track and is slowly quashed by swathes and Becky’s voice is reminsicent of Harriet Wheeler from The machine. Menacing soundscapes and haunting choral samples waves of electronic squelches, beats and arpeggios which are Sundays; smooth, vibrant, and full of spirit. Whilst musically, are punctuated with mechanical whirrs. Digital beeps are at equal parts Autechre and Boards of Canada. The track slowly the EP stays on the acoustic side of business, with occasional odds with playful eighties action film-style guitar riffs. This evolves into a sort of electronic slow dance, surrounded in flourishes of drums and guitars - especially on the jazzy On My album is a masterpiece in production – and made entirely on an mystery but with just enough impact and pace to keep folks on Way. The simple arrangements give the songs room to grow old-school Ensoniq sampler. Isaac Asimov may have ruled that their feet. Keep your eyes on Wigflex at all times, and if you and weave their magic on the listener. a robot may not injure a human, but these ‘bots just killed it, can attend one of their club nights then I’d advise you to jump Paul Klotschkow blud! Shariff Ibrahim at the chance. Anthony Whitton

Avaialble to buy now from Becky Syson’s website. You can download the album for free at theorist.bandcamp.com Available on vinyl from OhMyGosh records, Juno, Boomkat, and becksyson.com myspace.com/thetheorist Chemical UK. Download available from Beatport and iTunes. wigflex.com leftlion.co.uk/issue33 21 featured listing LEFTLIONChristmas at Lakeside LISTINGSLakeside presents February - March 2010 Kick Out The Hams

TICKETS ON-LION

Buying tickets for events in Notts? From the latest DJs at Stealth to the latest bands at venues like Seven and The Rescue Rooms, you can get them all through our website, Illustration Ungerer copyright and © Diogenes AG Tomi Verlag Zürich at no extra cost. Even better, thanks to our partnership with gigantic.co.uk, every time you buy one through us some of the funds will go towards LeftLion and a bit more goes to those nice folks at Oxfam. leftlion.co.uk/tickets

NEW YEAR, NEW MUSIC

It’s a brand spanking new year and with it comes a whole bunch of bands for you to check out around and about our fair city. From eighties pop to nineties metal and cheese to He may be flat, but he’s a hero! local talent to beatboxing and jazz - give your tabs a boost with this lot: Pesky Alligators, If any band in the city deserves the ‘ones to watch’ tag, it’s The Swiines. Scott Bugg, Adi Young, Spaceships are Cool, Chesney Hawkes, The DanielStanley Taylor Lambchop and Rory was Black a normal have healthy been boy casting until a theirnotice spiky-popSuitable pearls for across ages 3+ the and city their for families the best Curtis Whitefinger Ordeal, Lean Valley Band, partboard of eighteen fell on him! months, Now he’s supporting only half an the inch likes thick... of The HollowaysBased and on The the Subways, story by Jeff and Brown getting Nitzer Ebb, Marina and the Diamonds, Hot noticed by the likes of BBC 6 Music. So Sarah Morrison caught up with them for a chat about their Chip, Hadouken!, (Hed) PE, Katatonia, Burn Join Stanley and his brother on their adventures at Christmas time! Adapted for the stage by Mike Kenny The Negative, Idle Hands, UK Beatboxing upcoming new single, growing up with Britpop and giving Nottingham a right proper slap… Championships, Stiff Kittens and The Four Tops. Adi, what inspired you to become a musician? You’re all put in charge of Nottingham for the day. 27 NOVEMBER - 3 JANUARYThe love of music. I started playing guitar at fifteen or so when What do you do with the city? Light Night is back, forLAKESIDE its third year, ARTS to CENTRE Britpop was happening, listening to Ocean Colour Scene and Kula Give it a slap! Make everyone get up off their arses - no one’s brighten up the dark landscapeALL TICKETS for £7 the weekend Shaker, and just wanted to be a rock star from then. Everyone allowed to stop in and watch Corrie or mong out on iTunes. We’d of 12-13 February; musial highlights include a went round school acting like they were Liam. put a gig on for everyone that the whole city could go to. Leftlion and DealmakerBOX Extravaganza OFFICE 0115 in Trinity 846 7777 Square. Our DJ-based line up includes sets So how did the four of you link up? Tell us about your new single Stone Faced... INFORMATION WWW.LAKESIDEARTS.ORG.UKFrom two other bands, The Bets and The Arcane. We all got It’s being released in March - we recorded it with Guy Elderfield from Red Rack’em, Vinyl Abort, Beatmasta Bill, together for a jam - just to play some music, ‘cos we were still at Random Recordings, who produced our last EP. He’s a legend, Winston Smith and Yassa Dealmaker. More info with our other bands. We didn’t want to break them up, but we that guy. I think it’s our best work; it was one of those songs that at leftlion.co.uk/trinity all just clicked and everything sounded great - so we formed The just came together, straight from the off it just snapped into place. Swiines. It’s got a good solid melody and beat, it sounds quite commercial Valentine’s Day is the same weekend and for but underground at the same time. We’re very proud of it. We’ve the love birds amongst us there’s Pitty Patt’s What can punters expect from a Swiines gig? had really good feedback so far. Romance O Rama, Burlesque Workshop and An all round guarantee; visuals, music…people just wanna get Lovers Lounge. One venue worth a mention involved when they see us. It’s about music at the end of the day, Plans for the year? innit? We’re not just some typical indie band with jangly guitars. We’re recording an album that will come out in the autumn, again is the soon to be re-opened Cross Keys in the It’s more full-on - people have said it’s a proper rock ‘n’ roll sound. with Random Recordings. That’s an ongoing thing really, probably Lace Market, expect a sexy revamp of an old near on a years worth of work - we want to take our time with it. haunt. Not to be forgotten, the host of regular What’s your favourite gig been? We’ve also got a new bass player, Rory, who’s quality. We really nights include Percussion, Wire and Wool, Rock City, when we supported Subways, was definitely the most want to play festivals, as many as we can; we’ve had positive Ghoul Garden, Dirty Filthy Sexy, Fade, Dollop, memorable. That was the biggest. I mean, we had roadies, and feedback so hopefully we’ll get to play some. We just want to get Detonate, Acoustickle and Smokescreen. Not could hear the cheering while we were backstage. But we were the new tunes out really. impressed by that plethora of aural delights? talking about this the other day - we kinda prefer the smaller gigs. You may want to consult a doctor... We’ve had some good ‘uns at the Running Horse, really big energy Anything else you need us to know? in there. It’s always great when you get along with the other Go and visit ooizit.com - we were one of their featured artists last local bands. Personally, I love a sold-out gig with loads of people month. It’s like a new version of MySpace. We’re selling all our from Notts; just turning up at Rock City or Social and it being full. tracks from there, and Amazon and Spotify. And come out and see We’ve sold out gigs before, but somewhere big with everyone we us play! NOTTINGHAM CULTURE know in the crowd would be top. Catch The Swiines at the Bodega Social Club, supporting If your new years resolution is to get a bit more Describe your songwriting process… Twisted Wheel on Thursday 18 February. Tickets are £7.50. cultured then don’t be chucking money away It’s nothing formal really - a lot of improvising, feeding off each by heading dahn London Town, we’ve got it all other. They usually come from one of Scott’s ideas, we’ll have a bit myspace.com/theswiines right here on your very doorstep. of a jam and whatever comes out of it usually sounds pretty good. Who are your heroes? Theatre-wise, there’s Those Magnificent Men, In recent years, Alex Turner - his lyrics The Land of Yes and No, Fakebook, Blood are just phenomenal. Going back, Brothers and The Circus of Horrors. the Gallagher brothers made the 90s for me, it was happy days. And Kurt Creating chuckles will be Dave Gorman, An Cobain - the whole grunge attitude Audience with Trevor Francis, Comedy in the from when we were growing up. Hood, Lee Mack and Jo Caulfield. Regular And who are you listening to at the nights include Just the Tonic’s Big Value moment? Comedy Showcases on Mondays and Gladdie’s The last album I bought was by Night every last Monday of the month. These New Puritans; they’re a bit off the wall and very different. Twisted Visual art lovers have more choice than you can Wheel as well - we’re supporting shake a stick at - and a lot of it’s free: Star City, them next month, so that’s a Reservoirs of Darkness, Naomi Terry, [re]locate, massive bonus. Portraits of a Jamaican Family and Dr. Sketchy’s What’s the most rock ‘n’ roll thing Anti-Art School. The Swiines have ever done? Stopping cars on the M1 in a For even more listings, check our massive traffic jam to give people regularly updated online section CDs, when we were drunk on the at leftlion.co.uk/listings. way back from a gig in London. We were all in the bus goading each other. Things started to go If you want to get your event in this magazine wrong after that, but I don’t really and on our website, aim your browser at remember much else… leftlion.co.uk/add. 22 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 nottingham event listings... for more: leftlion.co.uk/listings

Monday 01/02 Friday 05/02

Rave Monsta Radio Marble Nise Boys Do It Indoors The Loft The Maze The skate kings of Notts keep rolling on Free, 8pm - 1am £4 , 9pm

Plus Basement Forte and Bodukwe. Notts in a Nutshell Established in 2007 and the only The Maze Pesky Alligators independent skateboard company £3, 8pm The Robin Hood that’s owned and run by Nottingham With The Franchise, Apollo, Free, 9pm skateboarders, Nise was born of the Cavalry, Opium Toad and Stay For need for somewhere to skate where The Festival. Put Two Sugars in it: Dolly the British weather couldn’t drench Disco you and the police couldn’t nick you. The Alley Cafe Thursday 04/02 Free, 8.30pm - 1am Founded by Benjamin Durnan-Fletcher

Sonny Side Up and his second-in-command Thomas Bonington Theatre Saturday 06/02 Siveyer, Nise commenced operations £10 / £8 conc , 8pm by renting a studio space in Sneinton Stan Sulzmann (tenor), Jim Mullen Percussion and building an indoor ramp, creating (guitar), Steve Watts (bass) and The Loft a safe, friendly environment for local skaters. Nowadays, they sell skateboard hardware and apparel on their website, Tristan Mailliott (drums). Free, 8pm - 1am have just released their first DVD and are on the hunt for new places to install ramps.

Wire and Wool Arficeden The entire modus operandi of Nise is to keep it Notts (as borne out by their commitment to using local artists, The Alley Cafe The Chameleon Cafe Bar designers and manufacturers as often as possible). They also have a strong anti-minginess policy, with realistic Free, 8pm - 12am 8.30pm pricing, subsidising trips for younger skaters, and the fact that any profits go straight back into running the With Undercats Hicks, Motormouth, Plus Dutch Schultz, Beyond This project. If you’ve just taken up the sport, they should be your first point of contact. With over a century of boarding Beatmasta Bill, Cooper, Paul Point Are Monsters and Cyril Snear experience between ‘em, they’re only a phone call or email away if you need help or advice, and they’re commencing Mincher and Jake Bugg. weekly tuition sessions at Southglade Leisure Centre between 12pm and 2pm every Saturday from February – so if Outriders you want to hone your skills and get immersed in the Notts skateboard scene, email [email protected] for The Wiyos The Lion Inn further details. The Maze Free, 9pm - 11pm £10, 7.30pm Plus support Fade niseskateboards.com Gatecrasher SIBA National Beer Festival £8 / £10, 10pm - 4am Sunday 07/02 Tuesday 09/02 Friday 12/02 Canalhouse Bar and Restaurant Antonio Vendone, Paul Lyman, Free, 12pm - 1am Misst, Ben Rubin and DJ Wax on. Arficeden Bonsai Band! Hot Pink 66 Runs until: 07/02 The Chameleon The Malt Cross The Robin Hood The Soul Ska Shakedown £3, 8.30pm Free, 8pm Free, 9pm Mandy Tatton Band The Golden Fleece Plus Dutch Schultz, Cyril Snear ad The Hubb Free, 9pm - late Beyond This Point Are Monsters Hot Club De Paris Free, 9pm Wednesday 10/02 The Bodega SAD! Lostprophets £6, 7pm Dive : FOAMO [Chew The Fat!] The Chameleon Cafe Bar Rock City Miike Snow The Market Bar £4 advance, 8pm £22.50, 7.30pm The Rescue Rooms Dollop £3, 9pm with support from Young Guns. £7.50, 7.30pm Stealth I’m Not From London £10, 10pm Dogma Presents MJ Cole The Malt Cross She Keeps Bees Chesney Hawkes with Erol Alkan and Rustie. Dogma Free, 8pm - 12am The Rescue Rooms The Maze Plus Casual P, Dawntreader and Spaceships Are Cool, Tim McDonald £7, 7.30pm £10 adv, 8pm Littlefoot. and The Leisure Class, Dulcinea Saturday 13/02 and Owain-My Dark Star Rising. Thursday 11/02 Tuesday 09/02 Manière des Bohémiens Friday 05/02 The Malt Cross Wholesome Fish Empirical The Hubb NME Awards Tour 2010 £3, 8pm Oceansize Rock City Bonington Theatre Free, 9pm £10 / £12, 8pm Rock City £15.58, 7.30pm Reprogression £10, 7pm The Maccabees, Bombay Bicycle Nathaniel Facey, Lewis Wright, Tom The Loft Julie Butler Fundraiser Farmer and Shaney Forbes. The Central Club, The Big Pink and The Drums. Free, 8pm - 1am 4am Forever £3, £4, 7.30pm Notts in a Nutshell The Lion Inn With Scarlet’s Wake, Tina Taylor, Rack and Ruin Krusade Free, 9pm - 11pm The Maze The Maze The Lion Inn Phil Ashmore, Sharp Knees and £3, 8pm Scotch Egg. £4, 8pm Free, 9pm - 11pm Last Call Home, Twenty Year Hurricane and more tbc. Fade Gatecrasher Deli £8 / £10, 10pm - 4am The Hubb Antonio Vendone, Gilly, Deep Cult 45s Free, 9pm Groove, Luke Black, Paul Sekhri, Mark Cohan and DJ Wax on. DJ Bailey joins the Cult for one night only Dogma Presents TRG

Dogma Pitty Patt Romance O Rama The mighty Cult are one of the top dogs on the Notts dancefloor Goli, Ashburner, Senate and Yosh. Circus of the Casanova scene, and renowned for bringing some of the most forward- The Bodega thinking DnB artists in the game to Hoodtown - Fabio, Marcus £6, 8pm Intalex, Kubiks and Lomax, Commix, S.P.Y and Big Bud have all Friday 12/02 With Cherry Deville, Ruby Rose, played some blinding sets for Cult in recent months. And now Fusion Club Miles Away and Billie Rae. they’ve relocated to a cosy new home. The Loft Free, 8pm - 1am Ghoul Garden The recently refurbished Market Bar is the place to get all Culty Dynamic (Good Looking records), The Maze from now on, and there are three reasons why; the state-of-the- Kaysha, Beggar Su. £3.50, 8pm art Funktion One sound system, the extended license that will give you up to 4am to bust a move, and the fact that it’s one of Idle Hands Love Ends Disaster! the skillest venues in Goosegate. The Lion Inn The Rescue Rooms Free, 9pm - 11pm £3,, 7pm To celebrate Cult DnB sessions’ second birthday, they’ve lined Plus Stop Eject and Pope Joan. up Radio 1Xtra legend DJ Bailey to bless the decks on 5 March. Rubber Room Blaze Bayley With over fifteen years service on the DnB scene, Bailey is The Maze Rock City a highly respected icon of the genre whose bookings now £3, 8pm £7, 7pm stretch across the globe, whilst his Radio 1Xtra show has been Pit of Curiosities Plus Sinocence. grabbing many awards and accolades throughout its seven-year stint. Pit and Pendulum

£3, 8pm – 11pm Francis Dunnery More importantly, Bailey is a veteran turntablist who was one of the original residents at the legendary Metalheadz With Alien Slime Wrestlers, The Deux nights at the Blue Note club in London – so he’s not just going to roll up with a record bag and stand over the decks Robot Girl, The Theremin Lizard £20, 7pm all night. Having perfected his craft, this man is a DJ first and foremost, and he knows how to work a crowd. Lounge, Live Alien Autopsy, The Brain and The Oracle. Junk Yard Azonika (HQ), Muse (Happy Go Lucky) and Fonik (Everyday Junglist), alongside the ever-popular Cult residents Gatecrasher will be providing support ammunition on the night. Miss and get dissed. Oh, and don’t sleep on the monthly Cult DJ Katie £8, 10pm – 4a,m Radio sessions at leftlion.co.uk/radio for the best in Notts beats. The Hubb With Luke Black, Paul Sekhri and Free, 9pm Mark Cohen Cult Drum and Bass sessions second birthday, Friday 5 March. 10pm-4am. The Market Bar, 22 Goosegate, Hockley, NG1 1FF. Tickets: £5. Flight Club Fenech-Soler Stealth Muse £5, 10.15pm wearethecult.co.uk Free before 10pm / £4, 9pm - 3am

www.leftlion.co.uk/issue33 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 23 event listings... for more: leftlion.co.uk/listings

Sunday 14/02 Friday 19/02

Pitty Patt Burlesque Workshop Nitzer Ebb The Bodega Rock City Ale’d Basford £15, 1.30pm £15, 7pm No Roar deals at The Lion at Lovers Lounge UK Beatbox Championship Basford The Maze The Rescue Rooms

£2, 6pm £7, 8pm Standing under the striking shadow of the old

Me and Mr Jones Toasted Frog Shippos Brewery, The Lion at Basford is a gem in the The Hubb The Lion Inn rough of traditional pubs, drawing in both locals and Free, 9pm Free, 9pm - 11pm Real Ale fiends far and wide. Not only does it stock a veritable cornucopia of non-Pissy Bir beverages, {Eklectic} but it’s also rammed with history; its beer cellars are Monday 15/02 The Maze part of the original Nottingham cave network and £4 / £5, 9pm – late are some of the deepest in the city. Acoustickle Goli and Ashburner, 25 Past The Maze the Skank (Live), Hanuman, Playing host to regular regional CAMRA festivals, £3, 8pm Still Motion, Beatmasta Bill and it has a longstanding reputation as one of the best Thinkyman. traditional pubs in Notts, with up to a dozen cask Hot Chip Rock City ales on permanent standby. At least two are local Swansong beers. Microbreweries don’t get overlooked either. As you’d expect, the snap is traditional too, with snacks, light £17.50, 7.30pm The Robin Hood bites and grills a-plenty on offer – as well as curry-and-a-pint for £5.95 on Wednesdays. Free, 9pm

The Lost Levels The Bodega Papa La Bas Ale and food is not all that The Lion offers though, oh no; it’s a quality live music venue too, with their Sunday lunch £5, 8pm The Hubb jazz sessions, Tuesday night blues jams and their Thursday open mic evening. With good jazz not that easy to find Free, 9pm in Nottingham, the former has been a staple of The Lion for fifteen years, putting it head and, er, mane above the Tuesday 16/02 rest. Well worth a short tram hop. Misst Club Vadar The Market Bar 44 Mosley Street, New Basford, Nottingham, NG7 7FQ The Maze £5, 10pm £3 / £4, 8pm with Cluekid, Jack Sparrow, Misst, thelionatbasford.co.uk Bonus Beyond, Sideways Falling Laurent and Em-T Thoughts. and Arcanite Reaper. 30 Seconds to Mars Trent FM Arena Monday 22/02 Thursday 25/02 Saturday 27/02 The Jon Allen Band £20.43, 7.30pm The Rescue Rooms Catch Me I’m Naked This City Ready Steady 60’s £8.50, 7.30pm The Maze Rock City The Maze Saturday 20/02 £tbc, 8pm £3, 10pm £tbc, 7.30pm Blonde Louis With Cubrik and Numinous. The Bodega Wholesome Fish Roger Clyne and The DirtFilthySexy February £5, 7pm The Malt Cross The Brothers Movement Peacemakers The Central £3.50, 8pm The Bodega The Maze £3 /£4, 8:30pm - 2am MuHa £5, 8pm £10, 7.30pm Electroflex, Rainbow Down, DJ The Malt Cross Kris Ward Plus Owen Harvey. Heathen, DJ Girl Scout and Lady Free, 8pm The Approach Noisettes Wildside. Free, 9pm Rock City Friday 26/02 Wednesday 17/02 £14, 7.30pm Moonbuggy Oh My Gosh! - Boom Bap The Robin Hood Pesky Aligators Futures The Loft Free, 9pm Free, 8pm - 1am Tuesday 23/02 The Lion Inn Rock City Four Deck set with Squiggley and Free, 9pm - 11pm The Garden Get Together £6, 7pm Cole Stacey Furious P. presents: The Maze These Monsters The Maze Richie Muir £5, 8pm Evil Scarecrow The Old Angel £5, 10pm - 3am The Approach Rock City £tbc, 8.30pm With The Revenge, Nick Shaw and Free, 9pm Mastodon £5, 7pm Plus Alright The Captain. Ed Cotton. Rock City Plus special guests Sons of Merrick Holly Williams £16, 7.30pm and Isolysis. Old Basford Sack Sabbath and Iron on The Maze The Hubb £10, 7.30pm Maiden Elvis Fontenot and the Free, 9pm Rock City Wednesday 24/02 Sugabees £10, 7pm Marina and the Diamonds Sould The Lion Inn Bizarre presents The Bodega The Robin Hood Free, 9pm - 11pm Rock City Ronnie Londons Groove Lounge £8.50, 7pm Free, 9pm £11, 6.30pm Grosvenor

Stiff Kittens Chipmunk, Daisy Dares You, Tinie £3 before 11pm, 8pm - 1am Detonate - 11th Birthday Thursday 18/02 The Bodega Tempah and Skepta. Stealth Free, 10pm – 1am £10 / £12, 10pm - 5am Nik Kershaw Notts in a Nutshell Sunday 28/02 With DJ Marky, Joker, Gentelmens The Rescue Rooms Fade The Maze Dub Club (Live), Total Science, The Sunday Sessions £16, 7.30pm Gatecrasher £3, 8pm Jubei, Transit Mafia and more tbc. The Robin Hood £8 / £10, 10pm - 4am The Rutherfords, Allotment Free, 6.30pm Gracious K (Migraine Skank) Antonio Vendone, Paul Lyman, Collective, Noel Street, The Hubirs

Stealth Lost, Evil Nine, R-A-K-I-T/Plax, and more tbc. Saturday 27/02 Blackheart £5, 7pm That DJ / Laina and DJ Hudson, The Rescue Rooms The Heavy Soasis £12, 7.30pm Shine! Smokescreen The Bodega The Rescue Rooms The Maze The Maze £6.50, 7pm £10, 7pm £tbc, 7.30pm £5, 10pm - 4am Monday 01/03 A club night for those with learning Nick Harper Tee Dymond disabilities. So Many Dynamos The Rescue Rooms The Approach Tom McRae An Audience with Billy Davies Stealth £10, 7.30pm Free, 9pm The Rescue Rooms The Approach £5, 10.15pm £15, 7.30pm £10 - £30, 7pm DJ Cosmos B’day Bash Plus Brian Wright. Jennifer Batten Thursday 25/02 The Loft Is the Premier League Calling? Deux Free, 8pm - 1am The X Factor Live Tour 2010 Mick Coady Quartet £35, 1pm - 4pm Trent FM Arena Nottingham Ben Martin Band Bonington Theatre Get guitar lessons from Michael Imperial Days £23.50 - £28.50, 7.30pm The Hubb £10 / £12, 8pm Jackson World Tour member. The Loft Free, 9pm Robbie Robson, Peter King, Ross Free, 8pm - 1am Notts in a Nutshell Stanley, Mick Coady and Steve The Maze Straight Lines Keogh. Sunday 21/02 First Aid Kit £3, 8pm Rock City The Bodega Paradox, Out From Shadows, Made £6, 7pm John Gomme Local Natives £8, 7pm In The Shade and Minority Theory. The Hubb The Rescue Rooms

Twisted Wheel Free, 9pm £9, 7pm New Tricks Giggs The Bodega The Lion Inn Stealth £7.50, 7pm Folkwit Sunday Toby Kennedy Trio Free, 9pm - 11pm £8, 7.30pm The Robin Hood The Hubb

Dogma Presents Brooks Free, 8pm Free, 9pm Fade Fionn Regan Brothers Jason Steel and Prints Gatecrasher The Bodega Dogma In The Snow. Swimming £8 / £10, 10pm - 4am £8, 8pm Free, 8pm The Bodega Eric Prydz, Antonio Vendone, With Brookes Brother, Transit Mafia Rock City £5, 8pm and MC Ruthless. £10, 7.30pm Paul lyman, The Elementz Sound System and DJ Angelo.

24 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 nottingham event listings... for more: leftlion.co.uk/listings Tuesday 02/03 Saturday 06/03 Tubelord and Tall Ships Trivium Valentia’s Day The Chameleon Rock City Star City: The Future Under Communism £6, 7.30pm £16.50, 6.30pm Nottingham Contemporary set the bar high with their debut exhibitions Tinchy Stryder Nat Johnson and The Figureheads from Francis Stark and David Hockney, and it seems they aren’t going to Rock City The Bodega drop their standards anytime soon. As part of Polska! Year of Polish Culture, £14, 7.30pm £5, 7pm Star City is a major – and unprecedented – exhibition inspired by science fiction and futurology under Cold War communism during the sixties and Borderline Wednesday 03/03 The Hubb seventies. This, according to co-curator, Lukasz Ronduda, was “the last time Free, 9pm people living in Warsaw Pact countries believed in the future.” The Stranglers Rock City De10SsHn Sound: 7th Bday! Star City - named after the USSR’s secret cosmonaut base - showcases £23, 6.30pm Image Bar leading artists of the post-communist European art scene who revisit how £5, 9pm - 4am the future was experienced and imagined from the other side of the Iron Curtain, and explain why those visions are Revolution Sounds important today. The list of artists is too extensive to mention but, impressively, over half of the works on display The Maze have been commissioned especially for the exhibition. Pieces featured range from film to print to installations £6, 8pm Sunday 07/03 The JB Conspiracy, Anti-Vigilante, to sculptures. In addition, there will be a range of real objects from the Space Race and Soviet popular culture, Solution Against, Addictive Philoshy Vader including propaganda posters, sci-fi toys and a life-sized sputnik replica. and more tbc. The Central £12, 6.30pm The works within Star City are by turns socio-political and imaginary, melancholic and absurd, ravishing and Plus As You Drown, Divine Chaos, esoteric. One of the highlights includes a huge sculpture, by Tomaszewski and Malinowska, of the first woman in Thursday 04/03 Lordaeron and Threnody. space, Valentia Tereshkova. The piece will occupy the entire 300-metre square room - appropriately named, The Space – and you’ll be able to enter the cosmonaut-cum-deity through revolving doors that are situated between Carlene Carter (HED) PE her open legs, which isn’t an invitation anyone should turn down in haste. Tobias Putrih will be building a retro- The Maze The Rescue Rooms futuristic cinema, made from the glass walls of a seventies Yugoslavian supermarket, to accommodate the screening £17, 7.30pm £10, 6.30pm of Narkevicius’s alternative ending to the Tarkovsky’s seventies cult classic, Solaris. Threat Signal and Attila. Hadouken! The Rescue Rooms Star City: The Future Under Communism looks to be an important, ambitious and impressive exhibition that £12.50, 7pm Tuesday 09/03 shouldn’t be missed by young or old. Equally, it will emphasise the space that Nottingham Contemporary has to offer as a gallery. Lisa Mitchell Friday 05/03 The Bodega Star City, 13 February-18 April 2010, Nottingham Contemporary, Weekday Cross, NG1 2GB £6.50, 7pm nottinghamcontemporary.org Splinter The Robin Hood Audio Bullys Free, 9pm The Rescue Rooms Wednesday 10/03 Wednesday 10/03 Friday 12/03 £12.50, 7.30pm Heaven’s Basement Rock City The Invisible L-VIS 1990 The 69 Eyes ATC/ BTPAM - Split EP Launch £7.50, 7pm The Bodega The Market Bar Rock City The Chameleon £7, 7pm £3, 9pm £11, 7pm £3, 8.30pm Saturday 06/03 Thursday 11/03 Friday 12/03 Aba-Shanti-I Soundsystem Wednesday 10/03 The Maze Percussion £5.99, 8pm - 2am The Loft Brazilica Fusion Club Gift of Gab Free, 8pm - 1am The Hubb The Loft The Rescue Rooms Free, 9pm Free, 8pm - 1am Saturday 13/03 £10, 7.30pm Fade Dynamic (Good Looking Records). Gatecrasher Dag For Dag Kaysha, Beggar Su and Ikaro. Karnivool Katatonia £8 / £10, 10pm - 4am The Bodega Rock City Rock City £6, 8pm £8, 7.30pm £9, 7pm

leftlion.co.uk/issue33 25 event listings... for more: leftlion.co.uk/listings

Saturday 13/03 Friday 19/03 Scribe Vibe Reprogression NorthSea International The Loft The Robin Hood The cream of East Midlands writers are linking up in Loughborough - and LeftLion Free, 8pm - 1am Free, 9pm want to get you in for nowt

Ghoul Garden The Hidden Cameras Attention, wordsmiths looking to take a huge step in their literary careers: quite possibly the most intelligent The Maze The Bodega thing you could do all year would be to attend the Writing Industries Conference, held in March at Loughborough £3.50, 9pm £11, 7pm University. WIC 2010 will bring together writers from across the East Midlands professionals from the writing

industries to share knowledge, develop skills and forge new contacts. DJ Mark Hughes Edguy The Hubb The Rescue Rooms 200 writers from the region will have the opportunity to hear from and meet with writing industries professionals in Free, 9pm £15, 6.30pm a variety of settings: there’ll be a series of panel discussions exploring specific areas of writing, from breaking into The Pitty Pat Club commercial publishing to working in the community (including our own Editor, Al Needham, gobbing off about his The Bodega Saturday 20/03 sex blog Todger Talk). There’ll be a fair featuring stalls from local publishers, funders and other organisations. And £6, 8pm there’ll be plenty of opportunity to meet, talk, chat up and God knows what else with others over a coffee. The Fillers Bluejaks The Rescue Rooms Perhaps because Writing East Midlands and the Literature Network are helping to coordinate the conference The Robin Hood £10, 7pm there is a real writer-focused emphasis to the events, the culmination of which is the opportunity to have one-to- Free, 9pm one sessions with agents and editors. That’s right, you read correctly: there’s an opportunity to physically talk Him to someone important about your own work, although places for this are limited - see writingindustries.com for Rock City The Shakes application details. The Malt Cross £20, 6.30pm

£3.50, 8pm Tickets for this event are going for £42, but LeftLion would like to offer one lucky member from our forum a bursary Lean Valley Band The Hubb to attend WIC 2010. Details of how to apply can be found on the WriteLion 4# podcast, which will feature further Monday 15/03 Free, 9pm information from conference coordinators Aly Stoneman, Damien Walter and Catherine Rogers. Writing Industries Conference, Saturday 6 March, Loughborough University / writingindustries.com Fun Lovin’ Criminals Rock City Sunday 21/03 £17.50, 7.30pm Thursday 25/03 Friday 26/03 Saturday 27/03 Turin Brakes Autechre The Rescue Rooms Run, Walk! Funky Thump Burn The Negative Stealth £16.50, 7.30pm The Chameleon The Loft Stealth £10, 8pm £3, 8.30pm Free, 8pm - 1am £5, 10.15pm Rob Hall, Russell Haswell and Didjit. Stiff Little Fingers Plus Aged Yummy, Fake Broken Rock City Legs and With Knives. Nachtmystium Ronnie Londons Groove Lounge £15, 7.30pm Rock City Grosvenor Friday 19/03 The Jim Jones Revue £8, 7pm £3 before 11pm, 8pm - 1am Brother Ali The Bodega Plus The Psyke Project. Stumble inda Jungle The Bodega £8.50, 7pm The Maze £8.50, 7.30pm Islands Sunday 28/03 £3, 9pm Woody Pines The Bodega The Maze £8.50, 7pm Nearly Dan Geoff Farina and Chris Brokaw Wednesday 24/03 The Rescue Rooms £10, 7.30pm Lee Rosy’s Tea Shop Smokin’ Hogs £10, 7.30pm Thee Silver £5, 7:30pm The Robin Hood The Rescue Rooms The Four Tops Free, 9pm Zebrahead £13.50, 7.30pm Trent FM Arena Nottingham Pressure Drop Rock City £38, 7pm The Hubb The Temptations, The Drifters, £10, 7.30pm Free, 9pm The 3 Degrees. Saturday 27/03 Thursday 25/03 The Sunday Sessions Emery Spunge Northgate Slide The Robin Hood The Rescue Rooms Rock City The Hubb Free, 6.30pm £10, 7pm £10, 7pm Free, 9pm

26 leftlion.co.uk/issue33 nottingham event listings... for more: leftlion.co.uk/listings

THEATRE Friday 05/03

Monday 01/02 Danza Contemporanea de Cuba Cuadrophenia Nottingham Playhouse There’s a new art gallery in town - but it’s The Circus of Horrors £12.50 - £20, 7.30pm Royal Centre Runs until: 06/03 not in the Lace Market... £14 - £33, 7.30pm Opening in November 2009, Cuadros Contemporary Art Tuesday 09/03 Wednesday 03/02 Gallery is situated within Hockley (inhabiting the space that was formerly Plank) and cements the city’s reputation as the Those Magnificent Men fastest-growing The Gay Man’s Guide Lakeside Arts Centre Lace Market Theatre £12 / £15, 8pm art scene in the UK. £6 / £7, 7.30pm The aim of Cuadros is to celebrate local and international Runs until: 06/11

Wednesday 10/03 artists by sourcing, displaying and selling artwork at reasonable prices. A mere nose around its cosy duplex space Tuesday 09/02 A Number tells you all you need to know; impressive original pieces Lace Market Theatre alongside signed, limited edition prints by world class, highly Poetry in the Hood £6 / £7, 7.30pm collectable artists. Runs until: 13/10 Robin Hood

Free, 8.30pm Prior to opening Cuadros, owner George managed a chain With John Micallef and The Mullet of galleries, which gave him the impetus to support and Proof Poet. Friday 19/03 represent artists of his own taste. Cuadros has also been set

A Day of the Death of Joe Egg Our Day Out up to help in the promotion and education of contemporary Nottingham Playhouse Nottingham Arts Theatre approaches to art in Nottingham, whilst bringing the personal £7 - £26.50, Various times £7 - £10, 7.30pm touch which can often be lost in commercial art spaces. Runs until: 03/04 Runs until: 13/02

The gallery is also proud to represent graffiti artists Urban Canvas who specialise in large-scale street art for community Friday 26/03 Thursday 11/02 projects and developers as part of Nottingham’s regeneration

Fakebook schemes. Jon Burgerman and Tim Lee are just two of the Forever Young Nottingham Playhouse many local artists making waves internationally that the space is keen to promote. Upcoming events will include Nottingham Playhouse £5 / £6, 8pm £10 - £20, Various times everything from one-man shows to group exhibitions, making Cuadros well worth a visit.

Runs until: 27/02 Monday 29/03 Cuadros. 1A Heathcoat Street, Hockley, NG1 3AF. cuadros.co.uk

Thursday 18/02 Blood Brothers

Royal Centre Antigone £12 - £32.50, Various times Monday 01/02 Saturday 13/02 Sunday 14/02 Sandfield Theatre Runs until: 10/04 £7, 7.30pm [re]locate by Tahera Aziz Star City Real Deal Comedy Jam Tour

Runs until: 19/02 New Art Exchange Nottingham Contemporary ‘Valentines Special’ EXHIBITIONS Free, 10am - 7pm Free, All day NTU Union Runs until: 10/04 Runs until: 17/04 £10, 7.45pm - 10.45pm Saturday 20/02 Monday 01/02 How was the future imagined Drew Fraser, Annette Fagon, Kurt Portraits of a Jamaican Family under Communism? Metzger, Wayne Rollins and Kat. Dr Sketchy’s Anti Art School Hui-Chen-Lin New Art Exchange Nottingham Lakeside Arts Centre Free, All day Measure and Purpose Escucha Free, All day Runs until: 13/02 Surface Gallery Sunday 21/02 £8, 1pm - 4pm Runs until: 21/02 Free, All day Chris Addison Pavillion Commissions Tuesday 02/02 Nottingham Playhouse

Thursday 25/02 Lakeside Arts Centre Monday 22/02 £15, 7.30pm

Free, 11am-5pm Naomi Terry - In a city not too Beating Burlosconi Runs until: 28/02 far away... The perfection of the iMperfect Lakeside Arts Centre Work by Frederico Câmara, Steffi The Wasp Room Surface Gallery Monday 22/02 £12 / £15, 8pm Klenz, Stephen Vaughan and Free, Thu-Sun, 12pm - 5pm Free, All day Runs until: 26/2 Pub Poetry Nottingham Tomoko Yoneda. Runs until: 21/01 Runs until: 27/02 Canalhouse

Free, 8pm – 10.30pm The Meaning of Style Tuesday 02/03 New Art Exchange Friday 05/02 Friday 26/02

Free, Mon - Fri 10am - 7pm, Sat The Land of Yes and The Land of No Tacitly Speaking Reservoirs of Darkness Thursday 25/02 10am - 5pm Nottingham Playhouse Backlit Lakeside Arts Centre Runs until: 10/04 £8.50 - £18, 8pm Free entry, 12pm - 5pm Free, All day An Audience With Trevor Runs until: 21/02 Runs until: 11/04 Francis Approach £10, 9pm Saturday 06/03 Lens Flair Pan-global Picciness at Lakeside this Feb Without from Within Saturday 27/02 Lakeside Arts Centre Throughout February, Pavilion Commissions are exhibiting new works by four Free, All day Steve Royle photographers at Lakeside Arts Centre. Pavilion collaborates with artists on the Runs until: 03/05 Bunkers Hill Inn research and production of lens-based work that resonates with contemporary £7 adv, 7.30pm

culture, giving the viewer a fresh and broad range of ideas and images to consider. COMEDY Thursday 04/03 Frederico Camara takes an ethnographic approach to his photography, extending his Stephen Vaughan, Ultima Thule Tuesday 02/02 research to examine our inability to re-create natural environments within zoos or to Lee Mack preserve them in the wild. Steffi Klenz examines the unusual Naiku shrine, a Japanese Count Arthur Strong Royal Centre Shinto temple, which is dismantled and re-built every twenty years. In a process akin to Chinese whispers, she only Lakeside Arts Centre £18.50, 8pm worked with models of the shrine and her only references to it were images and stories. £12 / £15, 8pm Runs until: 03/03 Thursday 18/03 Stephen Vaughan’s pieces also consider Japan; his interest is with the Shiretoko region, a geologically unstable Should I Stay or Should I Go? landscape which links to his previous works that look at significant points on the tectonic map. Finally, Tomoko Jo Caulfield Yoneda focuses on human relationships in modern culture, her photographs examine alienation, technology, Maze £4 / £5, 8pm Lakeside Arts Centre spirituality and compassion. £12 / £15, 8pm Pavilion Commissions, until Sunday 28 February Sunday 07/02 Tuesday 23/03 Comedy in the Hood Ice Ice Baby Should I Stay or Should I Go? Icebreaker smash into Lakeside Robin Hood Free, 8pm Maze Founded over twenty years ago and now one of the most unique new music groups in Britain, Icebreaker are a Pete Smith, Dave Dinsdale, Paul £4 / £6, 8pm thirteen-piece group whose unusual instrumental combination includes pan-pipes, saxophone, electric violin, Savage, Lee Grant and Johnny guitars, keyboards, accordion and cello. Always amplified, Icebreaker create music that appeals to contemporary “Shawaddywaddy” Sorrow. Saturday 27/03 classical, rock and alternative audiences alike.

Saturday 13/02 Marc Lucero No strangers to playing in both Europe and the United States, they’ve clocked up appearances at The Huddersfield Bunkers Hill Inn Contemporary Music Festival, the Warsaw, Aurhus, Gent, Grenoble and Budapest festivals and the NYYD Festival Dave Gorman £7 adv, 7.30pm in Estonia. They’re one of the few bands in the world who have their own dedicated festival, at the Wiener Musik Royal Centre Plus Rob Heeney, Tom Goodliffe Galerie in Austria - get them. Other notable appearances have taken place in New York’s Carnegie Hall and £18.50, 8m and Spiky Mike. London’s Barbican– meaning that this intimate gig promises to be very special indeed. Brian Higgins Icebreaker, Wednesday 24 February at Lakeside Arts Centre, University Park, NG7 2RD. Tickets £15/£12 conc. Strathdon lakeside.org.uk £10 (£15 with meal), 8pm Alfie Moore, Pete Smith and Spiky Mike. leftlion.co.uk/issue33 27 There’s nothing we like more at LeftLion than stuffing our fat swedes with a load words: Jared Wilson and Al Needham of good scran. So in the second instalment of our food page we check out some more places to eat in Notts...

LE BISTROT PIERRE JAMCAFE RIPPLE Haw hee haw hee haw What a delightful spread Making Waves

If you want an example of a restaurant that knows what It’s probably better known as a coffee shop and a music Ripple is a small, but perfectly formed, café bar restaurant it’s on with, look no further than across from Viccy Centre venue around these parts, but the Hockley-based JamCafe in the heart of Sherwood. All their food is made from fresh at the queues hanging out the door of Le BP on a weekday do a great line in tasty and ethically-sourced food, too. The ingredients, with a massive selection of vegan, veggie and dinner hour. There’s several reasons for this; it’s Frenchified moment you walk in, you immediately sense a laid-back and gluten-free fare on offer. without being up itself, it’s a cut above the average restaurant creative atmosphere. With big leather sofas or dining chairs to without making humping motions against your wallet (having sit on, intriguing sixties and seventies memorabilia adorning They have an extensive and healthy breakfast menu and lunch practically taken ownership of the Outstanding Value title at the walls and a consistently good selection of music, they offers up a wide range of ciabattas including goat’s cheese the Nottingham Restaurant Awards last decade). Plus, the definitely have plenty of style. Plus when we ate there they and red pepper (£6.25), steak (£8.25) or king prawn, lime snap is - as they say on the banks of the Seine – well propeur, played Tom Waits songs all night too. Result! and ginger (£8.25). There are also dozens of tasty tapas-style mon duque. dishes to choose from. If you’re going in early in the day, choose from their breakfast Where to start? Well, the décor’s minter than an entire kitchen special (muffin, scrambled eggs, streaky bacon, sautéed We came to sample the evening menu, though. I started wall that has been tiled with After Eights. It’s continental, mushrooms, pork chipolatas and homemade baked beans - with the mussels in a Thai-style chilli and lemongrass sauce but not overtly so – don’t expect to be assailed by accordion £5.25), chunky toast and jam for two (£3.50), boiled egg and (£5.95). In a city so far from the ocean this can be tricky to pull players on bikes with onions slung round their necks. Once soldiers (£2.95), Welsh rarebit (£3.65) or smoked salmon and off, but this dish would not have been out of place at three you’re in, you forget that you’re virtually next door to a TK scrambled eggs (£4.65). If you want a quick bite for lunch, times the price on a posh promenade. My guest went for the Maxx, and that’s the main thing. there’s a wide selection of sandwiches, wraps and melts such oven-baked goat’s cheese served on homemade raisin toast as crispy bacon and beetroot (£4.25), hummus and roasted (£4.95) and found that the sweetness of the bread and chutney The food? Well, there’s loads of it. We got stuck into the veg (£4.25), falafel pitta (£4.25) and minted brie pitta (£4.45). complimented the cheese superbly. saucisson de toulouse (£4.95) - a smattering of sausage and Throw in a dozen or so sides and savouries to choose from and poached duck egg served with a warm tomato dressing, and this could be a good place for an informal lunch with friends For mains, we were tempted by the likes of the honey mustard the fromage grillé (£4.95), cheese on toast that really thinks it’s or colleagues. pork with mash (£11.50), the chicken and chorizo (£9.95) and summat, with a hunk of St. Marcelin on sourdough, with pear the char-grilled 10oz steak (£15.50). But I eventually settled on chutney on the side. But if you go there for your evening dinner then you’ll see that the charging rhino salad (£8.25); a feast of vegetables topped they save their best for then. I went for the smoked haddock with two Thai-style salmon fishcakes (£2 extra). You know The mains were gargantuan. The 8oz rump steak (£13.50) with chorizo (£6.65) served with sweet potato mash and a those restaurant salads that are just a token effort? Well this was a slab of Scottish cow done to perfection, with a tangy- spicy tomato sauce. The combination of the fish and spicy was the complete opposite and I cleared my plate! My guest as-blinkin’-flip red wine and caramelised red onion reduction. sausage might not seem the most obvious, but it worked went for the traditional sausages and mash (£6.95), served Meanwhile, the rope-grown moules mariniéres (£12.50) a treat and left me wanting more. My guest went for the with lashings of rich red onion gravy and peas, delicious! practically filled a massive saucepan with fishy, creamy, chicken ballontine (£7.95) with cranberry and leeks, wrapped shalotty goodness and took ages to get through. in Serrano ham and served with new potatoes. The chicken As always, we’d saved room for dessert and shared a was cooked to perfection and complimented well by the ham. chocolate fudge cake (£4.25) served with ice cream and a big We managed to fit in a chocolate brownie and a tarte au citron Other possibilities we might try next time include blue stilton, fat strawberry. We also took home a slice of their fluffy cherry that made my tabs burst into hysterical laughter (£4.50) and a pear and walnut salad with homemade blue cheese dressing and almond cake (£2.50). couple of Irish coffees before being rolled out onto the street by (£6.25), three bean stew of tender chickpeas and mixed beans, the helpful but not over-fussy staff (tip: seeing as being French served with warm pitta bread (£5.95), shepherds pie and A final mention must go to the cocktail menu. I plumped for or French-Canadian appears to be a requirement of the job, minted peas (£6.95) and Teriyaki salmon and noodles with a mocktail, the Nojito (£3). My guest went alcoholic and had don’t bother trying to impress your mates by pronouncing the spring onions, ribbon carrots and pak choi (£6.95). the Sherwood Sherbert; a mixture of gin, vodka, lemongrass, dishes properly to the floor staff unless you actually do speak lemonade, lime and, fantastically, topped with popping candy the language – they know what you want). So next time you’re hungry in Hockley, check this place out. like you used to get when you were a kid. There are multiple places to eat around that little haven of It’s easy to see why Le BP is still packing ‘em in even though independent shops, cafes and eateries - but this is among the The things which shine through most are the love that has times are rougher than North Korean toilet paper; it effortlessly best of them. It might take a bit finding at first, but it’s just a gone into creating the place: the relaxed and romantic decor, breaches the gap between the dirt-cheap nosheries and minute or two on foot from the Broadway Cinema. Once you’ve the friendly staff, the fresh and wholesome menu and the budget-buggering restaurants, you feel totally at ease even found it, you’ll definitely remember it for next time, when you overall feel good nature. We haven’t even mentioned the when the place is rammed to the gills and there’s always do make sure you take a copy of this mag as there’s a 10% off weekly specials board yet! You’ll just have to pop in and see something else you need to try on the menu the next time voucher on page eleven! that for yourself. you’re there. 12 Heathcote St, NG1 3AA 0115 9483 566 577 Mansfield Road, Sherwood, NG5 2JN 0115 9693335 13-17 Milton Street, Nottingham NG1 3EN. 0115 9412 850 jamcafe.info ripplecafebar.co.uk lebistrotpierre.co.uk

Beane Noodler of MyHouse-YourHouse continues his quest to eat at every takeaway in Nottingham… City Kebabs Bombay Brasserie My long relationship with City Kebabs began nine years ago when I witnessed a friend of mine Choice is a wonderful thing - but not when you’re hung over, craving a decent curry, and are being pretty much thrown through the front window by, erm, one of his best mates. That night a confronted by a kitchen pinboard heaving with menus. Bombay Brasserie might actually be a close bond was formed between their kebabs and my mouth that has endured for many years. restaurant (in Mapperley and West Bridgford), but they also have a damn fine takeaway service that - in my opinion – is one of the best. Situated but a few metres from the infamous Thurland, City Kebabs is a late night eaterie that - at weekends - feels like Clapham Junction. Probably one of the busiest places in town, with randoms Its menu boasts all the usual suspects for the die-hard curry monsters, complete with a boss naan from all walks of life rubbing shoulders - partly due to its central location, but mainly because its bread selection and some serious side dish palaver. Where they come into their own, however, brilliant conveyer belt serving system gets you in and out in ten minutes. Lovely. is the chef specials they have tucked up their sleeve that - brace yourself - actually live up to the menu descriptions. Not the cheapest takeaway out there, but you’re getting restaurant-quality The menu is extensive, but where it really comes alive is its range of deep fried then microwaved food, so shush. Get yourself booked onto the sofa this Sunday and give ‘em a call. Oh, and make don’t-ask-where-it came-from chicken selection. KFC it ain’t, but it could sure hold its own in an sure you’re properly hung over. arm wrestle, of that I am certain. 7 Thurland Street, NG1 3DR 39 Plains Road - Mapperley / www.bombaybrasserieofmapperley.com

28 www.leftlion.co.uk/issue33 14 track CD album in stores now “The system that meets the wants of the few by denying the needs of the majority is in its twilight years” www.dealmakerrecords.com Aquarius (January 20 - February 19) Often reading between the lines can be easier than following the text - the human mind is subjective by nature. Final judgements are rarely just and strong opinions are rarely built upon the strength of all the available information.

Pisces (February 20 - March 20) You can keep your bathroom shower cubicle sparkling clean longer by washing the whole shower stall, then waxing with car wax (not turtle wax as this is green, be sure to get the clear stuff). This keeps blood from sticking to the sides.

Aries (March 21 - April 20) Be prepared for a shock this month! I sense pain in your future as a drunken debate with friends about the use of stun guns gets messy following your repeated and stubborn assertions that they don’t work on you. LEFTLION ABROAD Susukino Crossing, Sapporo, Hokkaido, Japan Taurus (April 21 - May 21) How big was the big bang? How universal is the Universe? The story of the world and its creation Susukino is a major red-light district located in Hokkaido, Japan. It’s one of the major pimping has always fascinated you and you’re right to seek out more information. But be aware that the areas of the whole country - a definite step up from our very own Forest Road. A walk along the ending will leave you with a lot of unanswered questions. Crossing will reveal all manner of illuminated restaurants, seedy bars, by-the-hour hotels and adult-entertainment establishments.

Gemini (May 22 - June 22) The photo was sent in by Notts-based filmmaker Simon Ellis, whose short films have been shown Give a man a fish and he can feed his family for a day. Teach a man to fish and he can feed them across the globe, from London to Los Angeles. The girl holding a copy of our mag is Tokyo artist forever. However, be prepared to be shunned by both that man and his family when his children Komada Kozue who, we’re told, “does huge, bugger-off paintings in front of a live audience, usually start to die of mercury poisoning. in a paint-spattered kimono.”

If you can get a photo of a LeftLion sticker or magazine somewhere exotic email Cancer (June 23 - July 23) us on [email protected] DH Lawrence once wrote: “The only justice is to follow the sincere intuition of the soul, angry or gentle. Anger is just, and pity is just, but judgement is never just.” Then he went and shagged the gardener.

Leo (July 24 - August 23) Following a nasty traffic accident doctors will refuse to operate on you this month. This not due to any moral concerns, fiscal dilemmas or even health-related fears. They’re just a vindictive and hateful bunch.

Virgo (August 24 - September 23) Think carefully before you plump for that mortgage as the decision you make now will affect you for years to come. You could end up trapped in a hell of your own making, forcing you to admit that you really should have put in a bathroom.

Libra (September 24 - October 23) Keep your piping clear under the sink by pouring a quarter cup of baking soda down the drain, mixed with a cup of vinegar. This creates a chemical reaction, which you should follow up with boiling water fifteen minutes later. G’lug with that!

Scorpio (October 24 - November 22) Discipline is like a refining fire by which talent is forged to become ability. At first it’s hard to make yourself do something outside of your circle of comfort, but eventually you will acquiesce. At this point you are ready to push yourself even further.

Sagittarius (November 23 - December 22) Vegetarians coming round to dinner? Simply serve them up a nice roast chicken or leg of lamb. Since they’re always going on about how tofu, Quorn, and Linda McCartney’s “tastes exactly like the real thing,” they shouldn’t notice any difference.

Capricorn (December 23 - January 19) This alignment of the stars in March will turn you into an angry, crazed, ferocious and totally out-of-control monster. But this is not down to the astrological implications, it just happens to Puss in Boots coincide with your period. Jesse Boot

LeftLion Magazine Issue #34 will be bouncing into a

venue near you on Born: 1850 Born: 17th Century Made a killing at: Ogres castle the last weekend of Made a killing at: Chemistry business Headgear: Feathered hat Headgear: Ibuprofen March, just in time Habits: Ball-licking Habits: 3 for 2 deals Annual profit: 3 blind mice for Easter... Annual profit: £302m

30 www.leftlion.co.uk/issue33

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