The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown at The Lexington

My list of "must see" bands is sadly reducing as we all get older so I was delighted to have another opportunity to see The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. 

The venue this  time was The Lexington in Islington, a place I had walked past many many times but had never visited before, so that was something to look forward to too.

Another bonus was that despite having walked all around that area when working by Kings Cross there were a few roads that I had not ticked off on my CityStrides Life Map, either because they are dead-ends or simply because I was not mapping my walk when I had been that way, so I spent an hour or so before the gig filling the gaps. That was another fifteen streets completed.

I even had time to grab a coffee and a sandwich from the local Pret before heading to the pub and in the pub I had time for a pint of Black Sheep Bitter before heading upstairs for the music.

I was quick enough upstairs to get to stand right next to the stage, something I had not managed to do with Arthur Brown for a little while. That let me take a few close-up pictures like this one.

The performance was much like the ones I had first seen in Lewes in 2023 snd twice since then. It had a lot of songs that I did not know, as well as several classic that I did, all of which were presented very theatrically. Obviously Time Captives was my stand-out song as it was entry into the crazy world of Arthur Brown way back in 1973.

It was another great evening and to cap it all off it finished in time for me to get back to the Grey Horse in Kingston for a couple of pints of The Naked Ladies.

I have walked 20% of Greater London

I used MapMyWalk to record each of my exploratory walks and CityStrides to summarise them all in one place. 

CityStrides also tracks the number of roads that I have walked on each town or city. Of most interest to me are the totals for each of the London Boroughs (I have walked every street in three of them) and the total for Greater London overall.

I have just completed 20% of Greater London. This is in terms of the number of roads walked (7,964 of 39,362) rather than, say, total distance.

The map below shows where I have walked and, more depressingly, those I have yet to do with some large areas hardly touched (there are a few gaps where I did not map my walks, such as the top section of London Loop).

My vague plans is to keep plugging away and to use every opportunity to walk new roads. For example, I have been to Royal London Hospital a few times recently and have walked quite a few new roads around Whitechapel and Stepney,

While walking 20% of London is some achievement iy is only fair to point out that I am only 4th in the CityStrides leaderboard and those ahead of me have managed 27%, 31% and an astonishing 68%. I do not expect to catch any of them.

I have walked every street in Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (again)

My claim back in May that  I have walked every street in Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames got a slight setback this week. Not that unexpected but unwelcome none the less.

The app I use to keep a record of everywhere I have walked, CityStrides, is based on OpenStreetMap which is maintained by a community of users, including myself (much as Wikipedia is) and it gets updated both with changes to the physical world, e.g. new streets, and by clarifications, e.g. marking streets with locked gates as private.

These changes get uploaded to CityStrides periodically and when these changes create unwalked roads (or parts of roads) the unwalked sections appear as red dots.

The latest update for Kingston upon Thames created a few red dots for me, as shown here.

Frustratingly none of these were new roads, just roads newly marked s walkable, and I would have walked them when in those areas had they been marked as walkable at that time. Still, things are what they are and so I set out to walk them all.

More frustratingly, some of the dots were at the very southern tip of the Borough (I live on the northern boundary) so it was a longish ride on two buses to get me to Malden Rushett. 

From there is was a pretty dreary walk up A243 all the way to the large junction with A3, an even drearier walk along both sides of A3 to the border with Surrey and back then further along A3 to Tolworth and just beyond. That accounted for three of the four groups of red dots.

Then I was lucky. I was expecting to continue along A3 to the final group when I learned that I could directly there on a 265 bus, so I did.

The final group was a little bit more of annoying A3 but the final two streets in my quest were in an exclusive private estate so I had lots of impressive houses to look at while tracking the final dots.

And that was it, I have now walked every street in Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames (again).

Gold Rush at The Half Moon (19 Oct 25)

I was always going to see Gold Rush on their latest return to The Half Moon Putney and this time I made something of an afternoon of it by tackling some location-based challenges in two phone Apps.

I collect Gold Gyms in PokemonGo (I have 750) and this means making repeated visits to specific locations to battle the gyms there, gaining more points each time until you read Gold level. I had a few targets in Putney and Wandsworth that I wanted to revisit, two of them in particular. Over the afternoon I got points at seven gyms and went Gold at two!

The other target was walking new (unwalked) streets for my CityStrides LifeMap. I had already walked most of Putney but there were plenty of gaps heading towards and into Wandsworth. It is a non trivial task to walk out the best route to cover new streets, I had to walk down and back a few dead-ends, but in the end I was pleased to tick-off 19 streets. This raised my total for LB Wandsworth to 975 streets which is just a midge shy of 60%.

I had to look after myself too and that started very well with an All Day Vegetarian Breakfast at Sweet Tooth in Putney, continued reasonably with a coffee in Black Sheep Coffee Wandsworth and finished correctly with another coffee and a cake at Nlack Sheep Coffee Putney.

I had not forgotten the main purpose of my trip and I duly arrived at Half Moon Putney around 6:30pm, in good time for a rest and a pint before the music started.

I do not have a lot to say about the Gold Rush concert that I have not said several times before, so I will mention Tom's guitars instead!

Tom have half a dozen or so guitars on stage and he surprised us on one song with a bright yellow one. He explained that he had been doing something else during the day (he is a co-founder of charity Electric Umbrella) and a helper had put the wrong guitar in the wrong bag.

He also had issues with his black guitar, pictured above, and had to swap it for a less iconic one for the last few songs.

Every Gold Rush concert is different, just as every Neil Young concert is, and my mood is different each time too, so different songs strike me harder each time. On this occasion my stand-out performances were Down by the River, Cortez the Killer (loved the keyboard intro) and Cowgirl in the Sand.

The night ended something over two hours after it started with some good news, Gold Rush had booked to play the The Half Moon four times next year. I will be there.

The Poltergeist at Arcola Theatre

My mission to watch every performance of a Philip Ridley play in London (and easily accessible places beyond) continued with The Poltergeist at Arcola Theatre, were I had first seen it almost exactly two years earlier.

This time it was on downstairs in Studio 2 where front row seat A12 was a sound investment at £25.

I planned the day to give me a little time in Dalston beforehand and I did a little exploring while also looking for somewhere to eat. 

It struck me that gentrification had failed to stick and the posh places that I had eaten at previously were all gone. And so I found myself, yet again, at The Speakeasy which despite being little more than a marquee is a friendly place and serves reasonable beer with good food; it was a pint of Camden Pale Ale and some veggie tacos this time. 

I remembered the gist of The Poltergeist but, as with all Philip Ridley plays, there is so much going on in the dialogue  that I knew I would be surprised, stimulated and entertained.

This was a solo performance (monologue seems inappropriate) and the heavy duties were given to Louis Davison who played the narrator, Sasha, and a host of other people. Incidentally, Sasha is a deliberate unisex name and many of Ridley's solo plays can be performed by a woman or man.

The stage was empty and the only props Davison had to play were his clothes and in his simple outfit in which he strode the length and breadth of the stage assuredly telling Sasha's story for eighty minutes.

On one level it was a simple story with Sasha and his partner attending a family child's birthday party which Sasha found difficult for reasons that gradually became clearer. Through the many conversations with the many party attendees, all played by Davison, we learned that Sasha had once been a promising artist until he had some sort of breakdown, the causes of which also emerge. 

The richness of the plau is in the dialogue, not the plot, and I was totally engaged for the full eighty minutes as I desperately tried to catch each quickly delivered word. And despite the core subject matter, a mental breakdown, the mood was often light and I laughed out loud quite a few times.

Philip Ridley has a distinctive style and voice which appeals to me immensely and The Poltergeist was yet another great example of why that is.

Entertaining Mr Sloane at Young Vic

There was a time when I was a fairly regular visitor to Young Vic but for various reasons (my changes in employment, their change in artistic directors) I had not been there since 2017 but a Joe Orton play was a good reason to go back.

It was a slow return and it took some good reviews to finally nudge me into booking and that was a non-trivial process due to my poor memory of the seating plan there. 

In the end I went for row P entirely missing that this is the front tow of the Balcony which I would have gone for automatically if I had noticed it. There seat Balcony P35 cost me £57.

The view from there was excellent and the first impression of the set was good too, this was clearly a production with some strong stylish thinking behind it.

Entertaining Mr Sloane has a simple concept, young exuberant Mr. Sloane starts renting a room with lonely middle-aged Kath who is regularly visited by her wheeler-dealer brother Ed. Their elderly father also lived with Kath.

The rich comedy came from the dialogues between the three main characters and the way that Orton wrote their words. The speech comes thick and fast with lots of short sentences that followed each other erratically, much like jokes work but with more natural language.

The stylish staging continued throughout with, for example, Mr Sloane remaining a centre of attention even when not in the scene by posing spotlight off-stage. The ending was equally stylish.

The Joe Orton script gave the play a solid base which the cast and staging enhanced. It was a marvellous return to Young Vic. I suspect it will not be another eight years before I go back.

Emma at Rose Theatre

There are obvious attractions for a play based on Jane Austen's novel Emma but for me the main one was simply that it was on at Rose Theatre where I have to have a good reason not to go and see a play.

Quick booking got me a seat in the very centre of the Circle, A35, for £41.5 with Senior Citizen Concession.

My only recollection of Emma, from a radio drama adaptation, was that she interfered unsuccessfully in other people's relationships while ignoring her own; not much of a plot but a sound basis for some character comedy.

The only comments I read about the production beforehand said that it was a complete reworking set in current times, so I had even less idea on what to expect.

Not knowing the original story that well I cannot comment on how close this version was and all I can do is comment on the play in its own right.

This Emma was a very entertaining character comedy. Emma, the character, was a fairly normal young woman surrounded by several exaggerated characters, notably her soon to me married self-centred sister who was fully into all the modern tropes from Instagram to Love Island.

Other notable characters included her frantic father, a boisterous hairdresser, a surly parcel delivery man and her sister's timid fiancee. A rich source for comedy indeed.

Given that the richness and success of the play relies so much on the strength of the cast, some of them with notable tv exposure, I think that it is something of a shame that the poster shows just the relatively unknown Emma.

This Emma was an unashamed rom-com and hit all the right buttons providing plenty of lives as the various couples eventually came together as they should and as we all expected.

The Truth About Blayds at Finborough Theatre

It was nice to have a good excuse to go back to Finborough Theatre and a play by A A Milne was certainly a good excuse.It also helped that it included William Gaunt who I have fond memories of from The Champions in the late 60's.

All that was easily worth £28.

Visits to Finborough have a routine and that started with a pint in Courtfield, opposite Earls Court Station, then a small meal in Cafe du Coin before walking down the incredibly busy, and fast, Redcliffe Gardens to the theatre.

That routine got me to the theatre early enough to claim a seat in the front row somewhere close to the middle.

The stage was set as a period study and this is where everything happened.

The titular Blayds was an elderly man and a famous poet. He lived in a fairly grand house with several members of his immediate family, one of who acted as his carer and another who managed his affairs.

The first half of the play covered the preparation and execution of Blayds' birthday and the second half covered the aftermath of his death soon after and the deathbed revelation (the truth) he made.

It was an interesting, if simple, plot whose real purpose was to be the framework for the interactions between the family members who were very different people and had very different perspectives on the situation. The truth was elusive, disputed and modified.

It was the mix of characters and their viewpoints that made the play interesting and entertaining while the truth in question raised a few points to ponder over. An entertaining play that makes you think is always good.

Pitchfork Disney at King's Head Theatre

I am still determined to see every production of a Philip Ridley play that I can so a revival of The Pitchfork Disney at King's Head Theatre was a no-brainer, despite (or because of) having seen it twice before, in Brighton in 2023 and Shoreditch Town Hall in 2017.

The King's Head Theatre has moved from above a pub to far below a new mixed-use development nearby and that has had an impact on ticket prices so my seat C21 was £42. That's not actually that much for theatre these days but my price expectations are sill somewhat set (unreasonably) by pre-covid pub theatre prices.

My keenness meant that I was quick to book and got a seat in the centre of the main seating with a perfect view of the stage.

All the action takes place in this messy sitting room with its many door locks.

Here we meet the odd twenty-something twins Presley and Haley. They argue over chocolate and medicine and tell each other exaggerated stories about being chased by dogs and being in a dark wasteland. These are stories they have told each other many times, just like one repeats stories to young children.

These stories are also typical Ridley monologues and so have their own value despite not being directly related to the main story.

Then they see two people outside, one of whom leaves, and after some argument they allow the other one in. That is Cosmo Disney and everything changes. Cosmo is a loud force of purpose and certainty which the meek and subdued twins can do little to contain.

The tone changes from retelling favourite stories to a barrage of questions as Cosmo tries to work out what is going on with the twins and they struggle to find out something about Cosmo. This is where the cockroaches in the poster come in. Here Cosmo's swagger dominates the play and William Robinson's acting is relentlessly powerful, questioning and in command. Cosmo has to carry the play and with William Robinson it does so assuredly.

The final short section introduced the other man seen outside, Pitchfork, who is monstrous in appearance and sound. While the Cosmo character is recognisable, if exaggerated, there are no similes for Pitchfork in real life.

It is a short sharp shock that bring the play to a magnificent conclusion.

The Pitchfork Disney at King's Head Theatre was an excellent production of an excellent play.

Inspector Morse: House of Ghosts at Richmond Theatre

Again this was a case of it is on at Richmond Theatre so I ought to go and see it. 

I have fond memories of the tv series too though my recollection of it is dimmed by the many intervening years.

For some reason, this was a more expensive show than usual for Richmond Theatre and so I headed up to the top level where seat Upper Circle A 12  was a mere £17.5.

It was dead centre too. The only downside is that it takes an awful lot of stairs to get up there and then some more very steep ones to get down to the front row. I am starting to notice these things!

In House of Ghosts, Morse has to solve a case of unexplained death during a performance of Hamlet and the ghosts were from his university days when he had been involved in another production of the play which involved some of the people who were also involved in the latest production.

Morse, and Lewis, tried to solve the puzzle by interviewing lots of people in lots of places, as well as going to the pub together, so the scenes changed swiftly. This was done smoothly and cleverly by moving just enough props to create each place. This is common theatre practice but it is not often done as well as it was here.

At the centre of everything were Morse (Tom Chambers), Lewis (Tachia Newall) and prime suspect and director of both Hamlets (James Gladdon) and they were a very strong core. Each character was vivid, believable and brought something different to the play.

I vaguely recall seeing this episode on TV and while that might have helped with one of the twists it did nothing to help to solve the main mystery and the ending came as a good surprise.

Inspector Morse: House of Ghosts did everything that I expect from a show at Richmond Theatre, it was a professional production that entertained easily without expecting too much from the audience.

Rainbow in Rock at The Cavern (12 Sep 25)

For some reason I had not seen Rainbow in Rock at The Cavern since February and whether that was their fault or mine, or both, I was glad to end the musical drought.

As is my custom, I was slightly late so missed the start (but not Man on the Silver Mountain) so I do not know if anything was said about the keyboard player who was new. His newness showed a little as he messed by just a little a couple of times which is no surprise given how much catching up he had to do with the other four who have been playing these songs together for years. It made no difference to my enjoyment of the evening.

Other than that things were pretty much the same, the pub was full with plenty of familiar faces, the beer was good (Wimbledon Brewery's SW19 this time), the set list was fantastic and the playing superb. 

This was exactly what I go to see pub bands for.

Death Comes to Pemberley at Richmond Theatre

I had not heard of Death Comes to Pemberley before, and had forgotten that Pemberley is the country estate owned by Fitzwilliam Darcy in Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, but I had heard of PD James and it was on at Richmond Theatre where I see almost every play so I went for it.

Mu usual seat on the left side of the front row of the Dress Circle had been taken so I went for the right side instead where seat Dress Circle A6 cost me £43.

The view from there is good, which is why I (almost) always choose to sit in the cheaper seats in the front row of the Dress Circle.

The photo also shows that the stage was fairly bare, more on the later.

While this was set in the world of Pride and Prejudice all that did was give the story a location and some characters to start with and this was very much a crime story and not a period drama.

It was a good story too with lots of dead ends and twists, in other words I had no idea who the killer was or why the killing was done until the reveal on stage.

However, I do not think that the story translated well from the page to the stage and, at times, it felt like a staged reading, an audiobook with pictures. I would have to see it again to test my theory but I think that part of the problem is that books can quickly move from one location to another whereas plays cannot so to achieve those changes they went for a fairly bare stage and moved just a few props in and out for the different scenes. That sort of worked but it meant that the play was not very visual and with little physical action there was little to watch.

Putting those negatives aside, it was a good story and the actors told it well. I enjoyed it but would find it hard to recommend it.

Stop Starving Gaza

While the condemnation of Israel's genocide is growing slowly no serious action has been taken against Israel (they are even still in Eurovision and the football World Cup!) and their deadly violence continues against Palestinians and any perceived supporters in Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Yemen, etc. and so the demonstrations for peace continue in force.

The demonstration this time was also against the ridiculous mass arrests of people sitting peacefully holding placards with the simple message, "I oppose genocide. I support Palestine Action.".

As usual there was a small group of genocide supporters waving Israel flags at one point along the route. I really do not understand why they are allowed to do this (when the far-right march we are not allowed anywhere near them) or why the Israel flag is allowed when it is a clear support for terrorism.

Le nozze di Figaro at Glyndebourne Festival 2025

My final visit to Glyndebourne Festival 2025 was to see Le nozze di Figaro. I had seen it at Glyndebourne four times since 2016 and so it was not an automatic choice to see it again but it is a lovely opera and this was a new production so that was enough to tempt me.

I went for the usual price band and got seat Blue Upper Circle A8 for £145. Happy with that.

Again travel did not quite work to Plan A but Plan B was fine, too late in Lewes to visit The Depository for lunch so I tried the coffee shop by the station entrance and that did the job. Several other Glyndebourne goers had the same idea.

The rest of the new routine worked and the first coach was early enough to claim a seat in the Veg Patch Stretch Tent. The weather was good so many people had opted for the grass leaving space in the marquees.

Any doubts about seeing Le nozze di Figaro were lifted as soon as the overture started, the music really is lovely.

The set made an immediate good impression too. Superficially simple with little decoration it rotated along several arcs creating multiple spaces with nonchalance.

The production made great use of the set and its movement creating busy but not fussy scenes.

The actors built on this by playing the comedy to the full with exaggerated, but not false, gestures and movements.

The combination of the set and performers and, yes, the sur titles, made this complex story easy to follow.

If this was a play then it would have been excellent but, of course it is an opera so there is the singing to consider too and this was excellent too. This was the most that I have ever enjoyed  Le nozze di Figaro and in the likely event that Glyndebourne revives it in a few years then I will eagerly see it again.

Falstaff at Glyndebourne Festival 2025

Falstaff is a jolly easy to approach opera so it was no surprise that friends wanted to see it with us.

Booking went well, as it had all season and we got seats Red Upper Circle B42-45 for £130 each.

Travel went almost to plan but we were too late into Lewes to visit The Depository for lunch so we settled for the cafe in the station instead and that actually worked well. It also meant that we were in prime position to get a good seat in the first coach.

And being in the first coach meant that we were able to secure a table in the Veg Patch Stretch Tent which is our current first-choice location.

Somehow we spent the almost two hours before the opera chatting over cake and bubbles and failed to go for the traditional walk around the lake. Not that it mattered, going to Glyndebourne with friends is as much about the friends than it is about the gardens.

Falstaff the opera is based on Shakespeare's  comic play The Merry Wives of Windsor which, in turn, reuses his character Sir John Falstaff from Henry IV, Parts 1 and 2.

Falstaff has propositioned more than one lady and when they find out they scheme together to get their playful revenge.

This leads to a Brian Rix style farce where people hide from their pursuers behind screens and in laundry baskets. Falstaff gets a comeuppance of sorts and we all head outside for the long dining interval.

In the final act Falstaff needs a further lesson and this time it all has a Midsummer's Night Dream feel to it with the village children dressed as fairies. When the second bout of playful revenge is over Falstaff good humouredly takes the lesson and all ends well.

The music and singing matched the fun and tempo of the plot and the evening was terrifically entertaining.

BCSA "Get to Know You" Social (August 2025)

I have not been good at documenting my visits to the monthly BCSA "Get to Know You" Social but they have remained an important part of my calendar.

The process around them has changed a little over the years with me preferring to walk all the way there since retiring and more recently meeting a few people in The Railway pub beforehand to do a few Pokemon Go raids (Wednesday 6-7pm is always Raid Hour).

And for the last two months I have dramatically changed my standard food choice of many years, smazak/smazeny syr, to a half portion of the same. Obviously I am still drinking pints of Pilsner Urquell.

Unchanged were the good company and the conversations, the reasons for going every month.

The Peter Ackroyd Thames Pub Crawl 2025

I had done the monumental, in so many ways, Peter Ackroyd Thames Pub Crawl several times in the past (2013, 2015 and 2017) and loved it every time but was a little hesitant this year as age has caught up with me a little and my walking and drinking were both reduced. But it is such a great walk and talk that when invited I just had to do it again.

Our starting point, as usual, was St. Stephen's Tavern on Parliament Square. A good central location to meet but plagued by tourists which makes the service a little slow. Also on the plus side it is a Hall & Woodhouse pub which means Badger Beers and I could start the day with a pint of Fursty Ferret.

From there we made our way towards Sherlock Holmes by Charring Cross pausing along the way to here tales of the early Thames and how it came to be the river we know today. Not sure what I drank and my limited notes from the day just say "Pale Ale.

Our next stop was for lunch at Mulberry Bush on South Bank. They were expecting us, most of us had preordered our food yet we were still there for well over an hour. The exceptionally slow service was a shame as everything else about the pub was rather nice.

Our next stop was a pleasant surprise.

Our eloquent guide, Robert Kingham, took us on a small diversion into the place where he works which just happens to have panoramic views like this. We lingered for a while over a few glasses of bubbly to enjoy all of the views.

We all took many photographs, because we are all curious tourists too, and while I personally liked the less familiar views looking south I chose this one full of landmarks to help anyone less familiar with London.

 

Our next stop was The Rake South Bank, on the edge of Borough Market. It has an extravagant range of beers from which I selected Verdant This House IPA. A good choice. 

The walking and talking continued as we sauntered towards Tower Bridge and our rendezvous at Dean Swift for dinner. I went for some pretty good ravioli and a decent pint of Bermondsey Pale Ale.

For me the most interesting part of this walk is the section east of Tower Bridge, a path less trodden by tourists but they are spreading! The light was fading when I took this picture looking back towards the City.

Approaching 10pm we hit The Angel which was the one unexpected low point of the evening, it took absolutely ages to get served not being a local and having to try and work out their complicated indoors/outdoors bars and the pint of Sam Smith's Old Brewery was definitely not worth the wait. That was a real disappointment for me as I had lived off that beer when I first started work in London.

The next and final pub, The Mayflower, was much more like it! The pub was lively and offered up a jolly good pint of Juicy Golden Ale, which I drank on a bench by the river with my fellow travellers. It was the perfect end to a perfect day.

And for the record, we walked about 18km.

Saul at Glyndebourne Festival 2025

One of the couples who we take to Glyndebourne usually choose a Handel so it was no surprise when they asked to see Saul and it was no surprise either that I agreed. 

The ballot gods were kind to use and we got seats Blue Upper Circle C:5-8 for £130 each. A good price I thought.

On the day the weather was not great so many people who would have picnicked on the grass had booked tables in the Veg Patch Stretch Tent instead and that forced us back into the main marquee, not our first choice but a perfectly reasonable second choice.

Saul has a long overture of familiar Handel style which was a welcome reassurance of what was to come, though it only told only part of the story.

Then the curtain was raised and it immediately clear that we were in for something quite different. Possibly inspired by Bridgeton, the cast wore Georgian costumes and made exaggerated gestures with their arms. And that set the scene for a visually spectacular feast with plenty of modern dancing and a few severed heads.

Stunning as the staging was the music lived up to it. With lots to like the element that I enjoyed the most was when the chorus sang. And things got even better when the two came together such as they did the times the chorus piled along the very front of the stage in three tight rows to sing directly at us.

I am not sure if I ever learned the story of Saul at school (and am glad I forgot it if I did) so but I did know about David (the first severed head was the giant's) so guessed that he would be the ultimate victor in the contest with Saul which was entirely of Saul's making.

Saul was the complete package with good music, good singing and exceptional staging.

A Moon for the Misbegotten at Almeida Theatre

When it comes to choosing plays to see I have a very short list of things that I considered mandatory and A Moon for the Misbegotten at Almeida Theatre had two of them; it was written by Eugene O'Neil and starred Ruth Wilson. I fell in love with both at Anna Christie at Donmar Warehouse in 2011.

I was quick to book and got seats in the middle of the Circle which, for some reason, showed on my ticket as Zone AA Row A Seat 17 £70. I was expecting to pay more and would gladly have done so.

It was a long play, circa 3 hours, which meant a 7pm start. I left home in plenty of time for a pre-theatre meze at Gallipoli Again which I was glad for an excuse to revisit after a gap of a few years.

The view from my seat was encouraging with a simple, if busy, set thick with wood and brick. After the excessive fussiness of A Streetcar Named Desire at Almeida Theatre in 22 I was hoping for something more traditional and this was it.

I had not seen the play before and knew little about it, other than it was connected to Long Day’s Journey Into Night and while knowing that play added a little context it was not vital to the plot. 

A Moon for the Misbegotten an in-depth look into a tough family situation, tenants farmers in financial difficulties, while creditors and suitors circled.

The family was led by Irish tenant farmer Phil Hogan (played by David Threlfall) who had one remaining offspring (the others had run away) his daughter Josie (played by Ruth Wilson). 

Their landlord was James ‘Jim’ Tyrone (played by Michael Shannon). Jim Tyrone had inherited the estate when his father dies, he was the main character in Long Day’s Journey Into Night .

The play consisted of long serious conversations mostly between Josie and Jim with Phil, And that meant the play relied totally on the performances of the three main actors and it is fair to say that all three were excellent. Really excellent.

I like the style of Eugene O'Neil plays with lots of dialogue that gradually exposes histories and secrets and this was very much the style of this, his final play.

I went hoping for a great play and great acting and my high expectations were easily met.

Neil Young at Hyde Park (11 Jul 25)

I try and see Neil Young whenever he plays in the UK, the last time being with Bob Dylan in Hyde Park in 2029. I was keen to end the long wait, mainly caused by Covid, I booked to see him at Hype Park again.

I was quite interested in seeing Van Morrison and reasonably interested in Yusuf/Cat Stevens and happily paid what, with all the add-ons, eventually came to £128.75.

It was one of the hottest days of the year so rather than go when the event started at 2pm I left it until 4pm which still left plenty of time to get the lay of the land and refill my water bottle before Van Morrison came on.

This safe approach did mean that I had no chance of getting a great place to see the acts but with BST allocating the first 50m or so as VIP space that was not going to happen anyway. This approach to grabbing as much money as possible off fans is very annoying - at a previous Neil Young event in Hyde Park I was able to move in and get quite close to the stage, about five rows back.

BST had not done a lot for the extreme heat, there was very little shade and there were very long queues and the two water supply points. I saw two people collapse within 5m of me and was not surprised, standing for several hours in the sun and heat hurts, even with plenty of water and a good hat.

To be honest, almost everything about the logistics of the event was bad.

Luckily the music made up for it. That said, it was close and next time I might agree to be exploited further and get a VIP ticket.

I have several Van Morrison albums, mostly from the late 70s (Hard Nose the Highway, Veedon Fleece, A Period of Transition, Wavelength and Into the Music), but I did not expect to know many of the songs, my hope was that they would be dancy, which they were. 

He was supported by several musicians including a significant brass section and between them they made a great sound. The songs were catchy is not familiar and the hour-long set was a lot of fun. He ended magnificently with Gloria, a song he wrote in 1964 when a member of Them. That might be sixty years ago but every seemed to know and love it.

Yusuf/Cat Stevens was more of a mystery to me and I only really knew a few hit singles. He played acoustic guitar in a folky style which while not particularly exciting it was perfectly fine. Not surprisingly it was the songs that I knew, like Moonshadow, that I liked the best and what was a surprise to me was that one of his songs is First Cut is the Deepest, better known for other versions.

He got political at one point mentioning the thirtieth anniversary of the Srebrenica massacre before playing a song that he wrote about it which he also dedicated to the children killed in Gaza; his shout of "Free Palestine" was received with a loud cheer.

Just before 8:30pm Neil Young and the Chrome Hearts came on stage.

This time I had a very good idea of what to expect both in terms of the songs and the way that the band would sound like. 

Of course there were some new songs, which sounded like old songs so that was okay, and while the Chrome Hearts are not Crazy Horse they played in much the same way letting Neil do his own thing and supporting him appropriately as he went in and out of extended solos.

Neil and the band played for just over two hours before the set cam to an abrupt end when the plug was pulled at 10:30pm when they were doing one of several false endings to Rocking in the Free World, always a great song to end a set with.

Along the way we had numerous classic songs like Southern Man, Harvest Moon, Cowgirl in the Sand and My My Hey Hey but even with two hours to play with there was no space for Hurricane, Cortez or Powderfinger. The Neil Young back catalogue is such an embarrassment of riches that even these were not really missed.

It was an absolutely fabulous couple of hours which even standing for hours in great heat could do little to diminish.

Marxism 2025

After attending Marxism 2024 I wrote, "Overall it was a lot of fun, if tiring at times, and I am tempted to go again next year.", and I did indeed go the next year.

Thanks to universities shying away from anything remotely looking like support for Palestine the venue had to change to something commercial and so I got to spend a few days in trendy Shoreditch in a venue called Protein Studios.

Shoreditch is not the easiest commute for me and a 10am start counts as early start these days but I managed it using a couple of different routes.

Shoreditch did have the advantage of being full of cafes and restaurants and the one in the same complex, Oat Coffee, was my first port of call each morning.

The format was the same as last year with multiple sessions run in parallel on a variety of national and international topics. That meant quite a lot of moving around the complex and that is when the reduced space really hurt. We also had standard general purpose rooms rather than lecture halls which was not ideal but it just about worked thanks to careful organisation and lots of helpers.

Just to give a flavour of the event, this is the Lenin Room before it got really busy.

This year I found myself doing several theory type sessions which were useful but tiring as there was a lot of content and it was delivered at pace.

A general impression I got was that there were diehard Marxists who though that things like Facebook could be squeezed into a Victorian view of production and others who thought that the original theories needed to be extended or added to.

I am in the second camp, Einstein did not invalidate Newton and Born did not invalidate Einstein.

I also found the idea of a Labour Theory of Value difficult to deal with as in my working life value has always been determined by the end-customer rather that the effort and resources used to produce it.

That said, I was never interested in that minutiae of (any) economic theory but am very happy with the basic Labour v Capital analysis and the need to significantly redress the balance between them so that the wealth is shared a lot more with those that provide labour at the expense of those that provide capital.

A few different views was to be expected, indeed that is the purpose of debates, and that did nothing to diminish the sense of camaraderie that pervaded the event, and that camaraderie was very welcome in a world that had somehow managed to get some much worse (Trump, Gaza, Starmer, Iran, etc.) over the last year. Let's hope there are some good things to talk about next year.

BCSA Garden Party 2025

Somehow it has been ten years since I lasted posted about te BCSA Garden Party and while Covid carries some of the blame the main fault has been my laziness.

The intervening years also brought changes to the Czech and Slovak embassies which meant that when the Garden Party could be held it had to be held elsewhere. It was nice to be back in the Czech Embassy and in the shared gardens (that is the Slovak Embassy on the left).

The format was much the same as it ever was with food, drink, music, dancing and a raffle. Also the same as ever were the conversations that filled the afternoon and gave the party its purpose.

Towards the end this group photograph was taken. I think a few shy people hid and some may have left by then but I think that it includes around a dozen people that I spoke to at some point during the convivial four hours that the party lasted.

Not even the determined efforts of TfL (no District Lines, mainline trains severely delayed) could dent the simple pleasures of the afternoon.

Parsifal at Glyndebourne Festival 2025

I am a late convertor to Wagner, and not a fully committed one at that, and it was more a sense of exploration that drew me to Parsifal at Glyndebourne, having seen it just once before in 2016.

I was keen enough to fork out £185 for Blue Upper Circle B6. I had gone for cheap seats (£95) last year and while that sort of worked I fancied something better this year.

We were a small familial party (parents and elder son) which made the logistics of the day simpler, e.g. we could all travel down by train and we did not need to try to impress guests with fancy food. A picnic of sorts in the Veg Patch Stretch Tent worked well, though the recently acquired bottle of champagne had not yet settled and opened with gusto.

Parsifal is a long opera and were were seated ready for the performance at 3pm with it due to finish at 9pm (with intervals).

It was stunning. There were several main characters and they all sang beautifully, and acted well to. The music was sumptuous and was played superbly, it was music to wallow in. The staging was interesting and active with things happening away from the main action. The only problem was the story that made almost no sense, despite the copious sur-titles.

Luckily the lack of story had no impact on my enjoyment, much is it does not with other foreign language music that I like (and also Yes songs that, despite being in English, often make no sense either). The music and singing carried the day gorgeously.

Sparks at Hammersmith Apollo (18 June 25)

Sparks are now about the only band that I try to see every time that they play in London who still play in London who still play in London with some regularity, the rest have either stoped playing altogether or only tour here occasionally.

They somehow manage to play a different venue each time and this comes with different seating/standing options. This was their first visit to Hammersmith Apollo (in recent years at least) and when I booked, which was when the bookings opened, there were only standing places available and so I went for one of those at £45.

I had been seated the last few times that I had seen them so was quite looking forward to a standing show.

You may have noticed that they played two nights and I have only mentioned one. Unfortunately I had a much earlier booking for Glyndebourne on the 19th, otherwise I would have gone to both nights.

Not having a lot else to do on the day I found myself in the queue around 6pm whereas I was already behind a good number of serious fans.

The entry system whereby you had to show tickets on their app twice, once to get into the building and again a few seconds later to get into the auditorium delayed me a little bit more than it should but I still got a place about three rows back, on Ron's side of the stage and with no tall people  in front of me.

The picture below shows the view I had.

Sparks came on around 8:30 and after two and a half hours of mostly standing I was ready for some music and some modest dancing.

The first song was no surprise, So May We Start has been the obvious opener  since being released in 2021 as part of the Annette soundtrack.

Sparks have an extensive back catalogue, almost thirty studio albums, and are able to pull out any track from any time so each concert is full of some surprises as well as some greatest hits and some newer songs from the latest album. 

This time the surprises included three songs from Nº 1 in Heaven played in reverse order of familiarity so that when the third song, the title song itself, it came as surprise. An even bigger surprise were the two songs from 1973's A Woofer in Tweeter's Clothing. That is when I first got into Sparks via John Peel, of course.

In addition to The Number One Song in Heaven, the greatest hits included Reinforcements, When Do I Get to Sing "My Way" and This Town Ain't Big Enough for Both of Us.

I was very happy!

Standing in a cramped area got to me slightly after a while and I slipped towards the back, helped myself to a refreshing pint, and settled down to listen to the rest of the show and enjoy the light show. It was still excellent from their and I liked the different perspective.

Sadly Sparks have yet to announce any more London dates so I will just have to wait until they do.

Little Women at Richmond Theatre

I never read Little Women (no great surprise there) but I had learned about it from radio drama adaptations and also an In Our Time episode and that was enough to tempt me to seeing it on stage. The usual process secured me seat Dress Circle A 22 for £39.

 

Just in case you did not know, Little Women tells the stories of a family of four sisters as they grow to become women, a coming of age story with four variations.

These stories have their ups and downs, as life does, but it is all very gentle and there is nothing puzzling or overly emotional to get engrossed in. It is all very English, except technically it isn't.

The lack of depth to the drama gave the cast little to work with but they did what they had to do with wit and charm. They were all good if not stretched.

The staging was lovely too, able to present many different scenes with just a few minor prop moves, which the cast did themselves.

The one thing that confused me was in the story, possibly the most significant event was moved from the first half (where it would have been a natural consequence of events) to the second (where it came out of the blue). That may have been to hold a key moment back for dramatic effect but it confused me, and probably everyone else there who, I presume, all knew the plot.

Little Women did what good tour shows do. It entertained simply and professionally without taking any risks. I prefer challenging and contentious plays but there is also a place for simpler things, provided they are done well, as this was.

Hawkwind at Barbican Hall (26 May 25)

I use the "hawkwind" tag on this blog to cover any band that plays Hawkwind songs, either exclusively (e.g. Hoaxwind) or mixed in with their own songs (e.g. Space Ritual), and it is always nice to hear the original band.

Once upon a time, Hawkwind's last gig on a tour would be at Astoria, long gone to make way for Lizzy Line, and since then they have played places like Shepherds Bush Empire and Royal Albert Hall. This was (I believe) their first time at Barbican Hall.

Having paid £55 for a seat at the very top of RAH to see them in 2023 I was a little surprised to pay just £43.5 for seat Circle A24. The view from there was very good as the photo below shows.

 

We were due to have a support band, and they sounded interesting too, only to have that cancelled due to them breaking down on the motorway on the way there. The fill-in was probably better. Hawkwind had been playing with a musical (!) and they had some of the music on a PC with them. That music sounded, to me, like 1960's cocktail  bar music, the sort of thing that they played in shows like The Saint, only the lyrics were very much Hawkwind. If that sounds strange, well it was. Strange, interesting and lovely. If it ever makes the light of the commercial day then I will buy it.

Hawkwind hit the stage around 8:20pm and rocked solidly for two hours. Unusually, nobody led the band visually and for most of the time all the band members were hidden in darkness behind a continuous light show. They are all on stage in the photo above.

Musically they played a wide selection of songs covering their entire lengthy career in a consistent heavy rock style enriched with keyboards. The emphasis was on "rock" but this was very much "spacerock".

A lot of the songs I knew and several were new to me, presumably from their more recent albums, Familiar or not they all sounded good and they all sounded like Hawkwind. There were some classics (e.g. Psi Power, Assault and Battery, The Golden Void, Spirit of the Age) some unexpected favourites (e.g. Paradox, Steppenwolf) and even some spoken word (e.g. The Awakening).

Of course with so many songs to choose from they had to leave some things out and it is a testament to how strong the setlist was that there was no space for songs like Silver Machine or Brainstorm. It would have been nice to hear them but they were not really missed.

Hawkwind have been going since 1969 and I first saw them live in 1976. It has been a long and happy relationship which I cherish.

Memento at The Cavern (24 May 25)

Memento remain one of the best things to do on a Saturday night so I was back at The Cavern to see them again.

As usual I walked there and took longer than I expected (I always get distracted along the way) so I missed some of their set but I did manage to catch a good chunk of the first half and all of the second.

Arriving late I ended up towards the back of the pub, not that that mattered.

The pub served Wainwright's Gold and I had a few of those which helped to refresh and relax me. A good choice.

Memento did what Memento do, they played a wide variety of rock songs, some of which I knew, with well rehearsed skill and obvious love for the music.

A highlight for me was Heaven and Hell from the Dio Black Sabbath period, a song I have loved since buying the album in 1980 (only 45 years ago!).

I went expecting good music, beer and atmosphere and, once again, Memento at The Cavern delivered in full.

I have walked every street in Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames

It has been over a year since I completed every street in London Borough of Richmond upon Thames and now, finally, I have completed every street in Kingston upon Thames (bounded by the thick light blue line).

The picture above, a section of my CityStrides LifeMap, helps to explain why it took so long, there are very few routes that I have walked beyond the southern boundaries, and that is because there is little of interest to me there.

I live at the north edge of Kingston (the other side of the road is Richmond) and while I regularly walk south to Kingston town centre and make occasional forays to New Malden, it takes something unusual to take me to Surbiton or anywhere south of that. There are areas of the Borough that I knew little about until I made the effort to walk every street. To be honest, I have no intention of ever going back to most of them.

I had not intended to get this competitive on completing streets but CityStrides makes it fun and easy to do and, generally, I find interesting things when taken into new areas. so I will put a bit more effort into completing Kensington and Chelsea (70%), City of Westminster (69%) and Hammersmith and Fulham (64%).

And just to put that all into some perspective, I have now walked 18% of Greater London and the leader in that competition has done 62%!!!. I will never get anywhere near that.

Il barbiere di Siviglia at Glyndebourne Festival 2025

Organising trips to Glyndebourne with different groups of friends takes some doing and then the food, drink and equipment for each trip has to be planned so it was good that on our first trip to Festival 2025 our guests offered to do all the food leaving us just to find a couple of bottles. They also offered to drive us there so that was sorted to. An easy start to the season.

I always have a sense of anticipation on the first visit of the year as there is always something that has changed. This year the main change was the enlarged and improved Veg Patch Stretch Tent which already was our first choice picnic area.

There were also some minor changes in the garden, including a work of art in the sunken garden where, years ago, the Henry Moore lay.

The big sculptures in the garden were there from the year before which was fine because I love them.

There had been some changes to how the seats were classified in the booking process but we were in our usual area where seat Blue Upper Circle B5 was a modest £110 (I am paying more to see Neil Young play in a field).

I seen the opera twice before, in 2016 and 2019, but had few memories of it and was ready to appreciate it afresh. The plot was simple and quickly understood, Dr Bartolo want to marry Rosina but she wants to marry Count Almaviva and is helped by Figaro (the titular barber). Their plans are playful and the story gentle fun.

The opera may be named after Figaro, and he takes the final curtain call, but it is the heroine Rosina, played by Cecilia Molinari, who carries the day with delightful singing and impish acting. She was a joy to watch and hear.