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.

Old shoes, new shoes

I once heard on a podcast the suggestion that we try everything when we are young but as we get older we stick to just the few things that we really like. That makes sense from a risk perspective, why try something you might not like when something you know you love is on offer?, and also from a time perspective, why dwell over other options you've found something you love? I've been there with shoes for a while. 

I buy all my shoes from Ecco (size 42) and have a mix of smart home shoes, everyday walking shoes and extreme weather walking shoes. 

It's the everyday walking shoes that take the most damage, remember I average something over 20km a day, and my current pair have just collapsed after ten months. So I've bought a replacement pair.

There is always a fair degree of guess work when buying shoes on line, e.g. you cannot get a feel for the materials used, and Ecco keep changing their designs in their extensive range. This was meant to be a like for like replacement and I am very happy with the result.

Gold Rush at The Half Moon (18 May 25)

Gold Rush, formerly Honeyslides, have the happy habit of playing The Half Moon in Putney every six months so I have the equally habit of going to see them when they do. It is easy to say it is because they play Neil Young songs (the rather obvious clue is in the name!) but it is more than that, they play an excellent selection of songs that covers more than just the greatest hits and they play them very well with joy and enthusiasm.

Every night is a little different and this time there were a few rows of seats at the front and thanks to my usual good queue management I was able to grab one in the middle of the front row.

Except for a couple of minor glitches, the sound mix and volume were superb. It is hard to compare when the gigs are six months apart but I think this was the best sound set up they have had. 

The set had a few differences, as it usually does, This time the new songs included Sedan Delivery which meant no space for songs like Powderfinger. and Sugar Mountain.

My highlights this time included Words, Cortez the Killer and Southern Man. Of course Like a Hurricane and Cinnamon Girl were blistering too.

It really was an exceptional evening and one I hope to repeat later this year.

My only regret is that the one decent photo I took that evening (of three) had just Tom Billington in it and while he is the main man they are a band and they all played a significant part in the success of the evening. 

Giant at Harold Pinter Theatre

In the flurry of theatre announcements that I get, several every day, I somehow either missed Giant when it was on at Royal Court or I did not appreciate how good it would be so I was pleased when the positive reviews and sold-out run were followed by a west end transfer to Harold Pinter Theatre.

Fairly obviously, I think, the fanfare was due to John Lithgow's sward winning performance. That was my interest too though, perhaps unusually, because of his roles in Dexter and Cliffhanger.

I was quick at the second time of asking and managed to get a good seat, Balcony A9 for a very respectable £40.

Despite being up in "the gods" the view was good, helped by having all the action at the front of the stage. It was also less vertiginous than other similar seats that I have been in, thanks to a solid safety rail.

The story, such as it was, covered Roald Dahl's published views on Israel, which were based on his own direct experience, and how these were edging towards anti-semitism. 

The topic was controversial then as it is now with Israel again bombing neighbouring countries and that topicality made the historical story very relevant.

While the jury is out on Roald Dahl there is no doubting the quality of the script or of John Lithgow's performance. This was top-grade theatre and that it left such a controversial question still open at the end is to its credit.

Blood Wedding at Omnibus Theatre

This was as close to mandatory as any theatre production gets for me.

The original play, also called Blood Wedding, is by Lorca a giant of theatre. I had seen and loved various Lorca plays over the years, including two versions of The House of Bernarda Alba.

I had also seen his Blood Wedding before, oddly at my only other visit to Omnibus Theatre on the south-east corner of Clapham Common.

This version was by Barney Norris and I have seen so many of his plays over the years at various locations that we chat a little whenever we meet.

This Blood Wedding moved the story from historical Spain to contemporary Salisbury (if you know Norris' work you will have guessed that!). That relocation helped to make the story more relatable and relevant. 

The story was the same (no spoilers, though the title is bit of a clue) but the richness in the play was the characters all of which were believable, had depth and were brought to convincing life by an excellent ensemble cast. For example, while the centre of the play was a bride and groom and her former lover, I found myself particularly interested in the bride's mother and her motives.

Clearly I had high hopes for this production and it is fair to say that they were met and possible exceeded. This was an absolute belter of a play thanks to those characters and Norris' dialogue that described them to us.