A recipe for remembering why London can be so brilliant:
1. Buy tickets to see the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra perform a very special gig nearby in an art deco masterpiece.
2. Dress up for the evening, and like a good girl, brush your teeth diligently.
3. Wind up with a bristle from the toothbrush stuck at the back of your throat. Ow.
4. Attempt to extract the bristle with tweezers. No luck.
5. Bring tweezers to the gig, hoping your friend – an expert model maker who is highly skilled with tools – can extract it. No luck. Tweezers too short.
6. Desperate to avoid a trip to A&E, where you will no doubt have to sit for seventeen hours waiting for help for this very non-lethal inconvenience, message a friend across town who makes fucked up art and no doubt has a huge pair of tweezers that might work.
7. Have friend confirm, yep they have huge tweezers – but they’re too high at that moment for the requisite hand-eye coordination.
8. Travel 90 minutes across town. Obtain tweezers (which are enormous), and call another friend who lives nearby to ask if they wouldn’t mind doing this very strange favour for you. Friend agrees.
9. Walk twenty minutes to this very kind friend, the third destination of the evening.
10. Open wide and say AAAAAAHHHHH…
11. Experience the unique joy of seeing a dear friend triumphantly brandish one single toothbrush bristle in front of your face with a pair of giant tweezers. A joy you never even knew existed.
12. Make it to the tube station in time for the last train, arriving home at a decent hour – spared the misery of four night buses or a very expensive taxi.
So in one evening I enjoyed great music, historic architecture, a pretty darn good transport system, and – above all – brilliant friends who came together to help me avoid a miserable trip to A&E (and gave me the ability to eat and drink comfortably again).
Nice one London: 9/10.
(One mark deducted because the brush shouldn’t have malfunctioned in the first place. Only in England would an attempt at normal dental hygiene wind up in a crisis…)
Kilburn isn’t exactly the first area that comes to mind when you think of hip and trendy London neighbourhoods. A friend who grew up nearby in Swiss Cottage asked where I’m living right now. When my response was “Kilburn, just for a couple months,” his reply was swift and succinct:
“Oh. I’m sorry.”
Far in Northwest London, it’s not exactly Soho or Shoreditch or Camden, all known worldwide for their nightlife and music scenes (even if they’ve been disneyfied). There’s some nice restaurants, but is anything else going on in Kilburn?
Well it turns out: There sure used to be.
Back in the 70s the high street was known as the “music mile” with a string of venues that hosted countless legends from Bob Marley to Dusty Springfield. And apparently no venue hosted more legends than the Gaumont State Cinema (also known as The State), a huge and beautiful art deco theatre which opened its doors in 1937 with a capacity of 4,000 – at time the largest purpose built cinema in Europe.
Sidenote: Remember when we all went to the cinema for the ritual of experiencing films with other people in an enormous room kitted with a great sound system – instead of just whacking Netflix onto the telly in our living rooms in solitude? I miss the past.
Back to The State: The Beatles, David Bowie, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, John Coltrane, Louis Armstrong, Thelonius Monk, Dizzy Gillespie, The Who, Black Sabbath and countless other stars played here. Check this blog post for an impressive and comprehensive list.
Then the usual happened: crowds moved elsewhere, the building fell into disuse, and it became in 1980 – wait for it – a bingo hall. By 2007 even the bingo crowds weren’t interested in the State, and rapacious property developers threatened to devour it before the Ruach City Church took over the theatre, which has hosted zero live music outside religious events for almost twenty years.
Until this month, when the glorious space reopened for the secular public as a live music venue, starting with a special performance from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. I didn’t look up any of the details about the venue or the lineup before going, I just said “OF COURSE” when my friends said the RPO were going to play at a venue down the road and the tickets were cheap (£15 – totally fair).
I normally do my homework… but this time I’m glad I didn’t. It was a joy to be surprised by the spectacular architecture (love me some art deco), and an absolute delight to learn about the venue’s history. I also had no idea that the RPO would be treating us to an evening of music from the legends who played here. When the strings fired up Bowie’s “Life on Mars” my heart sang. And I bawled like a child all throughout “Let It Be” (absolutely my favourite track from the fab four).
What a delight, and what a surprise. Never thought I’d say this but: Kilburn you get 10/10 for this one.
It was an absolute pleasure and a privilege to travel to the Czech Republic this October for the Dark Prague conference. In their own words: “Technology is the battlefield. Biology is the frontier. Networks are the lifeblood. This is where we examine systems to dismantle them, fork them, or remake them.”
I was invited to deliver a talk on one of the most hilarious and disturbing chapters in the history of narcotics and mind-altering substances: the use of drugs by the military, both on enemy combatants and their own troops.
Most of the other speakers were experts in decentralised banking systems or new forms of cyber security – blockchain, crypto and all that. Which I know absolutely nothing about. Plus, I’m a luddite and I break all forms of tech – even watch batteries – and I fully believe biology is superior to technology in almost every way. I felt a bit out of place amongst all the techies and hackers. So I asked the wonderful Michael Parenti why he programmed me: “The Institute of Cryptoanarchy strives to offer its tech attendees a broad, interdisciplinary program of content which challenges them to adjust their cognitive models and world views; Zoe’s expertise at the intersection of science and sociology was the main driver of adding her to this year’s conference. Her engaging and passioned speaking style is based in a desire to challenge people’s assumptions with fact-based research and a portion of dark humour – perfect for our audience.”
Well I hope I delivered – especially on the humour part. I mean, if you don’t find the fact that the CIA authorised a programme for officers to spike each other with LSD at any time whatsoever utterly hilarious, you have no soul. “Surprise acid trips became an occupational hazard,” as Martin A. Lee put it in his fabulous book Acid Dreams.
Come on: That is comedy gold.
As is this:
“As it turns out, nearly every drug that appeared on the black market during the 1960s – marijuana, cocaine, heroin, PCP, amyl nitrate, mushrooms, DMT, barbiturates, laughing gas, speed and others – had been tested in and some cases refined by the CIA.” My quip in response: “Sounds like a good weekend.”
There are many hilarious tales, but this one in particular makes me laugh: how the use of methamphetamine served the Nazis well against the French and British – but poorly against the Russians. And I remember exactly why I was laughing so hard at this moment in my talk.
It has only recently come to light that the Third Reich heavily relied on methamphetamine, in a pharma grade drug called Pervitin, which they distributed to their troops en masse to enable them to stay awake for days – even weeks. Apparently many could go without sleep for *seventeen days*. Handy in warfare. Norman Ohler has documented that roughly 40 million doses of meth were distributed to Nazi troops for the Blitzkrieg – while the French gave their own soldiers 3/4 of a bottle of red wine a day. “That is not a fair fight,” I observed.
What’s quite interesting though is that while meth gave the Germans an advantage on the Western Front, on the Eastern Front against the Soviets it was actually a hindrance. The Russians – true to form – gave their troops a healthy volume of vodka daily.
“Now, if you’ve ever been on a speed bender, you know that when you do eventually crash… you crash hard. The payback is horrific. But if you’re a Russian just necking vodka every single day, you can keep going for DECADES,” I remarked.
“So true!” a woman shouted from the back. And we all howled with laughter – nobody more than me.
Thank you Dark Prague, it was nothing but a joy for this luddite, technophobe and biophile to join you.
My brilliant and utterly unique friend Eileen Hall is hosting a sale of her paintings – absolutely delicious watercolours – and I would encourage all art lovers to have a look. For affordable art (£30 to £300) from a bona fide professional, currently being sold at up to 80% off, I don’t think you can say that isn’t a good deal for some seriously beautiful pieces.
I assure you: I’m not the only one who holds her work in high regard.
As Koch put it: “Her unique style shines through on the album art and the singles. The way she uses watercolor to evoke emotion and depth adds a visual layer to the music. The artwork goes beyond being just a cover; it acts as a visual embodiment of the album’s essence.”
I first met Eileen in 2022 when writing this piece for Neo Life about the musicians who make music for psychedelic therapy. My friend Carl Smith said I absolutely had to meet Eileen, which puzzled me: She made the art for Hopkins’ album, not the music, why do I want to interview her for a piece about music? “Just trust me,” he said.
And how right he was. She might not have scored the music for that album, but without question she was instrumental to its genesis, having taken Jon on a trip to the deep dark Tayos Caves in Ecuador for an intense bout of sensory deprivation in complete darkness. (You know what? I’m not jealous I wasn’t there!) She might not be a scientist, but she’s a smart cookie (obviously – she has an architecture degree). There’s a reason people in the psychedelic research community respect her so much. Check this podcast to hear her speak for herself.
Her insights are wise – she’s given me hours of free friend-therapy about grief and trauma regarding the untimely death of my irreplaceable mother, who died two days before her 70th birthday, just seven months after her own mother died at 93. Having lost her beloved dad at a terribly young age, just 22, Eileen’s insights were more helpful than anything any professional therapist had said.
The depth of her personality is clear to see in her art. As some people know, I’m not that into visual art – it’s just not my thing. I can stare at a painting for hours and not know if I feel anything. Music is my real passion: I always know within five seconds if I like a track. It’s just the way I’m built.
But once in a while I find an artist who does actually make my heart sing, such as Van Gogh or Matisse. Eileen’s work truly rocks my soul, and it was a privilege to purchase these two paintings, part of her Water Sentience series.
It’s an honour to be her patron as well as her friend. Check her website for more tasty watercolours such as these…
I absolutely adore Flavia Fraser-Cannon, and I want the world to know that right now: she is my hero.
Why is she my hero? Not only did she suffer through a year of treatment for anal cancer – ANAL cancer! – with stoicism and grace, she then threw the most badass bum-themed party when given the all clear, totally OWNING what she’d gone through without a hint of shame or embarrassment.
There was an alBUM, in which we were all to donate polaroids of our derriers. “All bums will be welcome here, all saved for posteriority.” (Posteriority – excellent wordplay.)
Friends sported silk sashes that stated FLAVIA’S BUM or WE LIKE FLAVIA’S BUTT.
She herself proudly wore a sash proclaiming QUEEN OF BUMS.
She handed out stickers from the Crab Museum in Margate that declared “I ❤ BUMS”.
(Why a crab museum stocks bum-related stickers, I have no idea, but I think it’s wonderful they sent her a load of them for free.)
And best of all, there was a huge bum-shaped chocolate cake (gotta be chocolate), which she lit up with sparkly firework candles as we sang “Happy Bum Day”.
How rock and roll can you get? What a way to own the experience.
If it had been me, with my predilection for perfectionism, I probably would have hid under the covers and never wanted anyone to know. But Flay put up a cool social media post when she was diagnosed, urging everyone to get the HPV vaccine.
Going through cancer treatment at any time is terrifying. In her case, I’m sure it was 1000 times more terrifying, as she’s the mother of a beautiful 11 year old boy. I didn’t realise until last week that she had to do radiation on her arse *five days a week* for a *year*. Christ alive.
Now she’s out the other side, what a genius way to celebrate the success of her treatment.
But of course, I expect nothing less than a hilarious and life-affirming party from this woman: Flavia is one of the biggest personalities I know, a fiery and spectacularly hilarious redhead with an intrepid career in independent theatre, a booming laugh, and boundless charisma. Plus, I’m not afraid to say this, unbridled sex appeal (one of the sexiest mums I know in fact).
Today I went through 18 years of photos to find the best ones of us slutting it up for the camera – we’ve never been able to resist gettin’ all sultry for the lens. Honestly, I had to give up after a few hours. It was almost impossible to find pics of us together where we *weren’t* hamming it up.
She’s always worked in the theatrical arts, with a true love and respect for the “bare boards”. Being a multi-talented minx, you can’t really pin down what she does: she can produce, she can direct, she can act, she can coordinate lights, she can stitch up costumes.
She can do it all. Please enjoy these adorable images of her with the “Young Sweeney” puppet from her wonderful 2012 Sweeney Todd production (a thousand times cooler than the mediocre film), taking it home for some A&E repairs.
Crucially: She’s one of the best photographers I know (which is f’ing saying something), and I’d never hire anyone else to do my head shots.
Only Flay can create the wind tunnel effect with no wind tunnel.
I really ought to pay her three times what I did, because dozens of publications have used her photos, including the Swedish newspaper Dagens Nyheter in full colour with the image printed larger than my actual face.
Recently she shot and edited her first music video. Leave it to Flavia to fucking nail the genre on her first try. Talented bitch.
But one thing I respected the most about her approach to her work, when I first met her in 2007, was that she was bored of dealing with the “creative” side of things, jostling with needy thespy egos, and instead she was was more passionate about the practicalities: Is there disabled access… Do you have enough toilets… Have you really planned for all health and safety needs…
“You can have the creative side of things – I just want the productions to work.”
My heart sang when I heard her say this: So few people in the theatrical arts keep those things in mind, and it’s so easy for sloppy production to ruin great ideas.
It is… an absolute miracle she stayed friends with me afterwards, because some of these almost killed us both. And as the only person on the team with a proper theatre background, the burden for competent production fell heavily on her shoulders. Honestly, I sometimes still can’t believe she talks to me even now, 14 years later, after what I put her through.
Note to my readers: Never try to stage a big production at Glastonbury. It will fucking kill you.
Without question many of these events – such as a nutty “particle zoo” performance involving twelve people and a script completed on the day – would have been utter disasters without her expertise and guidance. She even sewed some of the costumes herself from scratch. As I said, she can do anything.
However, one of her best and most astonishing qualities: the capacity to forgive.
I’ve seen her forgive a lot of crap from a lot of people… none more so than me. I don’t think she’ll ever know how grateful I am that she’s still friends with me now after the gruelling misery of those events, which she didn’t even get paid properly for, and didn’t even do much for her career but drain the life out of her. And yet she still talks to me. Remarkable.
In case you didn’t get the message: I absolutely adore Flavia Fraser-Cannon.
… so when I got the news that she had anal cancer, I burst into tears. All I could do was make a joke. “Well, that’s a pretty death metal diagnosis. Rock and roll?”
Fortunately, I burst into tears again when she told me she had the all-clear this summer. Brilliant. Sometimes modern medicine isn’t so bad.
I honestly can’t remember the last time I went to a party that was just so joyful from top to bottom (pun intended, but I shouldn’t have to point that out). How could we not all just explode with joy that she got through this? And – seriously – how much does she rock this outfit?
Pointing to her tiny crown, I said “Dang you’re rocking the Paper Bag Princess look!”
But of course she had no idea what I was talking about, as the works of Canadian children’s author (and world class coke head) Robert Munsch never made it over to the UK.
So I’ve sent her a copy of the book as a Bum Day gift.
Going over an online pdf, I realised that I had totally forgotten that one of the last sentences in the book is:
“You are a bum.”
Apt.
Flay, I hope you enjoy. And I encourage you to listen to Munsch reading the book himself. He was a rockstar in Canada, performing his books aloud to thousands of kids in huge venues – a rare feat for a children’s author (I doubt Beatrix Potter would have ever conceived of being so badass).
Indulge me – this interview with my grandfather on Canadian radio from 1980 is adorable. I think I only realised that my father was a big deal in the music industry when he got me front row seats to see Robert Munsch. I also find it hilarious that I didn’t realise until my mid 30s that he was loaded on Columbian marching powder the entiretime.
A tale about a kickass girl who tries to save a floppy, useless, spoiled prince from the clutches of a dragon and succeeds by outsmarting the lizard, The Paper Bag Princess is a feminist classic for little Canadian girls. I think Flavia will jive with every word.
In the meantime, I hope she’s still basking in the joy of being emancipated from cancer… and knowing how much all of us adore her.
Carpe diem and carpe nocte Flavia. You’ve got another half century in front of you to kick the world’s ass.
I was lucky enough to visit the grave of Orwell – nee Eric Blair – on September 5th, a week before the reprehensible “Unite The Kingdom” march in London.
Imagine what he would have thought about 110,000 racist idiots descending on the multicultural capital to complain about immigrants – and not the banks, hedge funds, non doms, tories or tax evading corporations for society’s woes.
One of the most nauseating points of the day: the speeches. Especially this one.
From the moment he opened his mouth that racist, overrated, overpaid, pasty, bloated, ketamine-addicted piece of crap (Elon Musk, in case you haven’t clicked the link) said nothing but offensive and inaccurate nonsense.
From claiming that “children are being gang raped” by migrants, to suggesting that the left “wants to import people to vote for them”, to the charming threat that “whether you choose violence or not, violence is coming to you”, his little rant was just a check list of right wing hyperbole. I am sure ChatGPT wrote it for him (probably because he was too ketamised to write anything himself). I particularly love that he can’t see how funny it is for a white South African to bitch about “massive uncontrolled migration”.
I expected him to say all that crap. But I didn’t expect him to start off by pointing out the text on his statement t-shirt: “What Would Orwell Think?”
How DARE he invoke the name of Orwell, a brilliant writer who despised fascists, dictators, unprincipled capitalists, heartless colonialists, and garden variety idiots. Elon obviously being all five.
What would Orwell think?
I don’t want to put words in the man’s mouth, but I think he’d say:
“Shut up Musk. And get my name off your chest. In the 1930s it felt like the end of the world with the Great Depression, the rise of the Third Reich and more. I couldn’t imagine any time in history being more terrifying. But a century later, watching Trump, Farage, Meloni, Putin and other fascists rise unchecked… While late stage capitalism entices people to just obsess over new iPhones while ignoring how climate change and resource consumption daily brings the planet closer to famine and untold misery… And techtwats like you are given astronomic wealth while destroying people’s livelihoods… You know what? I’m happy spinning in my grave – this is preferable to being alive and having to deal with your ridiculous ass. Who knew the 1930s would turn out to be a piece of cake compared to the 2030s.”
Again, I don’t want to put words in his mouth. But I would like to think he’d say something like this.
“Hey Zoe, we’d like to invite you to come and speak at the Boom festival in Portugal in July!”
“Sounds fun… isn’t that an enormous and insane eight day psy trance festival? I’ve heard people rave about it, but I gotta be honest – I don’t dig psy trance…”
Psy trance, for those who are unfamiliar, is a fairly monotonous form of dance music that was just impossible to avoid 20 years ago. For many years, it dominated every cool or illegal party… The fans are lovely, but it’s so not my thing…
The promoters persevered, promising I’d get professional and top treatment – transport from Lisbon and back, boutique camping, food and drink vouchers galore, and they stressed it’s not ONLY psy trance, they have other kinds of music too.
I accepted, figuring I could handle two nights at an intense, hot, sleepless festival – then head off to Lisbon for a few days alone in the peaceful city.
And… I’m so, so glad I did.
I cannot sing the praises of Boom enough: the production team was impeccably professional. I had zero headaches, they run a tight ship. And I know what I’m talking about, having worked at music festivals in some way shape or form since 2008 (and having been brought to them since I was in diapers at my dad’s events). I have seen more crummy production teams than you’ve had hot dinners – and Boom was exquisitely professional. When I turned up for my own gig, I couldn’t have felt in better hands. 20/10.
Plus I was impressed that the producers wanted me to give the darkest of the talks that I proposed – a survey of sinister military experiments with psychedelics… not easy listening for a high or chilled out crowd. Brave of them to program this. 25/10.
But best of all: the quality of production at the big stages was just off the charts. The levels were just perfect – you could feel the bass and the music at the right volume at any location in the crowd (as opposed to just the few “sweet spots”). Anywhere you stood, you could enjoy the music perfectly – but still talk to your friends without shouting. 30/10.
And I don’t know if I’ve ever seen such well done 3d projections. 40/10.
Great food, cheap beer, sweet location, and – most importantly… SUCH a lovely crowd. So kind, so gentle, so chill. I felt I could have left my laptop or my phone anywhere and they wouldn’t have been stolen or stepped on. Everyone was generous and humane and kind. 50/10.
It wasn’t *PERFECT* – no festival can be, it’s too hectic and too demanding an environment to ever be flawless.
I would have been grateful if the main stages were quiet for more than two hours a day, for a start. They only shut off the music from 6pm to 8pm for a siesta… that’s it. Not easy to cope with when you crawl into your tent at 6am to get some kip, but still have to endure rattling from all the bass for another twelve hours…
Also… the lake. I was thrilled to learn the festival has a lake you can swim in. I do *not* like deserts, I think they are horrid lifeless barren environments, which is one of the main reasons I’m not a huge fan of Burning Man. “This is a place where things go to die – why are we here”, I thought the first time I saw the playa. But a lake next to a dance festival? Sign me up! Alas, I was warned not to swim in the lake after the second day of the festival, as people frequently get violently ill from the water after it’s been polluted with hippy filth and glitter. I should have heeded the warnings… But surely you can see the temptation, it looked so lovely and it was *so* hot…
(It was worth it.)
However, those two things aside… This is an incredible festival, and I’ll definitely return. I’ll just bring a paddling pool to fill up with tap water instead next time…
To some, it’s just “noise art”… but to me, this is *ART*.
Check the links below for more, including an incredible installation at Kew Gardens – where you know they don’t mess around with amateurs – and proper video links on my Instagram account.
I’ve never been moved in the slightest by the abstract paintings of Rothko, Pollock, or Mondrian. Sorry, all-my-friends-who-went-to-art-school… I just feel nothing. But I’ve always gotten a kick out of experimental music.
Especially when it is made by Augustine Leudar a friend I love dearly and – maybe more importantly – respect very much. Because I know he is a bona fide intellectual with a PhD in a hardass science subject – spatial sound – coupled with epic experiments measuring the electrical signals in plants. He was doing this kind of work many years before the current breed of kids started attaching electrodes to leaves and stems to read the inner lives of plants.
Most of those performances, I’m told, just pick up static electricity and broadcast white noise as a result… but his work is the real deal.
Perhaps I’m most impressed that he could manage an intricate performance of his own while promoting and hosting an entire evening of experimental music with 28 artists! Jeez, most promoters just do the prep and sit back to enjoy the show… respect.
Honestly, there are never going to be enough words to describe how much I respect and care about the work of Vahakn Matossian, a polymath musical force of nature.
There is not enough space in one social media post to sum up my respect.
… so instead, I’ll just post about how hilarious it was to see all my friends marvel at Harky’s ability to “destroy the dance floor” with filthy, dirty, deliciously reprehensible beats at the The Undergrowth Soundsystem mini squat rave at The Post Bar…
“Wait what? I thought he did amazing ambient soundscapes like How To Be A Whale?”
(If you haven’t listened to How To Be A Whale, please do…)
My friends, adorably and naively, continued:
“Harky guy also does filthy dark dance music?”
Of *course* he does. No true artist is a one hit wonder: they’re always reinventing. Any other way would be boring.
You know how many languages contain one word to express a very complex idea – and there is no English equivalent?
Such as “schaudenfreude”, German for enjoying someone else’s misery. I however would argue that in English, we term that “the motivation behind capitalism”.
Or “тоска”, Russian for “a deep, melancholic longing or a state of spiritual anguish”. Which I would argue that in English, we describe as “the inevitable and deliberate results of capitalism”.
But I digress.
I’d love to have one word for this:
“The feeling of seeing one of your oldest friends, surrogate brothers, and favourite people in the world come to a party dressed in an outfit that perfectly matches one worn by one of your newest friends, surrogate brothers, and favourite people in the world”.
I’ve only known Afaan Khan for a year, but instantly adored the fuck out of him – especially after attending his @chill.in.chill.out events at the @londonnightcafe.
So, understandably, the only thing that gave me more pleasure than seeing both turn up in matching primal caveman outfits was seeing them become fast friends the moment I introduced them.
Note: When going through all the photos on my phone, weirdly I was able to take Afaan’s image and move it around the screen.
What fucking web developer manchild, overpaid techbro or irredeemable twat came up with this tool?
Why does humanity need this… I hate AI and I hate modern tech… WHY WHY WHY.
Anyways. When I figured out how to use this stupid thing, I decided to make Afaan and Vahakn make out (seen in the last image). Because – why not. We should all be 14 year olds at heart.
Sidenote: I know you should always hyperlink things, but people who insist on such things have no understanding of the struggles of people over fifty years old who use a PC and don’t use a hyperconnected smart phone.
Zoetic 