Events in the North West this year Watch this space for the relaunch of Geek Chic - www.clubgeekchic.co.uk. The lady responsible, another leading figure in the burgeoning Liverpool 08 Capital of Counterculture, also runs: Proscenium Event Design Gemma Aldcroft - Creative Director
Proscenium Ltd.
For all the latest on what's on in Liverpool from the Daily Post
Forthcoming Exhibition! Earth, Wind and Fire Thursday 13th March to Monday 31st March 2008 
Lis Edgar is an old bohemian chum of The Flâneur; she wore the brightest-polished Doctor Martens in the legendary Casablanca Club! Contact her on lisedgar@blueyonder.co.uk The Gallery is to be found above the celebrated Paul McCue's Bluecoat Books at 32, Hanover Street L1 4LN (only 200 yards from the Bluecoat Chambers) 'Moto Photo' Exhibition and Knees-Up
Your correspondent was pleasantly surprised to be invited to a private view at the Static Gallery on Roscoe Lane of 'Moto Photo', an exhibition of photographs evoking the spirit of motorcycling sponsored by the internationally-noted Davida Engineering of Birkenhead, manufacturers of classic helmets, goggles and other wares to the more style-conscious motorcyclist across the world. There was a party in full swing upon our arrival and there were a hundred or so images on the walls. Mr. Fid himself explained (between bands) that the frameless mountings were used so the exhibition could be transported anywhere on the back of a motorcycle. You know that with this lot that this will literally happen. Previous Davida events have included public lectures with lantern-slides by chaps who have travelled to India by goat and returned home on a Royal Enfield motorcycle purchased there, or crossed some remote obstacle on a motorcycle perilously dangling beneath a hot-air balloon. As is usual with Davida parties, many of the guests had travelled from overseas, and at this one there were strong contingents from Iceland, Finland, Ireland as well as a place called London. Your correspondent became immoderately tiddly. Davida is most famous for its 'classic' styles of motorcycle helmets that appear to be from a more civilised age but are built to modern safety standards. Similarly Davida goggles are based upon Second World War RAF fighter pilot's goggles.
Musical Food for the Soul Tayo Aluko and Friends Ltd.
0151 707 8187
Registered Charity No. 1118172
PAINT The Kitchen Gallery
Bluecoat re-opens Saturday 15th March 2008
That much-missed magnet for idlers, the Grade 1-listed Bluecoat Chambers is set to re-open on Saturday 15th March 2008, it having been closed for refurbishment since 2004. Indeed it is the only cultural building to open in 2008, the year of Liverpool European Capital of Culture! Its garden was a leafy oasis of calm in the hubbub of the city centre and its eccentric passages and winding stairs that led to book fairs, art exhibitions, a licensed bistro and the Bluecoat Books and art materials shop were irresistible to the Saturday dawdler trying to avoid the crowds of shoppers. It was also home to the late, lamented Merseyside Film Institute Society, a cinema that showed non-Hollywood films at sensible times when people were able to go and see them (please note, FACT and Picturehouse!). Alas there have been changes in the three-and-a-half years that the Bluecoat Chambers has been closed. The much-loved Concert Room, a performance venue for the most "way-out" jazz as well as the home of the Ruritanian Balls, is no more. It has become a 'bar-restaurant' called 'Upstairs at the Bluecoat'. The pleasingly-weathered red brick of the artists' studios off the garden (including the notorious Studio 47) has gone. Of course there are new facilities to replace and excel the old, but the charm of the place and that of the resident retailers (institutions such as Bluecoat Books and Editions in he past) cannot be dropped into place by a crane, cemented in by a bricklayer or installed ab initio by some stubble-faced 'fanky dezoyner'. It will be built up like a patina deposited by the people who will use the new Bluecoat Chambers. Only time will tell… This Queen Anne building was originally completed in 1717, making it the oldest building in use in the city centre. We must be grateful that the City Council haven't pulled it down. Yet. De Vouvray writes: And by God have they made a mess of it! I can picture the sharp suited 'creatives' spinning a snappy power-point-presentation-and-laminated-report line to gullible managers (is there any other kind?), then proceeding to destroy the place. Yes the old Bluecoat was a tatty mess and badly in need of renovation, but is there not a distinction to be made between renovating a place and ripping the heart, guts and soul out of it? The usual mistake has been made: no consideration whatsoever has been given to what people actually used the Bluecoat for. In the past, it offered gallery space, certainly, but its real popularity lay in a busy and very reasonable café/bar/restaurant, the bookshop, and the little art and card shops off the courtyard. And at the back, artists' studios and a ramshackle garden for relaxing in. It was a natural, and almost inevitable stop for flâneur and shopper alike, a meeting place for all and sundry, genuinely popular, open and inviting. Now? The bookshop booted out into Hanover St, the other little shops gone, a downstairs café with insufficient seating to ever be lively; an upstairs bar with sofas that it takes a mere half dozen people to fully occupy, and a formal restaurant with a rigidly timetabled menu. Worse, grim grey concrete walls, giving the interior all the appeal of a multi-story car-park, and everywhere locked doors. It is hard to imagine a more uninviting place. Charming young chap on the information desk, evidently a little rattled by the relentlessly negative remarks in the visitors' book, told us the 'tenants' have not yet moved in to the offices and 'studios' in the locked corridors, and when they are in, the place will liven up. We hope so. We'll pop back in summer to see if it has improved at all. But we fear the worst. What kind of 'artist' will be able to afford the rent space in the new, improved (and no doubt very expensive) Bluecoat? We suspect the future will be a lot of empty 'studios', and a few businesses thriving in private offices, the doors remaining firmly locked to the public. Maybe that is the intention: keep the bohos and hoi polloi out and attract a 'better' (i.e. richer) class of person? But are there really enough yuppies, financiers and merchant bankers in Liverpool to fill all the developments being designed around the city for them? Liverpool Architecture
Imagine or even plan one's Liverpolitan flânerie, or perhaps select a place to start an open-ended dérive, even from a great distance, by taking an "on-line architecture tour". The flâneur cannot saunter without beauty to nourish his soul!
Lancashire Hotpots Don't miss The Lancashire Hotpots See their website at www.myspace.com/thelancashirehotpots. Some may wonder what decadent absinthe-quaffing flâneurs like ourselves are up to hobnobbing with beer-swilling horny-handed sons of toil such as these (for heaven's sake, these fellows work, with their hands!). Of course, the answer lies in the naturally left-ward leaning proclivities of all true aristo-bohemians, who readily pop a Veuve Cliquot to the health of the labouring proletariat, and these Hotpots are jolly good eggs to boot. Moreover, we have a thoroughly satisfactory reciprocal relationship with them: 'We'll eat the lobster thermidor and raspberry coulis,
The Amorous Cat Bookshop Spiffing news for book lovers! The tragic decline in the number of second hand book shops in Liverpool is at last checked! We recently received the following ethereal mail: "Sir,
The Amorous Cat Bookshop
Welcome news indeed. Hie thee hither, Flâneurs everywhere! Liverpool Confidential Pub used by loafing Flâneurs voted Britain's Best Pub by B.B.C. Listeners
It has just been announced that after weeks, nay months, of polling, listeners to the B.B.C. Wireless Service yclept Radio Five have voted Liverpool's The Fly in the Loaf to be Britain's Best Pub. This hostelry has for some time been the subject of the early-to-mid-evening homing instinct of Liverpolitan flâneurs, since avaricious property developers caused the closure of The Flying Picket across the road some years ago. We congratulate the Manager, Mr. Dominic Hornsby and we fully intend to drink his health at the first opportunity! See the full story here:- Art in Liverpool Scouse House Goldfish
JAZZ CLUB EXPANDING Lark Lane Jazz Club invites all to Thursday evening sessions at newly opened bar, Vinyl. Following 3 years and four months of Monday evening sessions at Metro in Victoria Street, Liverpool Jazz Club is branching out once again. The club established Woolton Village Jazz Club (Village Inn, Quarry Street) in August. Host and house pianist David Fishel is clearly delighted with the event. "We didn't expect such a wonderful response, so quickly. Jazz music traditionally takes time to rootbut the most enthusiastic people, mostly locals, turned up from day one. We now enjoy an action-packed, well-attended session every Tuesday evening". And now it's Lark Lane's turn. Vinyl, a newly-opened bar at the Sefton Park end of Lark Lane in Aigburth, will host the club every Thursday evening, from 8 to midnight. Fishel is convinced the evenings will be successful. "Lark Lane has always been an artistic, Bohemian-type area. We hope to meet and perform with instrumentalists and vocalists every session and we offer a house band, a PA system, keyboard and drums. Asked what makes a successful jazz/jam session, Fishel says, "Most importantly, everyone involved, including the public, must be made to feel part of the event. The evening should be hosted, the house band should be good musicians and guest artists should be greeted and signed in. We are always happy to promote and encourage emerging talent". Liverpool Jazz Club artists are also currently performing each Friday lunchtime at BBC Radio Merseyside's new building in Hanover Street. The concerts are in aid of the radio station's Christmas Toy Appeal. Are there plans for further jazz expansion? "We would very much like to play a regular evening somewhere in the Wirral", says Fishel. "There is lots of great jazz already there, but it is almost all Traditional or Dixieland, there don't seem to be any venues offering our version of hard swing and jam sessions!" See www.jazzscene.no for further details Crosby Beach, Antony Gormley's 'Another Place' installation
Disturbing Rumours in the Capital of Culture?
www.bbc.co.uk/liverpool/content/articles/2006/07/04/capcult_archer_resign_feature.shtml
More Outrages committed by the Liverpool so-called Culture Company! Yet another local cultural institution has its regular funding from the Council cut off by the so-called Liverpool Culture Company!
The internationally-famed Shanty festival has also been given the bum’s rush because it isn’t mainstream pop music (though it is very popular in more civilised countries) even though at Liverpool, a major port, it is a highly relevant part of local maritime history and it attracts participants and audiences from across Europe where CD recordings of Liverpool shanty groups sell well!
Professor Chucklebutty's official guide to Liverpool Capital of Custard, 2008
Liverpool -European capital of Culture 2008
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