In the UK alone
• More than 80,000 people living with HIV
• One in three people with HIV are undiagnosed
• One in every 360 pregnant women in the UK is HIV positive
Worldwide, 2 million people died from HIV-related causes last year. That’s more than the entire population of Leeds, Manchester and Birmingham put together. It’s more than the entire popluation of several African countries.
This weekend I went to see the Annie Leibovitz exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London. It was fantastic, and worthy of it’s own blog, which it will get in a bit. The icing on the cake was the bonus exhibition showing for this week only – a little room at the bottom of the gallery, showcasing the covers she took for Vanity Fair, about “the challenge, the promise, and the future of Africa”. They’re well worth a look…
The exhibition was hosted by (RED), who so far have helped purchase antiretroviral treatments for nearly 80,000 people in Rwansa, Swaziland, Ghana and Lesotho.
Okay, so it never really went away. But since the closure in 2001 of the Town & Country, many acts have bypassed Leeds as a viable gig location.
Tonight sees the opening of the Leeds Academy, opening in the old location of the Town & Country and Creation nightclub, originally the Coliseum building on Cookridge Street.
In its early years, it was used for circus and variety shows of the day, through to political meetings and religious gatherings. Changing hands between various theatre and property developers, the Coliseum converted to a cinema in 1938 and was renamed the Gaumont. It closed in March 1961 and re-opened as a Bingo Hall and Social club, through to use as a television studio in the 1980s until 1991.
From 1992 to 2000, the legendary Town and Country Club, played host to many high profile acts including Blur, INXS, and The Stones Roses.
2008 sees the opening night being headlined by Leeds’ Kaiser Chiefs (well it had to be really!) to be followed by some really great bands over the next few weeks and months – Spiritualized, The Last Shadow Puppets, Elbow, The Streets, Hot Chip, The Stranglers, even Mercury Rev! to name but a few – there’s something for everybody.
This is footage from the London College of Fashion catwalk show. The light show was designed by a collection of students and music was directed by James Pegg, also a student at the college. Brilliantly produced video by Moving Brands.
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 30th of July 2008 at 5:40pm
Fashion, art and music always go hand in hand. What the band wears,
how the CD cover looks and how they sound.
Each inspires the other and is all the better for it. I think the best music video to capture this is D.A.N.C.E by Justice.
So many intresting T-Shirt designs and a great track to boot.
Posted by Ben on Tuesday 24th of June 2008 at 3:30pm
Aah, those were the days; recording songs off the radio on a Sunday afternoon, making mixtapes for girlfriends, loading favorite computer games (yes, computer games on cassette), how times have changed.
There’s a great online celebration of the design of our humble cassette to be found at www.tapedeck.org where you can search through galleries of cassettes by different manufacturers, tape length and quality.
Call me a geek but I find this kind of nostalgia for ephemera quite captivating.
Posted by Richard on Tuesday 29th of April 2008 at 3:56pm
A number of months ago I posted about the samba band, Honeydrum that Sian and I are members of. Well we’ve got our second biggest gig ever tomorrow night at the West Indian Centre. If any would like more details go to Raise the Roof and find out more.
This event is a fundraiser for No Title magazine and it’s excellent to see an event in LS6 get so much publicity and acclaim. The organisers were interviewed by ITV!
Posted by Tasha on Thursday 7th of February 2008 at 12:33pm
Music journalist John Lewis, has done some research into the types of music people listen to in different areas of the UK, to see if there are any regional trends.
Turns out there are, and it all makes pretty interesting reading, but my favourite bit is the revelation that…
...heavy metal is “the closest to a national genre of music… It’s pretty popular everywhere”.
Apparently, “Bloke rock is popular in large parts of the north and Yorkshire. Folk sells well in Doncaster, Sheffield prefers heavy metal and Leeds focuses on goth music.” I’ve never heard of ‘bloke rock’, but rock on for the rest of it.
Fists in the air people – mosh on!! \m/ \m/
Posted by Siân on Wednesday 6th of February 2008 at 1:28pm
Having abandoned the idea of becoming Roller Skating Disco professionals (it’s 9pm-2am on school nights which is too late for us oldies), Melissa and I are tonight embarking on our new ‘crazy ways to get fit’ programme – we are going to a Boxercise class. Neither of us really know what this is but feel it’s safe to assume there will be boxing of some sort…
I’ve got to admit I’m a bit scared – I was talking to someone over the weekend who said that she’s heard that EVENMEN do boxercise! Legs, bums and tums this is not.
Wish us luck!
Posted by Louise on Thursday 10th of January 2008 at 1:41pm
Batch Totem – a Scandinavian outfit, have released an album on floppy disc. So the debate in my head about digital vs vinyl (yes, some of us still buy it and use it) just got even more complicated!
They’ve used a new type of compression that means it all fits on the floppy, and have sound designed it to use the compression process in their favour, rather than ruining the sound. Add to that the fact that ripping the sounds to mp3 actually changes the property of the sound, making piracy virtually impossible. It’s designed to sound best on a computer with a sub too.
as more and more people expect music to be free (don’t get me started) a new label has started up.
myuzyk is a new netlabel, dealing purely in internet based label type activities, and give the music away for free under a creative commons licence. creative commons allows the music to be shared amongst individuals for free, helping the music get out there, and hopefully make money off compilations, advert usage and so on.
Posted by Phil on Tuesday 30th of October 2007 at 1:31pm
This evening Louise and I will be attending Skate Fever at the Jongleurs in Leeds. Skate Fever is a retro style roller disco. Neither of us has skated for many many years so it should be interesting to say the least.
Check out our Blog tomorrow to find out how it all went and if we ended up at A&E…
Posted by Melissa on Wednesday 26th of September 2007 at 12:29pm
Planet Leeds was a lot of fun. Honeydrum marched through the streets of Leeds and could be heard from five streets away.
Look out for future gigs and events at www.honeydrum.co.uk.
I know this is obvious publicity, but there are two of us involved at ICM! We’re also booked to play at Melissa’s wedding, so watch out for more self-promotion, I mean news.
Posted by Tasha on Wednesday 12th of September 2007 at 5:24pm
This weekend on Sunday is the first ever Planet Leeds festival in the city centre. In an effort to revive the Leeds Carnival the organisers are bringing together artists from different cultures who live in Leeds. There will be a stage on Briggate and one behind the Corn Exchange.
Two members of ICM, myself and Sian, will be performing in Leeds based samba band, Honeydrum. We will be opening the festival with a parade on Briggate, which should be great fun.
It’s brilliant to have events like this in Leeds and ICM have been extremely supportive of Honeydrum, helping with design work for advertising and the like.
Posted by Tasha on Thursday 6th of September 2007 at 1:51pm
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