The delightful Arch Stanton have just announced their first live show in over a year! Their sound could perhaps be described as Crosby, Stills & Nash-inspired alt-country, but it wouldn’t do them justice. I last saw them back in February 2009 at the Betsey Trotwood, sharing the bill with The Woe Betides (who, incidentally, are playing the 405 night at The Good Ship next week). Anyway, they’re one of the best acoustic acts I’ve seen on London’s live circuit: let their soothing sounds wash away your post-Valentine blues.
Arch Stanton at the Slaughtered Lamb, November 2008
Monday 15th of February at the Slaughtered Lamb. Buy tickets in advance, if you wish. Oh, and do have a listen:
Over the past few days I’ve been keeping an eye on the disaster relief efforts for Haiti, and the online response has been absolutely overwhelming.
Bloggers for Haiti have already raised enough to send four ShelterBoxes to Haiti – find them on Twitter with #bloggersforhaiti.
There is a new Ning network for sharing information about fundraising activities: Know Your Haiti Relief.
The British Red Cross, as part of the DEC (Disasters Emergency Committee) is raising money for the cause:
As is Oxfam:
In America, people have been raising money by text donations – over $20 million, in fact. The DEC has also used text donations, along with Twitter and YouTube. Their Facebook fans have soared from 800 t0 10,000.
Games company Bungie has offered to donate up to $77,000: all you need to do is play Halo online with the “heart icon” selected. For every thousand players that do this, Bungie will make a $100 donation. Generous, no?
Here in London, LBi has pledged to match all its employees’ donations. Which is nice.
All this goes to show that social media is increasingly helping us to share what we care about, and in sharing, encouraging others to be generous. People are already saying that the multichannel response to this natural disaster will become the model for future disaster relief efforts: I sincerely hope they’re right.
The LBi Christmas Tree is now fully operational, and open to all requests. It’s an unconventional tree, being entirely un-treelike in shape, colour and behaviour, but it’s a beautiful tree nonetheless.
Play us a tune!
“Mobile Mobile is a joyous seasonal story of re-cycled phones, collaboration and derring do.
Following an agency-wide mobile phone upgrade, an idea was hatched to re-cycle or “up-cycle” the phones in the form of an interactive sculpture. Essentially each phone is assigned a tone and is individually addressed by a computer to play the jingle or whatever the qwerty keyboard wants it to do.
Our COO not normally the most frivolous of elves, got in touch with his inner Jospeh and painstakingly sawed out the giant plywood polo from which all the re-cycled phones now hang. One of our colleagues in finance with piano skills played the midi file for the tune and the lads in IT took time out from turning it off and turning it on again to figure out the complexities of making all the kit work. And an army of agency staffers from designers and writers, to the facilities team and our managed services hosting heroes got together to hoist the beast up in our lobby. You might call it crowd sourcing, you might call it the hive mind of the agency. For us it’s just the way we work and a lovely way to celebrate the end of another great year. “
You can view the making-of documentary and find out how it all works at the Upcycle Ning network, or on Theo’s Gallimaufry. There is, of course, a hashtag to follow for #lbitree news: the more you use it, the more our little tree will sing. As I’m guest tweeter for LBiLondon this week, I will be certainly be doing my best to deafen the lovely people in reception with a cacophony of digital Christmas carols. Mwahahahahaaaa…
Update: We got onto the front page of Engadget! More specifically, I got onto the front page of Engadget! Bottom right hand corner, oh yes. Am I famous now?
A giant space invader has appeared on Ely’s Yard this week! Spotted this one while queuing for the Laughing Buddha Thai van. (Ginger spring onion chicken, rice, take away, every time – she knows my order.) I’ve never seen one so big!
On Thursday the 26th of November, LBi London set out to prove that it was the awesomest place in the universe. It succeeded. The guest list ran to thousands. The great and the good of the digital world queued at the door. A free bar provided liquid sustenance, with a little help from the tequila girls. FatWire sponsored jagerbombs went down a treat, too. We even got coverage in the NMA.
The perfect steampunk venue. A story laden with mystery, unfolding through song. A stage bursting with beautiful and talented people. Not one, but two intervals in which to consume exquisite home made chocolates and three kinds of absinthe. The best encore ever. And a magnificent after party. Five stars. Make that ten stars.
The Raconteuse
The Scientist
The Doctor
The Magician
The Fugitive
If you missed out on a ticket this time, keep watching the Clockwork Quartet site for new releases and upcoming live shows…
The excellent Clockwork Quartet will be performing three live shows at the Horse Hospital, from the 15th to the 17th of October. There will be steampunk, storytelling, absinthe and chocolate. Buy tickets from their site, or take a look at the Facebook event. I strongly encourage you to go.
So, the Foundry is to be pulled down and replaced with an “art’otel”. Such is progress. I’m particularly upset because the building proudly wears one of my favourite space invaders. Isn’t that a good enough reason for it to be listed?
The Foundry, in all its grubby glory
Apart from the absurdity of tearing down a thriving artists’ bar to replace it with a fake art hotel, it seems particularly galling that there is a derelict site two hundred metres down the road just begging to be redeveloped.
Very obviously derelict
This site has been derelict as long as I can remember, and is almost certainly structurally unsound (it must be, or it would have been turned into luxury apartments by now). Couldn’t some clever developer buy it up, perhaps preserve the facade, and turn it into an interesting destination? That, perhaps, would be a fitting “gateway to South Shoreditch” – not some incongruous new build eighteen storey high rise.
Rant over.
There is, of course, a Facebook group to join if you feel so inclined. It won’t help save the Foundry, but it might assuage your feelings of guilt and/or helplessness.
