I wrote about Richard Dawson’s Simple Things Festival set for @fateamagazine.bsky.social - one of my favourites in a day full of favourites. www.fatea-records.co.uk/magazine/liv...

Here’s my inaugural review for @fateamagazine.bsky.social of the incomparable Ushti Baba’s album launch the other week. It was a wild and wonderful night! www.fatea-records.co.uk/magazine/liv...

Do you compose or publish music in the UK? 'Call for composers and publishers to deposit digital scores' with the British Library and other legal deposit libraries? www.bl.uk/stories/blog... Please share with any musicians you know!

“A group of shushing librarians is called a cliché.” And yet it persists.

“Playgrounds, like libraries or other public services, shouldn’t depend on unpaid labour – they should be properly funded and run by local government.” Well said @robbryher.bsky.social www.bristol247.com/news-and-fea...

My review of the incredible @stickinthewheel.bsky.social gig at Strange Brew last Monday. They were so good, I’m ruined for all other bands now! www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

If you’re looking for a cosy evening of folk as the nights draw in, you could do a lot worse than The Greenbank Folk Club. Here’s my write up for @bristol247.bsky.social of Malin Lewis upstairs at the Greenbank last week. www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

Yep, agree with this. What the left needs is unity, not further fragmentation and division. Why create a new party when there’s so little to differentiate their policies from the Greens’? C’mon let’s work together!

I was lucky enough to review @deerhoof.bsky.social for @bristol247.bsky.social at the wonderful Strange Brew in Bristol. Fantastic support from locals foot foot and a memorable night all round. www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

”Either we all live in a decent world, or nobody does.” George Orwell, English novelist, journalist, critic, born #OTD 1903; author of Animal Farm (1945), Nineteen Eighty-Four (1949). BBC Archive | UCL Special Collections @uclspeccoll.bsky.social

Thanks to @lglpalmer.bsky.social for this great review of the One Leg One Eye gig in the Cube Bristol last week! www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

Another hot and brilliant night at the Cube last Wednesday for One Leg One Eye. Here’s my review for @bristol247.bsky.social www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

On a ridiculously hot evening @downendfolkroots.bsky.social, @caradillonsings.bsky.social was wonderfully cool. My @bristol247.bsky.social review is just here... www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

Eric Chenaux and RÓIS at Cube Microplex on Friday was incredible. Reminded me just how good live music can be. Here’s my write up for @bristol247.bsky.social www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

The children of Gaza are starving to death | First Dog on the Moon

Douglas Adams

As the UK and EU carve up fishing rights, I don't give a damn which party gets to trash our marine ecosystems by overexploiting fish populations, ripping up the seafloor and killing vast numbers of "non-target" animals. I just want this orgy of destruction to stop.

Well done to the co-op

This is so disingenuous. Instead of “fighting” @bristolgreenparty.bsky.social on proposed cuts, perhaps Damien Egan could use his influence as an MP in the governing party to campaign for proper funding for local councils, so they wouldn’t have to implement cuts?

Beautiful words from @michaelrosenyes.bsky.social www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

🚨 Calling all UK-based creatives! 🚨 The Eccles Institute for the Americas and Oceania is launching two new fellowships for artists working in zines or photography. Dive into our rich Americas collections and fuel your next project. Applications close Monday 2 June: bit.ly/BLEcclesCrea...

15 years on, 230,000 badgers dead, and no meaningful reduction in bTB in cattle. Lets end the cull now, not years down the line. Sign the petition govpetition.uk/700317

A bit like that time people using libraries stopped being called “readers” and started being called “customers”.

👀

Great review of Bristol Folk Festival here ⬇️Check out Gavin's new Substack.

“It shouldn’t feel so radical, and yet it does.” Here’s my latest for @bristol247.bsky.social on daytime gigs and Sailing Stones album launch at St George’s, Bristol. www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

The claim that academics live lives free from the practicalities of ordinary life has been false for many decades. Even if it were true, the Education Secretary’s policy here is to force the universities least like ivory towers to close.

Labour’s HE policy is stupid, based on false culture-wars talking points, deeply harmful to the country, and utterly incoherent.

Heartened to see that close to 900 fellow academics and educators have already signed our letter in support of trans rights, trans wellbeing & trans inclusion, and against essentialist, anti-scientific, racialised & regressive views of womanhood. Please do read, share & sign! tinyurl.com/mud7va29

bring this back you cowards

@hannahscottuk.bsky.social and @corujajones.bsky.social on Friday at @downendfolkroots.bsky.social - yet another great Downend gig. @bristol247.bsky.social www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

It's really saddening to have to post this about my own institution, but the University of Bristol is planning to embark on a cost-cutting exercise that threatens the viability of scholarship in the arts, humanities and social sciences: www.bristol247.com/opinion/your...

Libraries will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no libraries. Anne Herbert

I am begging my fellow librarians to just stop. Stop it. ChatGPT isn't our friend, it is making you worse at your job, and patrons are going to lose faith in us if this doesn't stop.

"CANCER: Water is your element, Cancer. This is the week to embrace it by picturing holding a patron’s head under a faucet after he asks you to find a book based on his description, "It has words, pictures, and a ‘V’ in the title.”

The Guardian coverage of the first all-female Jeff Bezos vanity space flight for the super-rich is hilariously snarky

Posting this extract from a lecture by John Maynard Keynes, speaking on the BBC in the middle of the Second World War, to every Labour cabinet minister

Booker shortlist day, y’all! #booksky

here’s a curse word free version of “look it up” as requested by countless teachers and librarians 🥰😘

My latest article for @bristol247.bsky.social www.bristol247.com/culture/musi...

Occasional reminder that there’s no, “it’s too late, its over” for anthropogenic climate change. Every molecule of CO2 that doesn’t go into the atmosphere makes a difference. Preventing 0.1 degree of warming makes a difference. Every bit of climate resilience we build together makes a difference.

PCS Union @pcsunion.bsky.social have been calling out low pay at the British Library for years, including strike action in 2023. If you care about working conditions in heritage institutions support their workers' trade unions where you can! www.pcs.org.uk/employers/br...

My Laurie Lee haul has arrived! I love his writing - so simple and earthy, steeped in folklore. The way he conjures up ancient rites and brings them to live another life with us, soothes and excites me in equal measure. #booksky

Everything you need to know, right here.

Join us for an analogy thread on academic publishing, #AcademicSky: Cows make milk. They milk themselves. Other cows check the milk (for free). Cows - get this - sometimes PAY THE FARMER to take the milk away. Then the farmer (you won't believe this, honestly) sells the milk *back to the cows.*

@sluginkpress.bsky.social hurray, you’re here!