Just got to this one before the gates slammed shut - Ketty La Rocca: you you at the Estorick Collection. The first UK museum exhibition for La Rocca (1938 - 1976). She worked in Florence with Gruppo 70, producing visual art, visual poetry, collages body art, especially the human hand. #kettylarocca

5-1 thrashing by Man City in the League Cup Quarter Final to end the year on the expected low. We kept them out for less than 2 minutes & another goal 5 minutes later left me fearing double figures. Ueki scored a decent goal but more comedy defending either side of halftime crushed any faint hopes.

You’ll have to take my word on this, but that’s a woodpecker at Upper Holloway station #Woodpecker

Festive joy for West Ham fans celebrating perhaps their worst ever season. The men are 7 points from safety, and the woman have 5 points from 11 games and have sacked the manager. Both teams get to lose to Manchester City this weekend, with the Ironesses crashing out of the League Cup later today.

"Carol Singers", a Claughton Pellew wood engraving from December 19th 1930’s Radio Times. A masterpiece, I feel entirely safe in suggesting.

Pirates at National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, in the that London, is on until January 4. The history of piracy, real-life figures such as Blackbeard, Captain Kidd and Anne Bonny, and fictional representations from Treasure Island to Captain Pugwash #Pirates

North Greenwich station yesterday, with Stereophonics playing the O2 #allontheboard

Like The Fall, Nine Lesson is always different and always the same. And if it’s @robinince.bsky.social and your granny on bongos, it’s Nine Lessons. I’ve been almost every year since it began and last night was among the best. 3 more this year, with different guests but I’m sure all just as good.

Tomorrow night in London....

Remembering Geordie on his birthday. Here are Killing Joke with War Dance

This is Rotterdam, but it could be anywhere

Unbelievably, it's been 25 years since we lost Kirsty MacColl yet the beauty of her music and her memory still resonate. Here's a song I wrote for her to sing in the 1995 movie 'Mad Love'. www.youtube.com/watch?v=aWjl...

Modern Football Is Rubbish, Part Zillion. After announcing this game would be on the Saturday, and encouraging long suffering fans to buy tickets, West Ham say it’s on the Sunday as it’ll be “streamed on Discovery + and also made available for broadcast overseas”. As ever, the fans are mugged off.

Yes, it’s Johnny Moped, wearing his trademark Johnny Moped leather jacket. It’s a cliche to say that they don’t make them like XXX anymore, but they definitely don’t make them like Johnny Moped. Any chance you get to see him live, you won’t regret it #JohnnyMoped

So many tributes to the magnificent Martin Parr, who has just died, aged 73. Another brilliant British photographer died in September, Chris Steele-Perkins, also Magnum. Definitely worth checking out his work #ChrisSteelePerkins

Two images from Olivia Arthur: Summertime, part of Magnum Photos A World In Color exhibition in London recently, after touring across Europe. She captures the energy of British summertime in Margate on a warm July weekend with its sandy beach, tidal pool and all the trimmings of a British seaside.

Emotional day at London Stadium as the death of Billy Bonds was announced before the game. Over his record 799 matches for West Ham, his passion, commitment and honesty made him a hero to those on the terraces. Hard to imagine West Ham without him, but Billy Bonds will never be forgotten #BillyBonds

Last season’s Liverpool game at the London Stadium was as bad an atmosphere as any, home sections full of away fans, and tourists. The club are ramping up security and trying to purge half and half scarves. But we’re a long way from the 80s when as this list of outs from the fanzine The End shows

Chimers, who supported The Saints at the Electric Ballroom in Camden the other night, post-punk duo from Wollongong, Padraic Skehan and Binx. High energy, hope they return to headline soon #Chimers

Putting the lights, camera, action into Acton, cinema history expert Nigel Smith does a walking tour of a place that once boasted five cinemas. . Check out his Memory Palaces website which charts cinemas lost like tears in rain. Other tours include Camden, the West End, and Islington #MemoryPalaces

I wouldn’t necessarily say that The Saints are my favourite punk band but they’re definitely in the top one. Fabulous show at the Electric Ballroom tonight, been waiting such a long time for this and they absolutely delivered #TheSaints

The inimitable Wreckless Eric at the Lexington on Friday playing Whole Wide World, the song he’s proud of, but doesn’t want to define him. It certainly doesn’t, this was a launch day show for his new LP England Screaming, played in full with Amy Rigby, Graham Beck & Morris Windsor #WrecklessEric

Jem Southam The Red River Huxley-Parlour Swallow Street, Piccadilly, London The exhibition has now ended, but well worth investigating this wonderful project #JemSoutham

Tonight’s the last show of the @bccamplight.bsky.social A Sober Conversation tour, and I’m sure Limerick will be memorable as the 40th gig. Can’t wait to see what Brian does next. In the meantime here’s a bit of Two Legged Dog with Abigail Morris at the Roundhouse in That North London #BCCamplight

So sad to hear of the death of Mani aged 63, bassist in the best group of their time. The Stone Roses missed headlining Glastonbury 1995 as John Squire broke his collarbone. So on September 1 they played this setlist in a tent at Pilton Pop Party just a few hundred there on a magical evening. RIP

If you’re interested in cinema history the history in London search out @nigelsmithwalks who charts those lost like tears in rain, along with survivors. Memory Palaces website, walking tours such as Camden, where the Odeon faces the final curtain, also the West End, Islington, Acton #MemoryPalaces

Memorials at the site of pharmaceutical company Sanofi, in Yew Tree Avenue, Dagenham. As May & Baker, cocaine was being made there by 1934, then the antibiotic M&B 693 (sulphapyrine) which saved thousands of lives. The site closed in 2013 and is now the film and television site Eastbrook Studios.

The UK leg of the BC Camplight tour has now ended, and there’s four more shows in Ireland starting tomorrow in Dublin. Saw the @roundhouseldn show and Brian and his crack band are absolutely at the top of their game @bccamplight.bsky.social #BCCamplight

3-1 win for West Ham v Everton this afternoon, a first @barclayswsl win of the season, and doubling the number of goals scored in league games. Shame we conceded a late consolation but maybe this is a corner turned #WestHam

"Obscure Pet Shop Boys" will see PSB perform five live shows at London’s Electric Ballroom in April 2026 featuring a setlist of only non-single album tracks and B-sides. Pre-order the new PSB book “Volume” before Tuesday, 18th November 12pm GMT for priority ticket access. petshopboys.lnk.to/store

Big match at High Noon for West Ham United Women and the search for a first WSL win of the season, as if not now, when? Last weekend the 21s, 18s and men’s first team all won, and all scored three. The women were on course to complete the set before conceding in the seventh minute of added time.

The Courettes playing Keep Dancing at Islington Assembly Hall last night, during a high energy support slot for Hugh Cornwell #TheCourettes

The other part of the Lubaina Himid exhibition at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge earlier this autumn was How May I Help You, large portraits of shopkeepers and their customers, with short scripts showing the difference between what is said and what is thought #LubainaHimid

David Lance Callahan playing the Lexington in London a bit back. Once of The Wolfhounds, then Moonshake, he quit music in the early 2000s, becoming a renowned ornithologist and writer. He later reformed The Wolfhounds, has a thriving solo career and plays with Swell Maps C21 #DavidLanceCallahan

Lubaina Himid and Magda Stawarska: Another Chance Encounter, which was at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge this autumn, but has now ended. This is Slightly Bitter, a multimedia installation (2025) inspired by the correspondence between the artist Nina Hamnett and the writer and poet Sophie Brzeska

Spent an evening in Manchesterford browsing in Acorn Antiques and brushing past Miss Babs' jugs. Victoria Wood's gloriously daft homage to Crossroads & musicals hasn't played the West End since its original 2005 run, Manchester's Hope Mill Theatre revived it at Shaftesbury Theatre for one night only

This has ended now, but really enjoyed it at Kettle’s Yard in Cambridge - Lubaina Himid with Magda Stawarska: Another Chance Encounter #LubainaHimid

Mavis Staples - Sad and Beautiful World. Just out, magnificent. 12 songs spanning 70 years, written by Kevin Morby, Curtis Mayfield, Mark Linkous, Tom Waits, Frank Ocean, Leonard Cohen among others, cameos from Buddy Guy, Jeff Tweedy, Bonnie Raitt, but really it’s all about that voice for the ages.

BC Camplight AND Badly Drawn Boy at the Roundhouse last night. I expected it would be an outstanding show, and it really was. So heartening to see Brian Christinzio at this storied venue, when three years ago he was at Oslo in Hackney. As he said himself, he’s not an overnight sensation #BCCamplight

This is out today, a real treat for Halloween. They only formed late last year, in Nova Scotia, and clearly in a hurry, this debut album is fantastic. If there’s been a better guitar LP released this year I would genuinely love to know what it is.

Peter Watkins, Oscar-winning director of The War Game, dies aged 90

Must be the wettest Halloween in many years, with the mean streets of north London turning into rivers, bad news for the trick and treaters, somewhat better for those who are not keen #Halloween

Two more shows on Emma Pollock’s first tour in almost a decade, Aberdeen tonight and a Glasgow homecoming gig tomorrow which’ll be sensational. New album Begging The Night To Take Hold is wonderful, while here’s the classic Paper and Glue from @thelexingtonlondon.bsky.social October 19 #EmmaPollock

Last call for the Genesis Exhibition: Do Ho Suh: Walk The House at Tate Modern which ends today. I would imagine it’ll be pretty busy #DoHoSuh

Sunny but cold afternoon at Hornchurch Stadium as unbeaten Urchins go back to the top of National League South after a 2-1 win over midtable Hampton & Richmond Borough, with a raucous 758 crowd. The first Hornchurch goal was scored by Angelo Balanta, 35, once of QPR, the best player on the pitch.

1 of London’s 9 remaining windmills. “Upminster Windmill was built for James Nokes, a local farmer, in 1803. It is a Grade II* listed building and in terms of quality, completeness and significance it is widely considered to be amongst the very best remaining English smock mills.” #UpminsterWindmill

Kew Gardens Tree of the (Belated) Day 7: Black locust (Robinia pseudoacacia, the first North American tree introduced to Europe, in the early 17th century. Planted in 1762, a survivor from Kew's original 5 acre arboretum and one of 5 Old Lions which remain. It survived a lightning strike in 2010.

I can’t get to Swell Maps at the Lexington in that north London tonight so here’s a snippet of Jowe Head and the Eternal Trinity (Catherine Gerbrands and Ravi Low-Beer) with Luke Haines at the Resonance FM fundraiser at the same venue a few weeks back #JoweHead

It’s taken time to process just how bad the @westham defeat to Brentford was on Monday, but this window display at a nearby pub sums it up perfectly. See also two injured players being ignored for ages. Will it get even worse at Elland Road tonight? I think we all know the answer #WestHamNightmare