Southbank Sixties

Sadly, silly me forgot to put a memory card into my camera, so I didn't get any pictures out of my trip yesterday. However, I did get a ton of new knowledge about the sixties!

As I mentioned in my last post, the Southbank Centre put on a sixties week as part of their 'The Rest Is Noise' festival, and I was lucky enough to grab the last couple of tickets. The Sunday portion of the event included talks, live music and film screenings; I attended three of these and, boy were they different to what I expected.

 The first, called 'Noise Bites' was very educational, but entertaining nonetheless. There were several sessions, and we went to the first one, which focused on Coronation Street, Woodstock, LSD, and Bernsein's Mass (we skipped Bernstein to have a yummy lunch at Las Iguanas). The Woodstock and LSD talks focused on aspects that were pretty new to me - for example, how most LSD research was funded by the military in the hopes that the drug could help control enemy forces. The 15 minutes on Coronation Street were a bit dry for me, but then it's not really my kind of thing.

 

After Mexican chilli chicken skewer deliciousness, we arrived a few minutes into a discussion about The Beatles. Bill Harry, creator of Mersey Beat and old friend of The Beatles (who, in fact, helped introduce them to their future manager), journalist Leslie Woodhead, and radio icon Paul Gambaccini all voiced their opinions on The Beatles' sudden rise to fame, the dynamic of the group and its members, and Liverpool's 'vandalism' of many music venues played by the group and others like them.

 

It was pretty packed and stuffy in there, so we had a wander around Southbank to clear our heads. We searched through the book stalls, checked out the little cutesy shops in Gabriel's Wharf, looked at all the pretty design shops of the OXO tower, and went into Foyles book shop so that I could spend more money on books I can't afford! I found this baby:

A signed first edition of Patrick Ness' latest book - I adore his books and this was just so cool I had to buy it for myself. It is amazing so far, and you'll hear more once I've finished it, for sure!

 

Finally, while most of the crowds were queuing for the Roger McGough and Brian Patten poetry reading, we slipped into an intimate performance of Stockhausen's Stimmung. This was really unusual - not so much singing as a combination of vocal noises - and in German, English, and jibberish (or so it seemed). The sound was lovely though, and quite fun to listen to.

 

And, Bonus, we got to see all the wonderful costumes of the folks heading to and from comic con!

 

For those who can't stand this text-heavy type stuff, there will be lots more pictures and fun stuff later this week, so keep your eyes peeled!

Kisses xx