Culture Diary w/c 17-06-13

Monday – Tony Bennett on ‘Culture’ 6.30pm @ Central Library FREE (booking essential)

The third in the series of Keywords lectures inspired by the Raymond Williams book, Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society (1976), and ahead of next year’s exhibition at Tate Liverpool, the internationally renowned sociologist Tony Bennett gets to grips with culture. It’s a word we probably all assume we understand well enough, but in addressing the ‘relationships between the aesthetic and the anthropological definitions of culture that Williams provides’, we anticipate new and greater insight here. More on Keywords.

Tuesday – Pompeii Live From The British Museum 7pm @ FACT

Introduced live by British Museum director Neil MacGregor, this chance to see a private view of exhibition Life and death in Pompeii and Herculaneum from the comfort of the cinema is pretty unique. Sure, it’s not the same as actually visiting the museum and seeing it for yourself, but with exhibition curator Paul Roberts featuring (bringing to life various artefacts preserved under ash for more than 1600 years), it’s as close as you can get to the real thing.

Daniel Bachman 8pm @ Drop the Dumbells £Donation

22 year old Virginian Daniel Bachman describes his sound as psychedelic appalachia. In lieu of any real sense of what that might mean (other than the Appalachian mountain range taking in Bachman’s home town), we’ll stick to what we know; this is lovingly layered, finger-picked acoustic guitar, low on vocals and high on pastoral vistas – whatever Bachman purports to be, we’re fans. With support from locals Trouble With Books and Fave Muslim.

Wednesday – Liz Green 8pm @ the Caledonia 

It’s two years since Liz Green’s debut album, O, Devotion!, received the kind of reaction singer-songwriters can ordinarily only dream of; her warm, blues-informed folk described variously as “Eccentric and rather magical” (the Guardian) and “Haunting and beautiful” (Sunday Times), we can think of no better place to be this Wednesday than the Caledonia.

Thursday – All American Prom 9pm @ the Kazimier £7 POSTPONED

Prom band, ’90s supergroup and DJs, and the crowning of a prom King and Queen. This is the All American Prom at the Kazimier where you to can live out the hell of American teen movies! With the promise of a night’s entertainment, your very own prom photo and all proceeds going to charity Plan UK, what’s not to like? Get your white/baby blue ruffled tux dusted off!

Friday – RIBA Love Architecture Festival 

This 10-day festival from the Royal Institute of British Architects represents myriad opportunities to get out into the city and know it better. With tours, access to architects and special screenings of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis and Terence Davies’ Of Time and The City, there seems something here for everyone, architect or not.

PICK OF THE WEEK: Saturday – Africa Oyé @ Sefton Park 12.30-9.30pm FREE

In existence for more than a decade, Africa Oyé remains the UK’s largest free festival of African culture, bringing together food, drink, arts, crafts, fashion – and of course music, for two days of celebration. With acts drawn from Zimbabwe, DR Congo and Nigeria as well as the UK, 2013′s incarnation promises to offer the usual mix of quality and eclecticism.

Kazimier Krunk Fiesta 3pm @ the Kazimier and Kazimier Garden £10

Taking in 12 hours, three stages and 25 acts, la Tomatina is the latest Kazimier Krunk Fiesta. Featuring, amongst others, are Renegade Brass Band, Bobby Conn and in-house band Dogshow, but this being the Kazimier, we also know to expect the unexpected; all we’ll say is TOMALOCO – The Tomatina gameshow.

An HD Odyssey 7.30pm @ the Liverpool Philharmonic £15

Featuring a pair of films from Duncan Copp in The Earth and The Planets, and NASA’s solar system exploration footage, An HD Odyssey combines space and music to produce “an audio-visual bombardment of the senses”. With scores (played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra) including The Planets by Holst, and Strauss’ epic tone poem Also sprach Zarathustra (the opening to 2001: A Space Odyssey), we can already feel the excitement building almost a week ahead of lift-off.

Sunday – Bonnie and Clyde 6pm @ FACT

Such was the studio’s reticence at the subject matter and graphic content of Bonnie and Clyde that it took its producer and star Warren Beatty to perform a major feat of arm-twisting just to gain the necessary financing. The rest, as they say, is history: it went on to be Warner Bros’. second highest grossing movie breaking numerous cinematic taboos of the time along the way. The term ‘iconic’ is regularly overused, but in the case of Bonnie and Clyde, it is nothing if not apt.

Posted on 17/06/2013 by thedoublenegative