AUDIO

📻 Listen up!

There are soooo many podcasters wanging on into the ether right now that it’s impossible to keep up.

Guestimates suggest there are over 2 million active shows today, and probably another 3 million mothballed in the groaning cloud archives.

As with all digital content now, a helpful, considered hand of curation is therefore essential, and we don’t just mean relying on the damn algorithm.

All of which is why this week we’ve picked some of our favorite locally-linked pods you might well want to give a try.

• 🦜Camden Fringe Pod has been counting down to August’s month-long borough-wide festival of comedy, physical theatre, improv and more since back in January, with weekly installments featuring interviews with 2023’s Fringe stars in the making.

• 🚢 Windrush Tales is Camden Council’s series of interviews with members of the Windrush era, descendants, community leaders, activists and experts, remembering and celebrating 75 years since the arrival of people from the Caribbean to help rebuild the UK after WWII - and the widespread impact they continue to have on our culture.

• 📻 Dua Lipa: At Your Service Praised for her thoughtful interview style, the former Parli school student, Barbie Movie star and recent West Hampstead basement pool extension planning battle winner has just announced the third series of her iconic-celebs-behind-the-mic BBC Sounds podcast.

• 🌬️ Camdeners is a long-running podcast that speaks with high profile locals who are busy working towards improving the quality of live around here. It’s produced by The Camden Clean Air Initiative, so there’s a lot of focus on combatting pollution and supporting good health via the air we all breathe.

• 📔 MagCulture comes from the Clerkenwell-based shop dedicated wholeheartedly to the joy of print magazines. Via interviews with leading lights of today’s resurgent print periodical scene, you get a real overview of the latest exciting trends in design, culture, publishing and art.

• 🎙️ The Rest is Politics is top of the podcast pops in the UK, but while you’re probably familiar with the twice-weekly doses of Rory Stewart disagreeing agreeably with Gospel Oak resident Alastair Campbell, you might not know that you can go to see them do it all live up on Hampstead Heath in September, as the audio duo are among the headliners at How The Light Gets In festival up at Kenwood. Not only that, but Camdenist readers get 20% off tickets: just use the code CAM23 here.

• 👔 Snowcast is another local political resident’s weekly heart-to-heart with some of life’s most interesting people. Former C4 news anchor Jon Snow has teamed up with the audiophile lot at King’s Cross’ Spiritland, and he’s such a familiar Camden face that we simply had to put together 10 quirky facts about Jon Snow - enjoy.

—🎙️—

In further local podcasting news, Transmission Roundhouse is the Chalk Farm venue’s occasional radio station for their youth student cohorts, and while it’s not put anything out since January, 15-18-year-olds might like to join the Radio Bootcamp next month.

Meanwhile, there will be podcast episodes recorded at the upcoming Roundhouse Comedy Festival in the shape of Jessica Fostekew talking to Joe Lycett about food in the Hoovering Podcast, and the Nobody Panic presenters probing comedian Lou Saunders in a special live recording, too.

Then the daddy of all IRL pod events returns to our doorstep 7-17th September, when The London Podcast Festival takes over Kings Place for its biggest edition yet.

POLL

FOOD & DRINK

Discover Holborn’s hidden global food high street

Tucked away between High Holborn and Theobalds Road lies one of Camden’s genuine foodie hotspots, but other than famished legal professionals or those on an active mission seeking out regional Chinese delicacies, you lot may not have ever ventured down there.

That’s about to change though, as we’ve put together a comprehensive guide to everywhere you can eat in Red Lion Street.

From sizzling bowls of Korean bibimbap, to fiery hotpots from Sichuan province, fragrant Uyghyr cuisine or deeply rich Malaysian curries, there’s a proper smorgasbord awaiting.

This hidden Bloomsbury dining enclave the final stop in our latest Secret Feasts series, supported by the Council’s Love Your Camden High Street Fund and local BID Central District Alliance, with the purpose of introducing you to new neighbourhood restaurants you might have previously overlooked.

• 🍺 Seven Dials is rapidly becoming London’s beer district, as Munich-style beer hall Bierschenke has just upped sicks from the City into the former site of Belgo, just ahead of the arrival of the huge £73m Guinness microbrewery incoming at the end of this year.

• 🍚 Nearby, at KERB’s converted banana warehouse food hall, Seven Dial Market, the latest permanent resident is InKerbator success story OshPaz, serving a popular Uzbek menu, including boxes of their artisanal rice-based ‘plov’.

• 😯 Archway’s beloved St Johns Tavern closed its doors on Monday, signing out with the cryptic message ‘times are challenging but we still need to eat!!’. They say a refurb and ‘exciting improvements’ will now take place, but can’t say exactly when they’ll re-open, other than hopefully in September.

THINGS TO DO

🌸 Encounter gorillas in Covent Garden

Pithecophopics* beware! London’s latest public art trail involves 15 life-sized gorilla sculptures dotted around the streets of Covent Garden.
(*aka people with a fear of 🦍)

They’ve been customised by a series of artists and arty type celebs, and you can download a map to find them before they’re eventually auctioned for the African conservation charity Tusk at the end of the summer.

Highlights range from graffiti artist Pure Evil’s ‘Forest Camo Gorilla’ to actress and producer Sally Wood’s on-trend pink and gem-crusted ‘Precious’ and British artist Jemma Powell’s lush ‘Gaia’, designed to juxtapose with it’s city setting.

You might have already spotted photographer-to-the-stars Rankin’s ‘Flowerilla’ as we did - taking shape through the windows of his Kentish Town gallery the other day - if not, we’ve helpfully twinned the two of them above.

🧊 Descend into the ice chambers

This is the only weekend in the year when the excellent King’s Cross-based London Canal Museum allows visitors down into the ice wells that are part of it’s building’s amazing history.

The wells were built by immigrant ice cream entrepreneur, Carol Gatti, in 1847 to store the precious ice required in making his exceedingly popular products.

Before the invention of refrigeration, ice came in by boat all the way from Norway and down the canals, which is why our area has a fair few of these subterranean structures.

There’s another opposite Camden Market’s famous Interchange building (er, now under a Wetherspoons) and a huge ‘lost’ chamber near Regent’s Park was rediscovered a few years ago, full of WWII bomb rubble.

Sat and Sun sees loads of icy celebrations at the museum including tours, ice cream-making and the Camden Town Community Choir.

🍦 And while we’re on the topic, Saturday is also the launch of a special fortnight of 99 x limited edition 99p ice creams each day, from the Ruby Violet truck in Granary Square.

They come with not just a flake, but some posh British seaside-inspired toppings, so at this price, competition for the daily quota could get a little heated.🔥

MUSIC

🎶 Unmissable live music & DJs this week

• 🔰 It’s been eight(!) years since his last LP, so Brazil’s drum & bass superstar DJ Marky has rightly been working long and hard with a stellar rollcall of collaborators on a brand new one. The Time is Right launches tonight at the Jazz Café with a 3-hour set from the maestro, plus a special guest or three.

• 🧑🏽‍🏫 Meanwhile, quite literally just around the corner, dub pioneer Mad Professor will be blasting out his heavy genre-defying sounds at Delancey Street’s happily reborn The Forge this evening, too.

• 🤠 Bob Wayne & The Outlaw Carnies bring their ‘pure country’ music to West Hampstead Arts Club on Thursday (27th), perfect if you’re looking for authentic forward-thinking country rock vibes.

Gig highlights in association with the fabulous Halibuts.com

MORE

• ➡️ Help pretty-up the towpath on Sunday, on a litter pick with Camden Friends of the Earth 

• ➡️ The amiable people at Camden Watch Company have branched out…. into tea. It’s a partnership with Brew Tea Co and evokes earthy, tasty stories of Camden’s industrial past, much like their timepieces.

• ➡️ Zabludowicz Collection has just opened its summer programme: Dust to Dust, where you can catch work by Wolfgang Tillmans, Milo Creese and plenty more artists, with workshops, live music and cutting edge fabulousness for free in Chalk Farm.

POLL RESULTS

📊 What exactly are you lot thinking?

We ask a question each week. Here’s what was recently revealed…

What do you feel about Camden Town by night?

You overwhelmingly love it, you cultured lot.

😍 It's a cultural hotspot that needs nurturing
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩  70%

🤐 It's a rowdy nightmare that I'd rather shut up
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 22%

🤷🏾 I'm not bothered about it either way
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 8%

That’s it for this week, thanks for reading.

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