Gigs in London this weekend

With its 30th edition taking place this summer, the Southbank Centre’s Meltdown Festival has long since established itself as a key date in London’s cultural calendar. Each year, the Southbank invites one celebrated artist to curate the festival, with such luminaries as David Bowie, Yoko Ono, Grace Jones, David Byrne, Nick Cave, Anohni and Chaka Khan have previously taken on the exciting tast. This year it’s the turn of Mercury Prize-winning rapper, Top Boy actor and previous Time Out cover star Little Simz.  She’s promising a boundary-pushing line-up for the eleven-day festival, featuring plenty of local and grassroots organisations, sets from the likes of The Streets and Ghetts, and the one-of-a-kind performances that have characterised Meltdown over the years culminating in a headline gig with the curator herself. The Southbank Centre has also announced a series of Meltdown Lates – club nights that will take place in the the Queen Elizabeth Hall Foyer. It will see DJ sets from the likes od Little Simz, Sippin’ T, Talylah Elaine, DONCH, Jordss, NARX and PÉJÚ. Plus, there are a series of free talks and workshops taking place, with fashion designer Tolu Coker, actors Letitia Wright and Tosin Cole and artist Yinka Ilori all on the line-up to speak.  Line-up includes: Little Simz and Chineke! Orchestra, James Blake, BADBADNOTGOOD, Mahalia, The Streets, Ghetts, Sasha Keable, Lola Young, Nubya Garcia.  Find more great London festivals here.

Where would London’s music scene be without pirate radio? There would be no jungle, UK garage, or grime music, for one thing, and legendary stations like Kool or Rinse FM would never have existed. To celebrate the radical influence of pirate radio that still impacts London’s music scene today, the Barbican is putting on a month-long programme of broadcasts, talks, workshops, club nights and screenings that will explore the history and impact of community radio, and Black British music.  Highlights from the programme include plenty of musical sessions and parties, such as: a month-long residency by Reprezent Radio, broadcasting live from a custom-built studio in the Barbican’s foyer, with special guests including DJ Spoony, Norman Jay and Daddy Ernie; and a one-off club night hosted by Rinse FM at the Barbican’s ClubStage. On the more intellectual side of things, the Barbican Cinema will screen a series of archive films exploring the world of pirate and community stations, including youth radio documentary Airwaves of Rebellion: Youth, Identity, and the Fight for Community Radio and 1970s LGBTQ+ thriller Young Soul Rebels.  On top of this there will be panel talks curated by Tobi Kyeremateng from Them Ones Presents, with speakers including Richie Brave, Laura ‘Hyperfrank’ Brosnan and Aniefiok Ekpoudom. And a music and memory sharing session will be hosted by DJ Bid, formerly of Rock-to-Rock Radio, that will allow members of the public to request songs and share their...

Put a bit of jazz pizazz into your Friday nights with this concert series, held in a new Battersea venue. World Heart Beat Gardens is an intimate 200-seater concert hall that's been built for optimal acoustics (and nope, it's not outdoors as the name might suggest). It's perfect for filling your ears with the sounds of some jazz greats, from 1920s classics from the Julian Joseph trio to new compositions by Henry Spencer to soulful sounds from Grammy Award-winning tenor sax giant Jean Toussaint.