Apologies, but just a little self promotion.

I recently purchased a new guitar, in the form of a rather lovely black and chrome Fender Jaguar, along with a nice shiny new red effects pedal which inspired me to go on a mission... So over two much needed days off in October I recorded 8 tracks weighing in at a rather short total of just over 15 minutes and thus "Power of the Octopus" mini album/ep was born.

After a lengthy fight with my CD recorder I finally mixed it down onto disc and so far Dave (Saneman) is the only person to have heard or own a copy, but when there is artwork available I'm sure at least a couple more will be inflicted on people in the near future so watch this space!!!

K

negativePANDA present:
MR TEETH "Power of the Octopus"

1. Intro
2. Ligeia
3. Isn’t it Scary
(When Pigs are Red)
4. Preaching Time
5. A River to -- / to --
6. Fairytale Blues
7. Next Big Star
8. Outro

All tracks written and recorded by Mr Teeth, except:
Tracks 1 and 5 words by Edgar Allen Poe
Track 4 vocals sampled from Son House
Track 6 vocals sampled from Tom Waits
Copyright <nP. > 2007
Recorded 18th and 19th October 2007

Jerwood Drawing Prize
The Jerwood Prize is a good way to look at some new talent, see what trends there are in this area if practise as much as the wider scene. This year there were a few looser 'drawing' interpretations - slides, films etc - but the majority followed a traditional ink on paper route. Many of the selected works employed pseudo-scientific or mathematical means: maps (Louise Norman's Map Circle, drawing over all the lines; Margaret Proudfoot Caught, skeletal white map of Baghdad reversed and with all but the roads cut out; Tone Holmen Coastlines, overlaid drawings), graphs or charts (John Holden Grid 2; Sophie Horton Studio Environment and Library Environment, studying sound and drawing with embroidery; Mary Rouncefield Mathematics Problem I; Susie Parfitt Reasons for Non-Achievement), or experiments (Brighid Lowe's 2nd prize winning Rain Drawing, a large paper sheet with ink lines which had just a few beautiful marks from rain drops; Tim Knowles Tree Drawing - Scots Pine on Easel, Buttermere Shore #2, a personal favourite, allowing the gently blowing bows of a tree with a pen attached to inscribe lines on a page, displayed with accompanying photo).
Other works we liked: Graham Brown Princess Illumination, found objects; Jaconb Cartwright I Told You So; Mark Fairnington The Congregation; Shareena Hill The Secret; Sarah Hope Yri Debyg Iawn Ti A Fi; Donna Nicholson-Arnott Trio.
Nice to see Melanie Jackson's A Global Positioning System again, last seen at the Arnolfini in Bristol.

Also two untitled drawings by Nicole Mollett, and Paul Westcombe's elaborately decorated paper coffee cups: Sex is Boring with Me, Westie's Wet Weekend, and You're Hardly Ever Here and When You're Here You're Bored - fantastic! and nicely placed close to the café. Until 28 October

Bernhard Martin at Union Gallery
This is the first UK solo show for Martin, housed in the Union's Ewer Street railway arch - a fantastic space in my opinion, the thunder of the services crawling round to Waterloo all part of the experience. Martin's paintings and sculptures/installations/contructions walk the line of figurative and abstraction like a sarcastic drunk: stumbling into both, deliberately taunting us with its oscillating swagger. I have some nice images of his paintings, but personally I prefered the sculptures which used some kitsch domestic objects, cuckoo clocks, plaster fantasy castles etc. There was kitsch and naff in some Germanic fantasy clash with Paul McCarthy, but with something of Martin Kippenberger also. Seemingly chaotic and violent, yet delicate; easily dismissed as flippant, and certainly humorous, yet strangely alluring and enriching. Very nice. Until 17 November

Images courtesy the artist and Union, London
www.union-gallery.com

Halloween gigs:
The Semi Detached play Punk Soho (14 Soho Street) on 31 Oct, £6. They are also playing at The Pleasure Unit (359 Bethnal Green Road E1) on 25 Oct, 28 Nov and 19 Dec, £5 a go.
Dogbonfire play a Halloween Kabaret night called SEX at the Half Moon in Herne Hill (10 Half Moon Lane SE24) on 27 Oct, as part of Artful Festival, £5 with flyer/£6. www.kaparte.info

Lucky 7s @ the Gowlett (62 Gowlett Rd SE15) is a night in a very nice Peckham pub where you can bring 7 of your favourite 7" singles and play them; first come, first served, and they reserve the right to kick you off if no one likes it, which is a bit of a shame; but looks like fun! www.thegowlett.com

The Courtauld Gallery will be displaying Walter Sickert's Camden Nudes from 25 Oct until 20 Jan. There has been quite a lot of excitement about this. www.courtauld.ac.uk
Collective Response is a London Group show at the Guildhall Art Gallery until 11 Nov featuring works by John Piper, Duncan Grant and others. £2.50 to gallery collections and exhibitions, free on Fridays. www.guildhall-art-gallery.org.uk
Traces is 'an exhibition exploring the marks we leaves in time and place' (sounds intriguing), at RK Burt & Co Ltd (57 Union Street SE1) until 1 Nov M-F 10-5. www.kess.me.uk/traces

Don't talk to me about cracks in the ground, okay? and that was me you saw in the Guardian, standing around looking bored.

The Frieze Art Fair is on now for everything that's hot and new and saleable in the artworld, and some things which are good or interesting or both. It'll probably be rammed this weekend and it closes on Sunday.

Anton Corbijn's Joy Division biopic 'Control' is doing well in the cinemas, giving the papers the opportunity to print childishly written articles by his daughter. Sad that Tony Wilson passed, but cheered by the fact he was buried in a coffin numbered FAC 501 - Factory's last catalogue number.

Thanks to Keith for setting me off on a trip to view loads of 70s films of The Ramones on YouTube. I also got the remixed version of Iggy and the Stooges' Raw Power recently - possibly the most uncontrollably aggressive album made. Wire have relauched their website with downloadable mp3s: www.pinkflag.com

Simon Bookish is playing at the Scala on Sunday 3-10pm along with a bunch of others in support of a compilation album based around artist David Shrigley's Worried Noodles. Also on the album are Max Tundra, David Byrne, Final Fantasy, Hot Chip, Grizzly Bear, Franz Ferdinand and others.

Bernhard Martin's paintings and installation are at the Union Gallery (Ewer St SE1) until 17 November. Meanwhile GREAT EXPECTATIONS - GROSSE ERWARTUNGEN is at their Teesdale Street warehouse branch (Bethnal Green E3) until the same date.

And finally, here's just a small plug for an exhibition featuring one of our friends:

Hunter's Moon

SEBASTIAN BUERKNER/VERA LOSSAU/PAUL WESTCOMBE

L'EST

lestinfo@gmail.com
www.lestlondon.com
020 7923 1814 until 21st October 2007
Opening times, Saturday-Sunday 14.00-18.00 or by appointment

Nicole Mollet and Paul Wescombe are in the Jerwood Drawing Prize show at the Jerwood Space until 28 October.

Tate Modern hosts Berlin duo  Discoteca Flaming Star's 'hardcore kareoke' Staurday 27 October, performing within the World as a Stage exhibition.

The Painting of Modern Life at the Hayward also looks interesting, with works by Richter, Doig, Tuymans and Warhol amongst others, plus a series of talks, music and films. until 30 December
Nogah Engler at Ritter/Zamet until 17 November
 
that's it.....           I promise

Last Thursday night required split loyalties, with Dogbonfire playing in Brixton and [a dog barks] films at the Roxy. One of our crowd caught the first half the films and then went on to the gig; not a bad option as the best of the films were in the first half. Dogbonfire now have a new singer called Jed and I am quite excited to see them at the next opportunity; but on this occasion I stayed on for the films.

The Roxy is a good place for a drink, meal or film. Its an awkward shape, kind of like a bowtie with a narrow bar area in between the front bar and the back dining and watching space. And you have to almost walk out onto the street to get to the stairs to the toilets. Notwithstanding, the service was good, Greek food very nice - what we could see of it as they turned the lights down about half an hour before the films began - good atmosphere, a nice place to have a drink with friends if you can hear over whatever is going on.

[a dog barks] were curating this evening, the second at the Roxy, featuring international artists'/film-makers' short works, and one of their own. Sadly Joe Lawlor and Christine Molloy's 'Who Killed Brown Owl' did not play well and was abandonned after a few minutes - a shame as this looked to have been one of the best. Next was a very amusing retro-computer animation by Grant Orchard where paintballing turns into all out war, with all the kind of filmic clichés laid bare.

Tony Johnson's 'A Garganta do Diabo (The Devil's Throat)' was by the far the best in the show. Beautifully documenting a tourist trip to a Brazilian waterfall and its accomanying mythology, it had a sense of poetic flow, acute observation of people, and a clever use of sound and imagery.

'Wee Milton Fidler' was another animation and barely deserves a mention. 'Pod' by Shelly Love was all David Lynch atmosphere played backwards to a Squarepusher soundtrack: not very inspiring. 'Ojiisan no 11 Kagetsu' by Masahi Sato was a fine piece of digitally maniputaled film using different characters in a frame to repeat endlessly in soft sepia tones.

The second half began hilariously with Jörg Wagner and Stefan Prehn's 'Staplerfahrer Klaus (Forklift Driver Klaus)': German safety training video meets Evil Dead. Where else would you see two people impaled on the prongs of a runaway forklift, its driver beheaded, running over the workers he has already severed hands from, impaled with knives or cut in half?

'YYYN experiment 14' was an animation using 4 cells and each time the fourth would give a value which didn't follow the series of the other three. Mildly amusing but over very quickly to an electronic beat. 'The Space Between Us' was a sickeningly self-piteous mobile phone ad of a film, which I hope I never have the misfortune of seeing again. Right Place was a japanese exploration of obsessiveness, followed by a Belarusian pop video. The programme definitely peaked early.

We didn't stay for the DJs as they were a bit loud and the visuals were not very stimulating after the films. Really grateful though to Tony Johnson and [a dog barks] for putting it on and we look forward to next time.

www.adogbarks.co.uk | www.roxybarandscreen.com

For those of you with Satellite, Cable or digital TV, BBC4 is having a Bob Dylan night on 14 October with films and live recordings.

Exhibitions:
Cornelia Parker at IKON Birmingham until 18 November
Pop Art and Politics in the 60s at Wolverhampton Art Gallery until 25 February 2008
Georg Baselitz at Royal Academy until 9 December
Anthony Key creates a kitchen out of takeaway containers, and a map of world conquest marked with Chinese takeaways, at Pitshanger Manor until 3 November
Gerald Laing War Art at Stolen Space until 13 October
Henry Moore at Kew Gardens until 2008
Every Eye Sees Differently from the Eye featuring Charles Avery, at the Drawing Room until 2 December
Tacita Dean at Frith Street Gallery until 28 October
Louise Bourgeois at Hauser & Wirth until 17 November, and at Marlborough Fine Art until 2 November (also at Tate Modern)
Matthew Barney at Serpentine Gallery until 11 November
Steve McQueen at Thomas Dane Gallery until 10 November
Savage Pencil cartoons at 96 Gilespie Road 10 November - 9 December

The Wire celebrates its 25th Anniversary with a series of concerts, of which I'm interested in:
Boredoms + Michael Gira (ex-Swans) 26 October at Shoreditch Town Hall
Strategy + Soul Jazz DJs + others 27 October at The Rocket
Matmos 28 Oct at Bush Hall
Lydia Lunch 1 Nov at St Giles in the Fields
Terre Thaemlitz + Tina Frank as part of Atlantic Waves at ICA 9/10/11 November
Han Bennink + Spring Heeled Jack + others at Conway Hall 12 November
Kode9 + Spaceape + Skull Disco (aka Shackleton and Appleblim) at Plastic People 15 November
Jackie-O Motherfucker at Cargo 18 November
Christian Marclay's Screenplay with JG Thirlwell and Blevin Blectum + more at Bush Hall 22 November
Three nights of film screenings at the Roxy curated by Mark Webber 30 October, 13 November and 20 November FREE

Two nights of Electronic Music at Goldsmith's great hall 3 October & 7 December FREE