Dozens of bars, caf?s, clubs and restaurants are situated in Soho and
Covent Garden; the best way to explore is to cruise around on foot,
although a few venues stand out. Bar Rumba ,
one of the best dance clubs in town, plays host to a series of
excellent one-nighters: Monday has jazz, funk and drum ‘n’ bass;
Tuesday, Latin; it’s deep house on Wednesday; drum ‘n’ bass on
Thursday; New Skool beats on Friday; and garage on Saturday. Each night
is among the best of its type. Equally popular is The Wag , a
stylish club on three floors that similarly plays host to a wide
variety of music. Midweek sees indie-rock nights; Friday, an ’80s retro
session; while ‘Blow Up’ is one of the best parties around on Saturday,
a night that takes its inspiration from ’60s soul and pop, but that
plays all kinds of ‘lounge’ tunes and big beat too.
The Velvet Room ,
on Charing Cross Road, is a luxuriously appointed ‘club bar’ that also
hosts an excellent drum ‘n’ bass Wednesday-nighter (‘Swerve’) and a
great techno and deep house night on Thursdays (‘Ultimate BASE’).
Stylish ‘club’ clothes should normally guarantee admission. Nearby,
opposite the Centrepoint building, is LA2 , home to ‘Carwash’ on
Saturdays, the best disco night in town but one for which you must
dress the part (ie like an extra from Saturday Night Fever).
July 30, 2010
Soho & Covent Garden clubs
May 30, 2010
Brooklyn Museum of Art
200 Eastern Pkwy at Washington Ave, Park Slope, Brooklyn (718-638-5000)
Subway: 2, 3 to Eastern Pkwy. Wed-Fri 10am-5pm; Sat 11am-9pm; Sun 11am-6pm. Suggested donation $4, students $2, seniors $1.50; concessions $1-$10. AmEx, MC, V (gift shop only).
The Brooklyn Museum, founded 176 years ago, recently appended the word Art to its name as part of a campaign to draw wider attention to the world-class collections inside this gorgeous 19th-century Beaux Arts building. The african art and pre-Columbian textile galleries are especially impressive, and the Native American collection is outstanding. There are many works from the ancient Middle East and extensive holdings of American painting and sculpture by such masters as Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins and John Singer Sargent. And don’t miss the Egyptian galleries: The Rubin Gallery’s gold-and-silver-gilded ibis coffin, for instance, is sublime. Two floors up, the Rodin sculpture court is surrounded by paintings by French contemporaries such as Monet and Degas. The 1999-2000 season includes a large show imported from London, ‘SENSATION: Young British Artists from the Saatchi Collection,’ which will include bad boy Damien Hirst’s pickled pig and absolutely fabulous work by Mona Hatoum, Sarah Lucas, Chris Ofili and Rachel Whiteread. There’s also an informal café (which closes at 4pm) and a children’s museum.
May 25, 2010
London Dungeon
28-34 Tooley Street, SE1 (020 7403 7221)
London Bridge tube/rail. Open Oct-Mar 10am-5pm (last entry) daily; Apr-Sept 10am-5.30pm daily. Admission £9.95; £6.50 4s-14s; £8.50 students; £6.50 OAPs, disabled; free under-5s, wheelchair users. Credit AmEx, MC, £TC, V.
Website: http://www.dungeons.com
It’s hard not to feel uneasy about the glorification of pain, horror and death at the London Dungeon; it’s equally hard to deny that the punters – and gore-adoring older kids in particular – love it: they pile in by the coachload. Peer through railings amid a dank, dark, musty maze of gloomy arches and eerie nooks, and thrill at the scenes of medieval torture and the screams as the rack is tightened another notch. Groups of visitors are herded into a mock courtroom, before being sentenced by a åjudge’. The punishment, it seems, is a scary boat ride that, frankly, isn’t. The last part of the museum centres on one of the grizzliest episodes from British history – the ever-popular tale of jolly old woman-mutilator Jack the Ripper: actors in costume take you on the hunt for the madman through rooms made to look like the East End (in pre-curry house days). New from Easter 2000 is Firestorm! 1666 , an exhibition about the Great Fire of London. Chilling and fun or exploitative and sick? Only you can decide.
