London Zine of Music, Arts and Miscellaneous Happenings. Monthly updates & seasonal physicals.
/ˈpɪnˌdrɒp/
1) adjective describing the silence produced when a performance leaves the audience speechless (ie: one could hear a pin drop)
2) verb to indicate the location of a particular happening
01
___Tracey Nelson @ MOTH Club £20.4 Live Nation - With some tracks on the new album recorded and produced by MJ Lenderman, Tracey Nelson takes a generous slice of the slacker-country pie. His music is soft and sincere, and has a lap steel (should be enough of a reason to go on its own), along with the seal of approval from exquisite indie label K Records. tickets
___Louis O'Hara & His Burley Chassis @ Windmill Brixton £6 - Louis O’Hara’s vocals are delicate and painfully sincere. Joined by the ever expansive Burley Chassis, O’Hara builds a village to accompany him on the journey through his mind. Captivating is his music to people around the globe, bragging of listeners from Wales to Seattle, where support artists, Serafima and the Shakedowns, hail from. Their music contrasts to O’Hara’s, with upbeat danceable and country facing tracks that are likely to sway the room into a dance hall. Gem Stark, also on the lineup, opens the night with irony-laced diary entries that pair like biscuits to tea with her clever string picking on a stolen guitar. This is a trio sure to alleviate a pounding halloween hangover. tickets
02
___Horse Jumper Of Love @ MOTH Club £28.98 Pitchfork Festival London - Everyone’s favourite slowcore Boston trio is in town and they’ve brought with them Jawdropped, a sunny '90s-inspired LA four-piece whose debut album Secret to Spare came out in September, and the riotous Oslo post-rockers Hammok. tickets
03
___Pindrop Presents: "Tomorrow's Great Songwriters" @ Windmill Brixton £6 - Hear ye, hear ye! Pindrop presents some of our favourite singer-songwriters on the block! Plucked from the bubbling Bristol scene...Dan Pacini (with full band), who will be supported the local legend Louis Gardner, the gentle Gem Stark, and the artful Airbed. A cozy night in at the Windmill on a Tuesday awaits! tickets
04
___Tortoise @ Hackney Church £42.11 Pitchfork Festival London - Coinciding with the rise in relevancy of their drummer’s son 2hollis, post-rock old men Tortoise launch their first large-scale tour in about a decade. Forever experimental, the group will bring a mix of dub reggae, rock, and electronica to East London, along with the weird and wonderful guitar improvisations of veteran Bill Orcutt. tickets
05
___Los Thuthanaka (in-the-round) @ EartH Hall £32.26 Pitchfork Festival London - 5 years ago, who would have thought Andean cyber-cumbia would be topping bills for Pitchfork music fest? Deeply psychedelic without the clichés: cycling off-kilter rhythms become second nature as wild samples, vibrating synthesisers, and CDJ turntable scratches push South American music into the 22nd century. The band’s guitarist and bassist, Joshua Chuqimia Crampton, opens the night, so get strapped in for an evening of new noise. tickets
06
___Tony Bontana @ Shacklewell Arms £17 Bad Vibrations - Tony Bontana is responsible for a ridiculous volume of musical output, and his frequent collaborations sew his brummie delivery into the most unlikely places – from TAGABOW to Nourished By Time or Max Winter. The rapper, producer, and DJ cannot be described adequately with so few characters; if you are keen on experimental hip-hop, you will love his work. tickets
07
___A Tribute to Leonard Cohen @ MOTH Club £15 Dancing Barefoot - London’s new voices of alt-rock and folk gather in MOTH club to commemorate the baritone bard of love on the 10th anniversary of his death. A night of magical poesies and musing strums and plucks, their modern musical takes will be as fresh as the tea and oranges all the way from China. tickets
___Godzooki's Album Launch @ New River Studios £9.27 Lost Wisdom - London slacker rockers Godzooki celebrate their upcoming debut LP In Living Colour underneath a live-in warehouse (...very North London) and alongside pop powerhouses Bramwell and ‘West Midlands emo’ champions second born. tickets
10
___goat (JP) @ ICA £26.5 - The compositions of Japanese quartet goat merge the slowly permutating polyrhythms of Steve Reich mixed with the tight percussive maximalism of Aphex Twin’s druqks, all on drums, muted guitars and bass. Acoustic music to keep the brain dancing. tickets
___Water Damage + Geologist @ Blondies Brewery £22 Baba Yaga's Hut - The irresistible force paradox of drone, Water Damage continue to pulverise musical progress into a primordial powder of stubborn kosmische – the bones of noise mantras crushed by an alchemical fusion of experimental music alumni. Their live performances are – in the spirit of The Fall – always different and always the same. Prepare for a brutal voyage around purgatory in distortion. And, no, your eyes don’t deceive you – that IS Geologist from Animal Collective on support duties, another for whom the raga reel is the only deity to appease. tickets
16
___Anna von Hausswolff @ O2 Shepherds Bush Empire £34.03 Bird on the Wire - It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to presume Anna von Hausswolff is some emissary from a fabled beyond. Likely a fiery dimension of filigree daemons would be the only place cavernous and gothic enough to house her plains of post-rock majesty and a voice that would make the hairs on the back of Ignota or Galás’ necks stand to attention. Until we find one of those behind the Atlantis Bookshop, however, Shepherd’s Bush Empire will do the job nicely. tickets
18
___Navy Blue @ St Giles' Church £26.35 Bird on the Wire - As part of his 'Knight Vision' tour (his 10th album before reaching 30 years old), serial collaborator and rapper-producer extraordinaire Navy Blue brings his smooth, often ambient hip-hop to London. His hypnotic production style and self-reflective writing will have listeners thinking as much as moving! tickets
___Newbuild @ Notting Hill Arts Club £5 Soil To The Sun - The hyper rock from fresh-faced teens Newbuild has them as one of the newest members of London’s musical network after their single launch at The George a few weeks ago. Supported by Bristol’s ultra-daring weirdo art-rock group The Scuttlers and emo heavy-hitters Kissing on Camera, this one may be one of the few reasons to journey to West London. tickets
19
___Ah! Kosmos & Hainbach @ Vespers £22 Baba Yaga's Hut - Land in Vespers, close your eyes and let Ah! Kosmos and Hainbach take you spiraling down the endless dingy tunnels of the U-Bahn. Take their gloomy oscillations and dark ambience and surrender to the brooding Berlin sound. tickets
___Posuposu Otani @ Longfield Hall £14.76 Atomiser - Japanese underground legend Posuposu Otani creates something so warm and embracing, it's remarkable the niche had yet to be conquered. Set to droning folk of ambient afrobeat guitar and peaceful fingerpicking, Otani uses throat-singing to both create uncanny melodies and bolster his lyrics with wild, instantaneous harmonies. Atomiser prove again that they are the crate diggers of the promoting world…and that they will, if in doubt, book a member of Bar Italia regardless of the bill...zzzzzz. tickets
21
___Rotting @ Finsbury Park Picturehouse £7 - Finally, an escape from the miserable greyness of British autumns. Form Affinity frontwoman Rotting offers momentary relief with her warm, twinkling sound, reminiscent of the second-wave emo from the American midwest (while actually being from LA). A pindrop favourite! Bring your digi-cam!. tickets
22
___feeble little horse @ EartH Hall £24.21 AEG x Outbreak - One of those groups with thoroughly deserved Pitchfork praise. Indie darlings with a glitchy finish, their popularity sees them playing for two days in a row (with the 23rd sold out). Go and see an “it” band that will live up to expectations before it gets too difficult to get your hands on gig tickets! tickets
25
___Yu Su @ Club Cheek £17.39 FORM - Boasting classical training along with a tight track record as an electronic music producer, sound artist, DJ, and chef, NTS resident Yu Su’s sound is stripped back, thoughtfully crafted, and builds on eclectic influences. Expand your palate and get yourself down to Club Cheek for an intimate night exploring new sonic textures. tickets
___Desire x Johnny Jewel @ Colour Factory £30.01 FORM - Essentially the architects of synthwave as we know it, Johnny Jewel’s Italians Do It Better label is the best example of modern-day svengali pop. Each glossy night-drive soundtracker counts the label founder as part of their roster, Desire being its most potent distillation. The duo of Jewel and vocalist Megan Louise have graced the soundtracks of Drive and Twin Peaks, and will no doubt keep you under their spell with a high-camp round of chrome-and-latex nostalgia. !kcor s’teL tickets
27
___Club Precious #10: Radhika @ Paperdress Vintage £14 Precious Recordings of London - Radhika and Supersun make up two of the key players in Glasgow’s DIY community with a reputation that precedes itself. Paired with Cardiff power pop prospects Bramwell who are (hopefully) rested from their support run with The Tubs, the holy trinity of DIY pop bands will see completion in a clothes shop turned music venue in Hackney (as God intended). tickets
28
___Bad Vibes All-Dayer @ Shacklewell Arms FREE - Lily Wolter of Penelope Isles takes a more intimate angle on her dream pop solo alias My Precious Bunny, with a dazzling debut album that more than warrants its place in front of the red curtain on the Shacklewell stage. Get there early if you fancy a punt on a range of other bands (Lindow Man, Scouts, Sugar Tax, Limes) – it is literally impossible to waste your money on this. rsvp
by RB
A vast expanse of Radio 6 dads look on with reservations under their Stetson hats, wondering how much of their kids’ spelling practice they have sacrificed waiting for Man/Woman/Chainsaw to headline. But first they have to get through Bathing Suits. The Leed’s quartet open with gritty guitars, thunderous bass, and shrieking synths, blasting dance tracks equally sexy and abrasive. Frontwoman Freyja Blevins begins to contort and ripple her body, slowly removing items of clothing as she moans, sings, and exclaims, “I can be a freak!” over her drum machine pumping early 2000s break-beat and the notorious Estelle sample. The band are graced by an unexpected fifth member who had only joined them once before at their home turf, the Brudenell Social Club. Fakie (drummer and vocalist of Leeds mathrock band Normal Village), enters the stage looking ‘erratic’ and confused, pacing and scratching his head as if experiencing withdrawal, while the other band members rock and twist, increasing the volume, distortion, and intensity of their pounding dance-noise. Fakie removes shirt, then trousers, then socks, as if one-upping Blevin’s semi-nudity will free him of his torment. The audience, a mix of stunned seventeen-year-olds and their disgusted parents, is left only with a pair of “GANJA” boxers separating their eyes from Fakie’s manhood (admittedly, he is a handsome fruitcake).
Bassist Elise Hughes sways ominously as Alex Mulholland uses, as a guitar slide, his freshly emptied bottle of Jonny Walker’s Red Label (a staple on their rider during their string of M/W/C support shows). Mulholland and other guitarist George Dickinson force interactive punky interjections over the rave-inducing drums and bass with their overdrive and fuzz. Fakie begins to grow in confidence; he is egged on by Blevins, who has enjoyed goading the unwelcoming crowds across this support run, taking pleasure in convulsing on stage and persistently making irony-laden attempts to liven them up. After half a set of peacocking with bodybuilding poses, Fakie takes it upon himself to crowd surf across the sea of hesitant millennials, many of whom are filming the set but still not dancing to it or visibly enjoying it. The four-piece were later issued a formal complaint from an audience member for Fakie’s antics, and had to write an official apology in response, with an extent of sincerity that can only be left to the imagination…
Blevins remains front and centre while being pummelled by an industrial fan that hangs her electric blonde hair mid-air, showcasing the blood that has started trickling from her forehead after an altercation with a guitar during the set’s frenzy. She jumps and lurches against the relentless four-on-the-floor drum patterns she has programmed, while the guitar textures grind and screech against each other like machine parts. All members bar Blevins start to turn to their amps, bending their guitar necks and shaking their strings into the speakers as if performing an exorcism on them will squeeze a little more feedback into the PA system. Then, one by one, with their amps still ringing, they exit – leaving Blevins alone, her sweat reflecting from harsh spotlights as she begins to summon a swell of their crying guitar loops from her mixer. All audience members are captivated (with many still confused) as Blevins takes the volume and saturation higher and higher, piercing the eardrums of the sound technician with a techno-leaning synthetic symphony. Her orchestration of the finale is masterful, endlessly rising, energetic, and painful – in a good way. She finally chokes the cacophony and is met with loud applause from an audience forced to accept the performance as one they can never forget (or unsee).
by RD
SOME PEOPLE THINK LITTLE GIRLS SHOULD BE SEEN AND NOT HEARD. BUT I THINK, “OH BONDAGE, UP YOURS!”:
It is a dreary month of storms. The punk queens and the weatherman formed a pact to open this exhibition on one diluvian day in October, and though the foreboding flood and violent gusts of wind may be punishment for this century’s endless consumption and expert conformity to prejudice, today in Camden, people embrace the rain. In the frizz and frazzle atop the heads of Londoners, they gaze into the eyes of Poly Styrene, Siouxsie Sioux, Ari Up, Patti Smith and Debbie Harry, and discover their precipitation-punk hairdos in the reflection of framed portraits, reminded that beauty is an invented commodity and ugliness is not real. The exhibition is a deliberate and aestheticised curation of ephemera, but has the face of a woman who refused to be subjugated by the mundane conventionalities of the white West.
The exhibition heralds a “celebration of female aesthetic, expression, and inherent rebellion”. In one large space of clutter and clangour, one woman remarks “everywhere I look, there is something new!”. It is a familiar teenage bedroom, one that at once vomits intimacy and publicity - vulvas occupy the same space as newspaper archives. Embarking on the DIY ethos of the punks, the exhibition is a multimedia haven, replete with a photographic plethora of portraits, films about she-punks projected or trapped in tiny 80s televisions, and glass cages and walls housing the archives of the 1970s cultural punk petri dish. A visual story unfolds whilst the sounds of punk play loudly through the museum’s speakers; the optics come not from a man’s sexualising gaze but from some euphoric genderless creature.
Women, get on stage! The wall of fame portraits tell us. On the opposite side is wall art and album covers, saying women! Get behind the paintbrush! One which seems to overlook the room is Caroline Coon’s Between Parades (1985), a large landscape piece depicting women in a brothel under ambient orange lighting. Their faces are a bizarre crossover of Modigliani and the jazz palettes of abstract expressionism; their breasts are large and accentuated. But despite their sporadic sprawling across the room, an intimate solidarity occurs. She-punks fronted stages and led men Joan of Arc style, producing their own image. Beneath Coon’s painting displays her statement “how can I grow up into a woman who does not cause offence?” - and herein lies the vitality of female-fronted punk - be messy! Be ugly! Be loud, be abrasive. The names ‘X-Ray Spex’ and ‘The Slits’ do not suggest surface, but dissection, embracing the guts of realness that surpass any bullshit idea of what ‘womanhood’ must be.
Colonised countries still suffer from the inescapable bounds of patriarchy introduced by the imperial powers, and so, what of the diaspora in the UK? Poly Styrene’s heritage is scarcely mentioned in the exhibition. Being of half-Somali and half-English descent, she grew up in Brixton, one of the most significant hubs of immigration and punk post-Windrush. The punk’s antiracist efforts are shown occasionally, but there is no mention of the Afro-Carribean influence on punk, nor how Poly Styrene’s heritage would have marginalised her amidst a growing far-right culture. X-Ray Spex’s own sound was distinct with its ska-inspired saxophone (played by Lora Logic), infusing a predominantly white genre with a sound unique to the UK diaspora.
Regardless, take from this exhibition that patriarchy (and its spouse, imperialism) has maintained the world to be a dollhouse, but she-punks, particularly Poly Styrene, attempted liberation through total aversions to ‘femininity’: gender is not real, nor has it ever been.
SE
___Shy Baby by Laurice (UK/US/Canada??, 19??)
___He Cried (Tender Absolute) by Sunday Mourners (US, 2026)
___Beatnik by The Clean (New Zealand, 1986)
GKA
___Composite by Palm (US, 2018)
___For the Teacher by Jasper Llewelyn (UK, 2026)
___June 2 - Early Version by Wednesday (US, 2026)
MLT
___Deep Water by Strawberry Switchblade (UK, 1985)
___P-E-V-E-R-T by The Welders (US, 1979)
___Save the Cheerleader by Godzooki (UK, 2026)
JR
___Yahoo! by Soapkills (Lebanon, 2000)
___Emperor XIII in Shades by Cameron Winter (US, 2026)
___Reminiscence غروب by Yasmine Hamdan (France, 2025)
Pindrop is AJ, BW, EM, GKA, HYS, JR, LD, MLT, NF, OS, RB, RD, SE, TM
Contact us at @pindropzine (instagram) and pindropzine@gmail.com (email)