Every so often we spend hours getting lost in social networking sites and when it's new bands we're after we turn to myspace. This is how we came across the gentle twinkles of Synth Girl. Mainly a musician for other artists, we loved 'Hurricane Butterfly' (which you can hear online) so got in touch to say hi. It turned out she was actually in a band of her own Toy Toy which with it's......

The year was 1959, and in an often overlooked corner of Hackney, one of the world's most recognisable Hollywood beauties was bringing just a touch of Californian colour to a peculiarly English affair: a budgie show. Jayne Mansfield, living in London while making the film Too Hot To Handle, was invited to the All Saints church in Haggerston in September 1959 to help judge the East London Budgerigar and Foreign Birds Society show. Michael......

Londonist asks that most pressing of daily concerns: where to go on your lunch break. Wick Café 28 Felstead Street E9 5LT 0208 533 7575 6am-5pm for (Monday-Saturday), 8am-4pm (Sunday) Expect to Pay: around £5 for amply piled dishes of vintage caff favourites Rating: 9 out of 10 This tea peddling East London greasy spoon, where the only thing more high viz than the vests of the chowing workers is the specials signage adorning......

As we mentioned briefly before, Thursday brings the East 2008 Festival. For six days, a cornucopia of performances, exhibitions, workshops, food and other events ensures entertainment with emphasis on promotion of the best of East London. Here’s our pick of the mix: 6th March: F-EAST - artists Wiebke and Nicholas Morgan cook a meal from 12 recipes from a Nigel Slater cookbook, and serve it for visitors as an exploration into ownership and the......

There's masses going on for us culture vultures to choose from this week. First Thursdays As it's the start of March, it's First Thursdays this week. More than 80 galleries and museums will be open til 9pm across East London. We recommend John Squire's (yes, him from the Stone Roses) Re-engineered Garments; alternatively, pretend you're an alien at the Barbican. The Martian Museum of Terrestrial Art opens this Thursday. East is East East London's......

This Week In London’s History Monday – 3rd March 1982: The Barbican Centre is opened by the Queen. After 15 years of construction, at a cost of £161 million, the centre would become the largest performing arts centre in Europe (as well as being voted the ugliest building in London). Tuesday – 4th March 1882: Britain’s first electric trams go into operation in Leytonstone, East London. Wednesday – 5th March 1856: The second Covent......

It's officially Spring and by Pisces it's lovely out there in the sunshine. Crocuses have been spotted in Highbury Fields so our biggest recommendation for expenditure light trips this week is get to the parks and into the gardens and witness the miracles of the changing seasons. If you're in need of more artificial stimulation, however, and are squirrelling all your spare cash into your ISA before the end of the tax year then......

Pink parenting – a gay parent support group has been founded in East London. Olymponomics are starting to do our heads in – you decipher this for yourselves. Ken is backed by the left. Um, that’s meant to be news? Newly discovered DNA evidence may yet convict the Stephen Lawrence Five. Haringey council is in trouble after a bunch of confidential files were found dumped in a squat. The favourite tipples of the street......

Massive Attack to curate Meltdown London flood resilience to be tested East London super-church for KICC turned down Bloomsbury insider archive goes on display at the British Library Camden Market reopens in time for the weekend - London urged to rally round traders Image courtesy of Orhan via the Londonist flickr group.......

It’s a beautiful sunny February, and we’re back after a brief hiatus. The American writer’s strike has just been resolved, which means our American favourites will be back on our screens before too long, but until then here are a few things you may want to take a peek at. On TV, Londonist likes: Monday, 11 February City of Vice (Channel 4, 21:00-22:00) The series looking at the creation of the modern police force......

This is what we have learned while you were out bisto-ing the Spring air and foraging in the farmers’ markets this weekend: It’s the Baftas tonight, and as the Oscars are on ice, the paparazzi will be out for this in force. ‘Fraid the bloggerazzi prefer watching it on the telly. Battersea is looking for love this Valentines Day. A man has been charged with the unlawful removal of a head. Well, something like......

It's definitely time to think about how you want to spend the 14 February. Whether you're a sap for all things commercially romantic or a stalwart anti Valentine, it's important to know where you're going to be and what's going to be going on. No good staying in and ignoring the event if your flatmate's getting all hearts and flowers with their current kissing partner and no point trying to go out for dinner......

Book-lovers will be checking out a unique new venue on Saturday [2 Feb]: St James Street Open-Air Library in Walthamstow. No payment, no tickets – just bring as many books as you like, and swap them. Fab, but Brrrrrr. Its hours are brief; from 1-3pm the first Saturday of the month. And its book stock is the few hundred its organisers have rounded up from supporters – plus whatever anyone brings. But it’s handily......

Crowd-surfing in a mosh pit down the Astoria or Brixton Academy is the closest most in London can readily get to the waves and Waikiki lifestyle. That could be about to change: plans are afoot for a permanent outdoor surf machine in East London. As we reported yesterday, big things are happening along London's riverside. Spelling-shy Venture Xtreme have gone for the ambitious: they've released pictures of a "unique surf centre and extreme sports......

You’d be forgiven for thinking that artist Sickboy had lived in London for several years. His temple icons are hard to miss on even the shortest stroll down the obscurest of Shoreditch or Tower Hamlets streets. However, he’s lived here for less than a year. And as busy as he’s been since his moving to London, he still made the time to sit down and answer a few questions about his art for us.......

Bozza's not only got a website, he's got a mighty warchest too East London terrorist foiled and jailed Exotic Rivoli Ballroom in Brockley listed and saved Alesha turns out to get London running Image courtesy of Shakespearesmonkey via the Londonist flickr group.......

Transport anarchy is threatening to break out in W12. TfL's plan to close Shepherd's Bush station on the Central Line in early February for escalator upgrade work has been met with a stentorian campaign by locals to keep it open. The protesters claim that the work - to fix up the station in anticipation of the hordes of shoppers flooding to the £1.6 billion Westfield complex, scheduled to open later this year - is......

Erm, police agents lose the security codes for 73 of their stations. Dolts. The Royal Marsden re-opens for business. Troopers. Paddick is Elton’s candidate of choice. Sweeties. The East London Line is on schedule to be on schedule. Can’t call them liars, so let’s settle for optimists. Beckham honoured for being Beckham. Top man. It’s-that-time-of-year piccie courtesy of shadow of my future self’s flickr photo stream.......

Above-inflation fare rises and teeming queues at the ticket machine as people flock to renew their passes; January 2nd is traditionally not the best day for the rail industry. TfL may be harking about a single fare freeze (whilst downplaying the Travelcard fare increase), but for Londoners today the news in general is less good: two of the capitals busiest transport hubs are closed. Liverpool Street station, shut since December 23rd while engineers were......

New Years Eve is a funny one. Some people think it's the best night ever, and those who don't are kind of forced into thinking maybe they should be thinking that and invariably end up having a rubbish night. But how about you just think about it as an excuse to go dancing - that's never a bad idea. Here's our favourite dancefloor happenings tomorrow night. If it's dance music you want, then absolutely......

Heads up people: the East London Line closes this Saturday. It will undergo a magical transformation that will take rather a long time but the line will reemerge from a 3 year chrysalis as a beautiful section of the newly tangerine London Overground network, linking the North and East London railways. You'll eventually be able to travel from Richmond in the West all the way round in a massive arterial horseshoe via the existing......

Our friends at the South East London Folklore Society (SELFS) will be hailing and celebrating Yule tonight with a good old fashioned game of pin the tail on the Yule Cat. There will also be beer, chips, storytelling, songs and games. If you're a fan of urban legends, One Eye Grey, Jack the Ripper walks, gory London histories, oddities, nooks and crannies, the occult, paganism, Morris dancing, dragons, witchcraft and the like, you need......

Bored tonight? Well if you're hanging round East London without much to do then we recommend a visit to Stoke Newington's Bardens Boudoir. Constantly a source of exciting small bands and DIY events, tonight Upset The Rhythm are your hosts. Girl Talk is their headlining act and one we're particularly excited about. A big star in the music circles, Gregg Gillis has been mixing up all types of songs in his DJ sets as......

Londonist was rapped on the nose the other week for cocking a snooty snook at the unending, Tube-clogging newspaper coverage of the travails of Ms. Winehouse, while - yes - covering the story ourselves. Cowed and humbled, we bring you the latest from Chez Amy without any further editorial pawmarks. With her hubby incarcerated and her private life a whorl of drug-taking and rumours of ill health, Amy has wisely decided a change of......

Anyone wanna go see Radiohead at Victoria Park next year? Tuesday 24th and Wednesday 25th June. That's Glastonbury week too, isn't it? Well presales are available now if you don't fancy getting up all early on a Friday. But be quick. No word on whether they'll resurrect their 'tent' tour of Kid A days, that pitched up over in East London, but with favourable Rainbow reviews all round, it's a chance for the band......

Dusting off the snow from last year, every day this month the Londonist team will be pointing you in the direction of a Christmas present that (with a bit of luck) you won't already have on your list. Climb up onto our collective lap and we'll see what we can move from our sack to your stockings.. Heat things up in the bedroom of your metrosexual love with saucy, designer duvets from London based......

The provocative title is not simply a cheap trick like putting "SEX!!!!1!" across the top of a flyer to catch people's attention for carpet cleaning equipment. The One Night Stand With... series is quite literally one night with a specially commissioned artist at VINEspace, an inquisitive East London gallery in Bethnal Green Each month, an artist is invited to present an exhibition for one night only. It is taken down in the morning so......

Advent is upon us. Hanukkah starts on Wednesday. Office parties are already everywhere. Tis the season to be jolly, jolly, jolly but we know this can be draining, emotionally and financially. Don't let the state of your wallet throw you over the edge. We can't afford to buy tickets to the BFI IMAX all-nighter next weekend and we're not allowed to enter our own competition. But we can do the following splendid things for......

Well, the sugar people are actually living up to their somewhat irritating catchphrase at the moment, as they are being incredibly good eco-bunnies. They are to install an awfully costly new biomass boiler (£20 million - in Londonist’s book that’s expensive: mind you, you shouldn’t get us going on the subject of the cost of plumbing…) at their East London plant which will burn on something called ‘wheat feed’ (a bi-product of the flour industry).......

The 2012 Olympic Games may seem a long way off, but the pressure is starting to mount on the proposed developments for East London. In addition to building a shiny new stadium, the Olympics is meant to be an opportunity to provide more jobs, improved transport, and 9,000 new homes (of which half will be low-cost). While the Overground is now servicing Stratford and due to hook up to the East London Line in......