London On The Cheap: 1st - 7th October

By London_Sian Last edited 207 months ago

Last Updated 30 September 2007

London On The Cheap: 1st - 7th October
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Londonist appears to have spent all of our money on excellent but expensive gigs and over priced taxi fares this weekend. So once again, we've got no money. No, before you ask, we haven't ever heard of budgeting. We don't need to budget when there's all this exciting free stuff to be done this week:

Monday: With so many other cool kid bars around in East London, the Rhythm Factory doesn't get written about very much. (It's also quite difficult to spell.) This is a shame as there's always loads of treats going on here. Tonight is the gloriously named 'Spoonful of Poison'. It's an open mic night where anything could happen. Comedy, performance poetry, music.... you'll see a little bit of all this and everything inbetween tonight.

Tuesday: We know we keep talking about the Arcola theatre, but at the moment it seems to be the only place willing to promote free theatre available to all. This deserves shouting about in our book. Meetings is showing this week so make sure you go and see it. As always, don't forget that the actors have bills to pay. It's 'pay what you can Tuesday', not 'be a cheapskate Tuesday'.

Wednesday: In our bid to make dance seem less scary and intimidating, we've sought out some freebie dance moves for you. The funkily named Instrumotional at the Southbank Centre. There are wooden platforms, cubes and audience interaction. We don't know how it all works yet, but we really want to find out.

Thursday: Feeling a little decadent and old fashioned tonight? Then head to the beautiful Cellar Door for a bit of thirties Kit Kat Club Kabaret. Tonight will be fabulous and we could tell you what to expect, but where would be the fun in that? We will tell you that the first live act is on at nine and they do a great martini here. You'll have to find out the rest for yourself.

Friday: Not been to Cargo for a while? It's been so long since Londonist went there we'd almost forgotten all about it. That was until we found out Raison D'etre were setting up camp there for this evening. Described as a UN for music and performance, they want to work with everyone and let their fans listen to anything they discover. There's even a bit of an arts collective going on. Oh, and it's free before 9pm too. Woo!

Saturday: Free bands on a Saturday are a rare thing in London. Good free bands in London on Saturday are like finding four leaf clovers on a blue moon. Lucky for us that The Patty Winters Show came along. They're apparently 'music for boys to dance to' but we reckon at the ever fabulous talent spot 333/Mother Bar everyone will be dancing as they're pretty great. They've got loads of other gigs coming up this month too. So if you really like them, you can go and see them six more times in a row. In any other scenario, you'd be stalking, but with live music you're just a bit of a groupie.

Sunday: Sport doesn't feature on London On The Cheap's radar too much. Hangovers often get in the way. But when free bicycle polo comes along, it's hard not to mention it. With a rather excited smile on our faces. There's some thing very silly about this. But only to us. It's taken a bit more seriously down in Brick Lane. We happen to think it'll be fun to watch before a walk around the markets. Then it'll be back off to the pub for hair of the dog.

Or, you could stay in and watch the Eastenders instead.

Photo from Jason Rogers' flickr stream.

There's lots of stuff to do here, and lots of opening and closing times. Londonist thinks you should take a quick gander at the websites before you go for more information. Know of a free event we should cover? Let us know and we'll see what we can do and even make you a little bit famous by saying thanks.