That was how I came to be at the Hoxton Underbelly last Friday. Sometimes people describe me as “lucky” so I suppose it was no surprise that, having discovered a great new band originating from my home town of Nottingham, I would swiftly find them playing just round the corner from my adopted Spitalfields. After the fates had conspired, it would have been rude not to attend.

Rude, but possible. There was a parallel invite from ITV to spend the night in the Jonathan Ross green room (the real one rather than what you see on stage) with Noel Gallagher (who did so much to revive British music at its most dead), Michael Sheen (who did a magnificent portrayal of the great Cloughie himself) and Miranda Hart (who did so little to win all those comedy awards) but I reasoned I can go to Wossy any week when he’s filming. But then there was an also a British Sea Power  gig at the Barfly in Camden and they are quite possibly Britain’s absolute best band, but I have seen them maybe a dozen times before. Nottingham’s finest won out.

This year I’ve been invited to see Muse in the private Wembley box of the head of Warner records, stood on the very front row for U2 at Glastonbury and even had to step in as John Taylor’s body double for Duran Duran (I told you I was a lucky so-and-so), but it’s this sort of gig, down in the basement of a small club with an energetic hungry young band that will always excite the most.

Spotlight Kid (the Spotters on Tour) had support: the long running order comprised four hungry bands, but I missed the first (apologies to La Bete). Next up came three-piece Alphastate, with singer Ani announcing it was her birthday. She sang well, but spoke quietly and moved little, but I liked her dreamy folky vocals. And that she asked if anyone had been lucky enough to get Stone Roses tickets earlier in the day. I’d booked my place at the reunion gig so raised my glass to her and cheered, and embarrassed myself as I was the only one in the whole of the Underbelly in that fortunate position.

After Alphastate came four-piece Faults (in the unusual position of having a female drummer). They had what I thought were excellent songs,  but the Hoxton-fin-crowned lead singer’s voice was just one you really didn’t want to listen to for any time at all and the (excellent) guitarist squeezed every note with the emotion and anguish of forcing a number two. Half the audience seemed to comprise family or friends of the band, so you clapped on pain of being beaten up. Bizarrely the other half was largely made up of minute women, presumably swelling the crown to make pint-size Spotters singer Katty Heath feel more at home.

Katty’s pronounced “Cat” rather than “Kate”. I know because I asked at the beginning of the evening, finding her all glittery eyed selling CDs and T-shirts in the middle of the bar. That’s another thing about proper working/touring bands – you can talk to them properly, except when you get all tongue-tied despite being a professional wordsmith like me. But she is very cute and all smiles. And just when you think she can’t get any more perfect, you notice the Johnny-Mackintosh-style Starmark tattoo on her right wrist. It would have been rude not to buy a CD and in fact I found myself asking for two.

In the twenty-three years before I left Nottingham permanently I don’t recall any decent music coming out of the city. One band (Krush) made it to number three in the days when the singles chart mattered, and I think they even DJ’d at The Garage, a presumably long-defunct Lacemarket club where I spent most of my weekends, but House Arrest really wasn’t my cup of tea. I moved to Oxford and fell into the “Happy (Thames) Valley” Shoegazing scene made all their own by the once-mighty Ride, with support from Chapterhouse and Swervedriver and Lush and Curve. Back in that muddy Somerset field I felt I’d hit upon the new Ride, but with more ethereal vocals. And unlike Alphastate, Spotlight Kid are all energy on stage, Katty pumping her air guitar for all it’s worth.

But Spotlight Kid are much more than their female singer. They’re a six-piece of sweltering guitars, building a wall of subtly crafted noise and with vocals and energy also coming from Rob McLeary, an effortlessly thin guitarist with spectacular hair and a penchant for taking his guitar into the audience and climbing onto the sound desk. He told me he was from Arnold and he looked it. Your eyes are drawn to these two but the band are very tight, with Chris Moore and Karl Skivington also on guitar, Matt Holt on bass and Chris Davis bashing away behind them. Space was limited. I thought I’d caught Katty on video accusing the others of touching her bum but the phone failed so instead you get a video of a track from their new album Disaster Tourist. This is “Forget yourself in me” (I might be wrong but I think it would make life easier for Katty in all that wind if she got a shorter veil):

The Spotters are endearingly proud of their visuals and I guess must have spent a lot of time putting them together. I thought this meant that the occasionally bitty nature to the night was because, between every song Katty had to get down on her knees and play with a laptop to call up the next vid. But she reliably informs me it was just to have a swig of water before belting out the next number!

The setlist is short and well crafted, as yet without an encore. Is that because Spotlight Kid haven’t yet found their breakthrough song that might see them sitting in the Jonathan Ross green room? Or are they just modelling their appearances on Jesus and Mary Chain/Strokes/Vaccines (take your pick)? I hope the former. Next time they’re gigging, treat yourself – I hope London doesn’t have to wait too long. What we heard was:

Plan comes apart

Forget yourself in me

Can’t let go

April

Creeps

Reason

All is real

Seefeel

Haunting

During the final number, grasping her tambourine tightly, Katty made her way back to the CD stand to sell merchandise with the promise of kisses for purchasers (sadly I could hardly buy more) while Rob vaulted onto the bass drum, only to fall backwards into the drum kit – I wasn’t sure Chris was terribly amused.

Three months after the dreadful events of 22nd February when Christchurch, New Zealand, was struck by an earthquake, the Gherkin is unlocking its revolving doors to make way for the Step up 4 Christchurch Earthquake Appeal. You have the chance to walk or run (there’s even a race) all the way up the 1037 steps to the top or, if that sounds a tad too much effort on a Sunday morning (shame on you), there’s an alternative route to the top via the lifts. Sadly, these will be the conventional type rather than the antigravity ones normally used on the Spirit of London.

The event, taking place on Sunday 22nd May 2011, been organized by the Evans Randall Investment Bank so full marks to them. I was alerted to it by Meg Ellis who’ll be taking part as one of her 100 things for charity. There’s an entrance fee that goes to the earthquake appeal and, if you’re taking part, get yourself some extra sponsorship too.

One last thing, watch out for aliens when inside, including this one in the lobby …

The daytime view from the Royal Observatory

On Thursday I was lucky enough to be invited there for the Astronomy Photographer of the Year Awards 2010 (thanks to my friend Anna who worked on a series of astrophotography Tutorials to accompany the exhibition). I’m fortunate that in my day job (when I’m not writing Johnny Mackintosh books) I get to travel the world, going to many scientific conferences, so can reveal that all the other scientists are jealous of astronomers because of their beautiful photographs and the way they can capture the public’s imagination.

Fuel Cell Photo, courtesy Avni Argun and Nathan Ashcraft, MIT

The Horsehead Nebula

Would you rather look at this MIT photo of a new fuel cell membrane (of course enormously important research) or of the Horsehead Nebula? However important the science, it’s no contest really. This Horsehead Nebula image won the 2009 Competition for amateur astronomer Martin Pugh. It helps show that, even now in the twenty-first century, amateurs can and do make a great contribution to this particular science.

There were several categories:

Earth & Space

Our Solar System

Deep Space

Young Astronomy Photographer of the Year

People & Space

Best Newcomer

Like the Costa Book Awards, the overall winner is chosen from the victors in the different categories. The awards were sponsored by Sky at Night Magazine and photo-sharing site Flickr.

The great team at the Royal Observatory had put together a planetarium show with all the shortlisted entires – it’s a breathtaking watch. Before the winners were announced, from all the pictures I saw I picked out three personal favourites:

The Green Visitor by Richard Higby

Richard Higby was only highly commended for this photograph of Comet Lulin, but I thought it was one of the most impressive entries. It’s a beautiful image that it’s a once in a lifetime opportunity to snap. But it’s much more than that, with the coloration telling us much about the chemical makeup of the comet, in this case revealing the presence of special, diatomic carbon molecules (C₂).

Rogelio Bernal Andreo's Orion Deep Field

Rogelio Bernal Andreo produced an incredible wide-field shot of the area of space around Orion’s Belt, to win the Deep Space category. I especially loved the image because it includes Alnitak and the Horsehead Nebula, two places that feature prominently in the Johnny Mackintosh books. It’s incredible that a land-based amateur photographer can bring us something like this, that I’ve only seen the like of in Hubble Images before. I’d suggest it didn’t win overall, partly because it is a little like the type of spectacular astrophoto we’re already used to, and partly because of the subject matter being too close to last year’s winner.

The third image I especially liked proved to be the overall winner, and was Tom Lowe’s Blazing Bristlecone, so named because of the way the Milky Way mirrors the shape of the Bristlecone pines. With my artistic hat on, I’d say the composition’s excellent. With my scientist’s hat on, I fear a little for because the beauty of the Milky Way, something that was a commonplace sight for every human being who’s walked the planet until the last few decades, is now lost to all too many people.

With global light pollution preventing us from looking skyward, where will the next generation of astronomers or scientists generally come from? That’s why competitions such as this, and the dissemination of other spectacular images by the world’s astronomers and space agencies are so important – that and that they’re just so magnificent and beautiful.

Tom Lowe's Blazing Bristlecone

On a final, popularization of science note, it was tremendous to meet up with some many people in the same location who have this shared desire to inspire the next generation of space scientists, but I couldn’t help thinking we could have been in big trouble had a comet such as Lovin piled into the Royal Observatory and vaporized the community in one fell swoop.  Perhaps there should be a rule tha everyone shouldn’t be in the same place at once, the same way that the secret formula for Coke lives on?

Happily, that didn’t happen, so and everyone can visit the exhibition for free until the end of February next year. If you can’t make it to Greenwich, then do at least pay a visit to the Flickr group.

If Johnny were especially lucky, he might have a cake a little like the one baked for my birthday last year:

Readers of Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London will know the book opens on Johnny’s birthday, but it wasn’t originally 23rd April. If I remember, I set the first day of the early drafts as 14 April, but eventually decided I needed to move a little later in the month for the chronology to coincide better with the final day of the football season.

Growing up in Nottingham, every year I’d participate in the St George’s Day Parade (as a cub and then scout), which was generally a pain as it often coincided with the FA Cup semifinals (only highlights) on the TV. It’s hard for people to imagine how starved of televised football we were back then.

More recently, St George seemed to have fallen out of fashion with the absurd position the English couldn’t celebrate our own patron saint. Here in London we’re still in the frankly rather strange position where we have a huge parade from Trafalgar Square on St Patrick’s Day (the patron saint of Ireland) yet there’s normally been next to nothing for St George himself. No offence to our Irish neighbours who I love dearly, but happily George is returning to prominence.

There are also celebrations for Shakespeare at the Globe on the south bank. Being a writer, it’s impossible not to be aware of the shadow of the most famous ever Britain, who looms over all our work. When I moved the date to 23rd April it was actually with a nod to the bard, as I’d heard that he lived in Shoreditch, which is the same part of London as me. Just before Christmas, the site of his original theatre was discovered about half a mile from my house. There’s not a lot left, as it was deconstructed in Shakespeare’s own lifetime with the timbers removed to be used in the building of a new theatre to show off his plays – the Globe. It would be funny if, one day, while performing Henry V there, the final line of the opening scene of Act 3 was spoken as:

Cry ‘God for Harry, England, and Johnny Mackintosh!’

Hackney is close to where I live in London. Shakespeare’s original theatre is there, where he performed in person as well as having his plays first staged (before it was dismantled and the timbers used to construct The Globe on London’s south bank). Nowadays it’s home to another theatre, the famous Hackney Empire, and is represented in Parliament by Diane Abbott MP (a regular on my favourite telly show, This Week).

Throughout its history it’s been a haven for free-thinkers, partly because it’s just five miles outside the centre of historic London which meant people were able to give speeches there criticizing the state and the church that weren’t allowed any closer in (by an Act of Parliament long before Diane Abbott’s time).

It’s also where I shall be giving a little talk on World Book Day. I hope this shan’t be too subversive, even though I’ll explain how time travel is possible and why aliens are almost certain to exist in our galaxy, as well as discussing whether or not there was ever a real place called Atlantis.

If you want to listen and even get yourself a signed copy of Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London, make your way to the Hackney Museum and Library for 4.30pm. The full address is

Hackney Museum

1 Reading Lane

London E1 1GQ

The event’s been organized by the fabulous Victoria Park Books and I’ll be there until around 6.30 and will be talking with two other writers, Belinda Hollyer and Gaby Halberstam. For younger readers, there’ll be some other authors too: David Lucas, Kevin Waldron, Carolyn Hink, Guy Bass and Will Gatti. We all look forward to meeting you.

Before getting started I had five minutes to judge the winners of a poetry competition from a shortlist – this was impossible because the standard was incredibly high. I confess I wimped out and drew the names of the winners from out of a hat but I’d say to everyone whose poem was there, their entries were superb and I’m sure there are some future writers among the finalists.

I began trying to talk a little about story-telling. With a willing volunteer and a couple of trusty umbrellas (doubling as light sabres) I re-enacted the pivotal scene from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back to demonstrate the beauty of a plot twist, before also talking about Harry Potter, probably the series that most influenced my writing.

We moved on through discussions of time travel (which clearly happens in Hounslow as some of the pupils had actually met Albert Einstein earlier that very day), the possible location of Atlantis and the existence of aliens. Of course those are all elements of the Johnny Mackintosh story and I hope whetted a few appetites for the book. Then I rushed through a reading of when Johnny (and Clara) are taken into space for the very first time.

The reason it was rushed was because I overran terribly, partly because of all the hands in the air while I was talking to my eager listeners. I didn’t want to ignore possible the best audience I’ll ever have, so I found myself stopping all the time to take questions (which I didn’t feel I did justice to properly). I was asked if there was a moral to my story, whether I’d seen the Transformers film, if you went back in time how could you bring the dead back to life, and zillions more, all of them fascinating and thought-provoking.

Looking back, I probably made the cardinal author’s sin of not saying enough about my own writing and book, so if there’s anyone from the school who wants to ask me a question they didn’t get to pose on the day, or one they felt I didn’t answer well enough, or they couldn’t even get to the talk so missed out on asking a burning question about Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London, me or writing and stories in general, now’s your chance. If you leave a comment on this entry I promise to give you a considered reply.

And, finally, thanks to everyone for being such a wonderful audience.

Checking it out, Get London Reading is a biennial event sponsored by the Mayor (Boris seems a literary sort of chap so I’m sure he’ll keep it going) promoting reading in the capital. Sadly, it ran from 25 March through to the end of April, but if you visit the website there’s an interactive map showing the locations for various London-themed reads.

Naturally, I suggested they add Johnny Mackintosh and the Spirit of London, placing it at location EC3A 8BF (site of the Gherkin). But I’m sure the more votes it gets the better, so feel free to demand its inclusion (somewhere in that Wellington boot-shaped patch just below the “n” of “Houndsditch”).

When it runs again in two years’ time, will they let me give a reading in the space at the very top of 30 St Mary Axe?