Robert Barry

Very excited to announce that Soho Electronic festival will be happening again in about one month's time, with performances from Nik Colk Void, Agnes Haus, Howlround, and various others, plus, most importantly, me. tickets from Dice dice.fm/event/3o8pbv...

www.theguardian.com/books/2026/o... wait. what happens if Rooney says she's gonna give Chris Haughton and Nicola Davies' royalties to PA? And then some more authors pledge to give their royalties to Haughton and Davies in solidarity? Sod stockpiling food and water, I'm gonna start stockpiling books.

last time my mum came to one of my gigs she said afterwards, “i liked it when it ended”.

Looking forward to the section of the race where all the riders queue for hours to have their fingerprints taken for the EU Entry/Exit system when crossing the channel.

‘For all the melancholy of the themes, the Turner Prize in 2026 feels more alive than it has in years, animated by the pleasures of stuff, buoyed by a sense of wonder at the world.’ Robert Barry reviews a display of work by the shortlisted artists.

There is a new issue of The Wire out now and I have contributed reviews of Oslo's Ultima Festival, a book by Jacob Smith about New Age music plus a profile of Concentric Group, an artists' record label forged at the Bauhaus.

At Neiderdorf’s annual potato festival “the original” in northern Italy. Disappointing lack of potato-themed content tbh

‘Mendieta is rarely thought of as a “media artist”, in the mould of Nam June Paik or Trevor Paglen, but whether drawing on paper made of tree bark or shooting on 16mm film, the physicality of different materials is at the forefront of her work.’ Robert Barry on Ana Mendieta at Tate Modern.

if you know you know

Texted a friend yesterday and he wrote back to say he was on the Côte d’Azur. I said, Nice? He said, very!

read an Eric Ambler book recently and got really nostalgic for a time when you could just decide to go to a place and get on a train and go to that place without spending weeks planning and booking things in advance. weird how the instantaneity of the net has actually made spontaneous travel harder.

One of two mirror balls installed by Charlemagne Palestine in the Tonspur passage in Vienna’s museum quarter.

am being relentlessly pursued the length and breadth of this train platform by a wasp. hate to be a cop but if it boards the train i’m gonna have to call the conductor to inspect its ticket.

the way apple maps actually makes street names smaller when you zoom in should be considered a hate crime against people over 40.

kicking off Lasse Marhaug’s marathon 24-hour noise concert at the old studios of the Norwegian national broadcaster…

Last week I was Eupen in the east of Belgium, watching people make sounds out of ceramics, kilims and burning microphones. Read my report on Meakusma Festival @thequietus.com here thequietus.com/quietus-revi...

Mental how many people drive innit

next week on firstfloor dot com: Sia Not Actually That Little 12 Year Old Girl!

Ok so for once I don't actually have any writing in the new issue of The Wire. BUT you should STILL BUY IT. Because *even without me* it remains – somehow, incredibly – a fantastic magazine.

It's funny how, any time someone makes a vaguely fact-based historical drama movie, if they cast Jeremy Strong as a real historical figure, you know 100% for sure the director thinks that person is an absolute tool.

When I heard Tim Curry had died, oddly perhaps, because I do love those films, what first sprang to mind was not Rocky Horror or Clue, but an exchange from early on in Skolimowski's The Shout: "He's not entirely normal," "What's normal?"

if someone earnestly brought up either their own or anybody else's IQ in conversation i would walk away while they're still talking. incredibly boring and unpleasant type of stupid to be. homie you got brain damage from an online quiz. wow 135 that's so smart, what hogwarts house did you get

i feel like Kurtag should be more popular online. like here’s this guy making all these funny little bits of music, they’re a bit wacky, a bit silly sometimes, but they’re a minute long so🤷guy basically invnted tiktok but it’s contemporary music.

I really love Joni Mitchell's records, but for years I avoided ever listening to Blue out of some sort of instinctive aversion. Now, much later and much more familiar with Blue, any time I do hear one of the songs from that album I can't help but think, shit, I was right all along! That album sucks!

Heads up that I'm putting on another basement party next month to celebrate my being a year older www.brunswickpub.co.uk/event-detail...

For this month's @bandcamp.com Tape Label Report, I caught up with the good folks behind Bloxham Tapes. Read it, if you like: daily.bandcamp.com/tape-label-r... @alisoncotton.bsky.social @obsidianshard.bsky.social @lukedrozd.bsky.social

It's new issue of The Wire time! This month, I interviewed reclusive mystery man of Portuguese electronic music, Nuno Canavarro and reviewed a festival of sound art in the suburbs of Copenhagen on the hottest day in Danish history.

god i hate it when things are "highly anticipated"

wrote about apes, blockchains, protocols and music for @artreview.bsky.social artreview.com/the-blockcha...

I reviewed Oliver Beer's recent show at Ropac, London, for @artreview.bsky.social artreview.com/oliver-beer-...

This was a nice one

Our age of bronze is collapsing

Bought tickets to see the Philip Venables opera 4:48 Psychosis and my google calendar has helpfully autocorrected to 16:48 Psychosis, so now every time I look at the calendar for October it's like, oh, yes, I must remember to go mad at about ten to five in the afternoon that day.

apparently it’s 20 years to the day since me and a bunch of pals from brighton released an album that changed our lives (and maybe a few other people’s too). so, for old times sake, let’s all pull some shapes youtu.be/HbnVNZe2D_0

Dear Hearts, If you don't already, please think about dropping a few quid a month on a Quietus subscription during the last day of the 1/3 off sale. And if you can't afford it, maybe give us a 'reskeet' instead! Thx! thequietus.com/subscribers/

Wrote a little bit about some of the records by Fluxus-affiliated artists and composers in my collection for @thequietus.com 's subscribers thequietus.com/subscriber-a...

Cometh the hour cometh the bin.

Wrote a few little bits for @thequietus.com Albums of the Year So Far chart about recent albums by Juni Habel and Bergrún Snæbjörnsdóttir. But who made the top spot? Only one way to find out, pop pickers! thequietus.com/tq-charts/al...