Site search

Bittersweet streets: a look at artist Julian Pinnick's new exhibition at Broadway Gallery

Anyone who has lived in Nottingham for years will have snapshots in their mind of characters, shops and moments lost to time, but one local artist has gone a step further, memorialising fleeting scenes of Nottingham’s past in paint. Ahead of an upcoming exhibition at Broadway Gallery, Liz Johnson talks to Julian Pinnick about his creative journey and why slow art can capture a changing urban landscape

Nottingham's Streets Paved With Stories In Literary Map

Literary lovers don’t need to wait any longer to get their hands on a copy of
Nottingham’s Literary Map...

These Streets Are Ours: Beeston

In our latest edition of love letters to Nottingham neighbourhoods, local wordsmith Matt Turpin, editor of The Beestonian magazine, discusses the creative melting pot of Beeston.

Review: Beat The Streets 2026

“This is our 8th edition since 2018; we’ve raised over half a million pounds so far!” proudly announces Managing Director of DHP Family George Akins during the Beat The Streets press tour backstage at Rock City. It’s a mind-blowing sum of money and a reminder that this festival hasn’t just become a staple of the Notts calendar for giving the city an amazing day of live music – it’s an event that makes a huge difference. Heading out for another day of venue roaming and charity fundraising, this is what our LeftLion team got up to at Beat The Streets 2026…

Beat The Streets 2026

Fine Fat Funk: Fat Digester talk thirty years of making music ahead of Beat the Streets

Not many Nottingham-based bands and acts can boast a thirty-year longevity, but Fat Digester certainly can. The eclectic, cool and funky collective have been making audiences move and groove in awe since the 90s, and have no intention of stopping or slowing anytime soon. We had a chat with frontman Paul 'Ned' Needham all about the band’s approaches, stage shows and very exciting future plans!

These streets are ours: The Park Estate

In the latest in our series of love letters to Nottingham neighbourhoods, Andrew Spencer explores The Park Estate, Nottingham’s wealthiest and perhaps most secret set of streets…

These streets are ours: Sneinton Market Avenues

For this instalment of These Streets are Ours we celebrate the creative hub of Sneinton Market Avenues…

Follow the stickers: Notts filmmaker Matt Watts on the stories behind sticker art on the streets

Hidden amongst the barrage of commercial advertisements and billboards that dominate our city landscape, the more curious among us may be drawn to some unusual markings; the plethora of quirky stickers plastered on lampposts, signs and electrical boxes. Follow the Stickers is a short film by Nottingham-based documentary filmmaker Matt Watts. Here he shares his journey of tangents, discovering artists, events and more obscure messages of the underground sticker world, and telling us why we should keep an eye out for them too… 

Greening the streets: street artist Anna Wheelhouse on community and big canvases

Anna Wheelhouse is one of Nottingham’s most well-known street artists, with her signature, verdant nature-themed murals enlivening buildings and walls around the city, from pubs to parks to back gardens. We talked to her about her lifelong passion for the arts, and the benefits of working on a larger canvas. 

Whose streets are they anyway? How street art crossed the pond from New York to the East Midlands

Graffiti, tags, murals, stenciling, paste-ups… street art is a diverse artform with many subcategories and styles. While some might deride the practice under the blanket term of vandalism, for proponents of the artform, taking art out of the gallery and into the streets is about civil disobedience, ownership of space, and creative expression outside of the mainstream. We dip into the origins of graffiti in NYC and speak to artist Richie ‘Pops’ Baker about how the medium came to Nottingham in the 1980s…

These streets are ours: Sherwood's Haydn Road

Boasting independent bars and restaurants, plus a great selection of charity shops for the thrift-lovers among us, the Nottingham suburb of Sherwood has been a popular destination for a leisurely afternoon for many years now. But just off the high street, Haydn Road offers a surprising selection of local staples. In this new regular feature - celebrating lesser-known but much-loved areas of Nottinghamshire, Sophie Gargett meets the traders of Haydn Road and muses on the merits of local shopping.

The founders of Hyson Green Community Action tell us why they're greening and cleaning their streets

Combating fly-tipping pile ups that pose health hazards to loved ones, Hyson Green Community Action was a naturally formed group sparked from the thirty year build of frustration from sisters Zaynab and Farzana Akhtar. Starting with a popular petition, Hyson Green locals have come together to not only change their environment, but the mindset of the younger generation who call the area home. We decided to talk to the sisters behind the clean scheme to discover their future goals and current achievement.

Review: Beat The Streets 2025

It may have been a cold and rainy day, but that didn’t stop thousands of Notts residents darting between Talbot, Pelham and Broad Street for this year’s edition of Beat The Streets. With the annual festival having raised a whopping £491,100 for Framework since it began back in 2018, this was another opportunity for local music fans to enjoy the vibrant sounds of our great city and raise vital funds for this great cause in the process. Not ones to miss out, we sent our team down to the festival to capture the sights and sounds of this amazing event...

Beat The Streets 2025 preview: 10 acts you must see

Since its inaugural event in 2018, charity festival Beat The Streets has firmly established itself as the annual curtain-raiser for Nottingham’s music scene. We look at ahead to this year's edition...

LeftLion Interviews Podcast #8: George Akins on Rock City, Beat The Streets, Thekla, Dot To Dot, Massive Attack and 30 years working in live music

A bonus eighth episode  talking with the most influential man in the Nottingham music scene, George Akins; owner of DHP Family, Rock City, Rescue Rooms, Bodega, Stealth, Splendour Festival, Dot To Dot and more...

THePETEBOX on The Voice UK, Working With will.i.am, and Beat the Streets

Nottingham’s Pete Sampson, aka THePETEBOX, has been making music for about the same amount of time that this very magazine has existed. Now based in London, the 2023 semi-finalist of The Voice UK chats to us about being coached by will.i.am, his appearance at Beat The Streets, and what’s coming up for him in 2024…

Festival Review: Beat The Streets 2024

DHP Family’s Beat The Streets saw huge crowds gather to enjoy a full day of live music on Sunday, with tens of thousands of pounds expected to be added to the fundraising total for Framework from this year’s event. Here are the LeftLion music team’s thoughts on the 2024 edition of the festival…

Thousands Showed Up For DHP’s Beat The Streets Raising Vital Funds For Framework

DHP Family’s Beat The Streets saw huge crowds gather to enjoy a full day of live music on Sunday, with tens of thousands of pounds expected to be added to the fundraising total for Framework from this year’s event...

We Speak to Festival Booker Joe Patten Ahead of This Year’s Beat the Streets

Tomorrow, Beat the Streets Festival will return to the streets of Nottingham. We spoke to festival booker Joe Patten to gain his perspective on the festival’s continued success since 2018...

We Chat to Framework Night Support Worker Jordan Francis Ahead of Beat The Streets

Ahead of this weekend’s Beat The Streets festival - founded in 2018 by Nottingham promotors DHP in conjunction with Framework - we caught up with night support worker Jordan Francis to find out more about the challenges he faces and the role music can play in shining a light on an a spiralling issue...

From Art Exhibition Launches to Beat The Streets Festival: Here's What's on in Notts 22 - 28 January 2024

This week in Nottingham, enjoy live music in aid of a great cause at Beat The Streets, celebrate the opening of new exhibitions at Nottingham Contemporary, or join the National Holocaust Museum for Holocaust Memorial Day...

We Catch Up With Bloodworm Ahead of Beat the Streets

In 2023 their first headline show in Nottingham sold out and in 2024 they will take to the Beat The Streets stage. We catch up with Bloodworm to find out what to expect from their set, what else they've got planned for the year, and when we can expect to hear some new tunes from them...

We Speak to Alfie Sharp Ahead of Beat the Streets

With debut EP Home Truths on the way, which will be celebrated with a launch show at Peggy's Skylight, we chat all things Beat The Streets with Alfie Sharp...

We Chat to the Cost of Loving Ahead of Beat the Streets

One of the most exciting up-and-coming bands from Nottingham right now, The Cost of Loving have made a mark with their recent singles Esports Player, Strings (Attached) and Remorse Code. We chat to them ahead of their appearance at Beat The Streets festival at the end of this month...