IAN SINCLAIR draws attention to the powerful role that literature plays in foreseeing the way humanity will deal with climate crisis
Latest editorial
The original girl band
SYLVIA HIKINS relishes a brilliant untold Merseybeat story of how four talented women dared to break the mould
GDPG
High quality pulp, rollicking online murders, Abnorman Britain, and high skates drama: reviews of The Get Off, Everyone In The Group Chat Dies, Pagans and First To Fall
DENNIS BROE notes what happens to content when the streaming giants incorporate AI and deregulation into their economic models
New releases from The Tenementals, Nik Bartsch’s Ronin, and Kuunatic
SCOTT ALSWORTH hears the call to burn down and rebuild the video game industry from the bottom up
The Chinese language only introduced a feminine pronoun in the 1920s. Now, it might adopt a gender-inclusive one, suggests JANET DAVEY
ALEX HALL is intrigued by a detailed history of Gaza that demonstrates its historic resilience and changing economy
Girls Don’t Play Guitars
Royal Court Theatre, Liverpool
IN the early 1960s, changing their name from The Squaws to the fictional symbol of Liverpool, the four Liverbirds were one of the very few female bands on the Merseybeat scene, as well as one of the first all female rock and roll bands in the world. Yet how many of us have even heard of them?
Inspired by the Beatles, they went down to the Cavern Club to see what the Fab Four thought of an all-girl band. The response from John Lennon was his now infamous remark: “Girls don’t play guitars.” Unsurprisingly, The Liver Birds were shocked by this and they became even more determined to prove Lennon wrong.
More from this author
A manifesto for change, feminism in the digital age and a wordless play by Palestinians
SYLVIA HIKINS is enthralled by a biography of an extraordinary, 19th-century mould-breaker who influenced policies regarding the status of women in society
SYLVIA HIKINS applauds a musical show that emphasises the growing difference in songwriting between Lennon and McCartney
SYLVIA HIKINS revisits the visionary world of Blake in a handsome book that sets him alongside his European contemporaries
