What to do with a day’s annual leave during a tube strike? Well, if you’re a sensible person you stay home and maybe have a nice walk in the forest. If you’re me, you force your husband to spend many hours of his birthday on various modes of transport to go and see two things in West London. As I type this, I’m suddenly reminded of the time I made him stand on a traffic island in Waterloo on his birthday so I could take a photo of the Number 4 bus. It was a gift for my baby niece, don’t ya know?
Anyway, he didn’t complain. I think he was glad someone else was making decisions for him, even if those decisions weren’t always soundly made. But it all turned out fine. I hadn’t even told him I’d taken the day off work until after we’d been out for coffee so his head was probably spinning too much to even considering complaining.
I didn’t tell him where we were going until we were outside and a large sign gave him the answer he was looking for. I won’t try to maintain the same suspense with you as it’s right there in the post title – it’s an exhibition on Kurt Cobain, in the context of the MTV Unplugged session from 1993. All through the journey, I’d tried hard to manage his expectations because the £5 ticket price made me think this was not going to be a huge exhibition. And while they had two impressive artefacts on display, the wording in the marketing made me wonder if they had anything else other than those two artefacts. Still, I think Nathan was pleasantly surprised when the “two things” turned out to be things he was actually interested in and not just two random things. I am good at managing expectations, as it turns out.
First tho, a word on my tube strike hack journey. We usually go to South Ken on the Piccadilly Line – Overground from HP, Vic line from Walthamstow, Pic line from Finsbury Park. But the Overground was the only bit of that that was functioning that day so we went all the way to Liverpool Street and hoped that the Elizabeth Line was open.
It was! The usual tube entrance – opposite the Overground platforms – was closed but the separate entrance outside the station was open and there was no queue to get in. It’s the entrance near the Amazon Fresh shop. A few days after this, I would see the queue for that entrance stretch all the way back to the station building and round the corner so we were lucky to be travelling in the middle of the day.
From Liverpool Street, it’s a mere hop on the Liz Line to Paddington and from there a mile’s walk to South Ken. I was slightly sceptical about the last bit, as thunderstorms had been forecast but we were in luck. It was drizzly as we emerged from Paddington but it soon cleared up and we crossed Hyde Park in glorious sunshine.
It felt a bit like an American romcom set in London – doesn’t every Londoner cross Hyde Park on an daily basis in those films? – but it genuinely was the easiest way and brought us out just near the Royal College of Music. I’ve only attempted this route once before and that definitely was in the rain – that time we had teens and suitcases (the aforementioned baby niece) and had to hide out in Queen Anne’s Alcove to eat our pasta salad. No sniggering at the back there.
So we definitely lucked out managing to time this between rainstorms. Tho a rainstorm in Hyde Park would have been very American romcom too. And we saw some amazing dogs on the way, including four giant ones that looked like lions. Good boys. We also saw the Peter Pan statue, tho it’s hard to get a photo without tourists in it:
Then we found where we were actually meant to be, the secret was revealed and all we had to do was go down a couple of flights of stairs, through a museum of instruments and up another flight to find where were meant to be. Even without the exhibition, RCM is worth a visit. The interiors are gorgeous and it has this really quirky building-within-a-building bit:
The exhibition was indeed small but there were more than just two things to look at. We were there for about 40 minutes in all I reckon, as there were bits to read and watch as well as the two main attractions. But I can’t hold off from telling you about them for much longer so here they are:
Thing 1 – Kurt Cobain’s guitar that he was playing for the Unplugged session. It came with the original case and number of little oddities that were inside the case (cutlery themed lapel pins, for one):
It’s a right-handed guitar adapted for left-handed playing i.e. the strings have been put the other way up. Which means that the scratchplate is on the wrong side to be of any use and so you can see all the scratches where the scratchplate should be.
Thing 2 – Kurt Cobain’s cardigan that he was wearing for the Unplugged session. This was also in “pre-loved” state, with a cigarette burn, a missing button and a mysterious stain. But that made it authentic, right? One of the descriptions said Kurt was wearing a green cardigan for the session but to me it looks grey, both IRL and on the videos they were playing. Maybe it was green when it was first made and has faded? This could be Gen X’s version of the white/gold dress debate.
There are also displays around the edges, telling the story of both Nirvana and the guitar. There are some handwritten notes from Kurt to his manager and some handwritten lyrics too. There’s a wall of post-its from other visitors, which range from the amazingly intricate:
To the “not written by me but it could have been?”:
The thing I found most intriguing though was the video of the band rehearsing for the MTV session. It’s really interesting to see them try songs, screw them up, bicker a little and then do it better. Just like running a choir or a ukulele group. They really struggled with “The Man Who Sold the World”, proving my theory that it’s impossible to play the riff and sing the melody at the same time. I sat and watched the video for ages and felt better about my own abilities on that song as a result.
There was also an interactive room, with Guitar Hero and dress-up cardigans but it wasn’t entirely clear whether we were allowed in there or whether it was, essentially, for children. It had a photo opportunity, with the Unplugged black candles and a wall of ukuleles but I tried a couple of ukes and they weren’t tuned so I quickly gave up.
So, not a massive exhibition but certainly worth a visit while it’s on. There are audio guides included in the ticket price so it’s extremely reasonable and any Nirvana fan would enjoy it, I reckon.
We had a quick look at the musical instruments gallery downstairs and then emerged to find that we had missed another storm.
I always enjoy a wander down Exhibition Road and it’s especially pretty in the post-storm sunshine:
And I forgot to mention earlier that we also spotted a giant ape along the way:
We were on the search for food and I’d remembered there was something “like a fake Subway” at South Kensington tube. I was hoping it would be open, even though the station wasn’t. And it was! It’s called “More Than Just Subs” but Nathan, exercising his right to freewill, had a sub anyway. Plus some chips:
It’s a pretty cost-effective way to eat in a pricey area, especially as we had birthday curry planned for later and didn’t want to ruin our appetites. I had a BBQ Chicken wrap which was tasty but extremely messy to eat.
Then we decided to go an alternative tube-strike-hack way home, starting with a 430 bus to West Brompton. It wasn’t exactly fast-moving so, after a long time in the same place, we decided to get off the bus and walk the last stop. At which point, it obviously shot off without us. And that’s the same point as the heavens opened and our rain-dodging luck finally ran out.
Ah well, it wasn’t far to the station and then we just needed to sit on the Mildmay Line for 45 until it reached Hackney Central. I’d like to say that we took in all the sights of Willesden, Hampstead and Camden on the way but truth be told, there isn’t much you can see from the train. There were some nice greenhouses at Kensington Olympia though.
And that was pretty much it for our adventure. I wouldn’t necessarily choose to do it on a tube strike day again but it all worked out well. The exhibition is on until November so if you’re interested click here for tickets and more info. Just look at this happy birthday boy:
