glasgow

Most of us have probably been in a slump lately and in need of some good, uplifting news. So Glasgow said: “Hold my jelly beans.” The immersive Willy Wonka Experience that went viral last week has been an excellent source of entertainment for people across all social media platforms. And while it wasn’t so fun for the actors involved or the people who bought tickets for $40, the level of absurdity kind of does make one chuckle nonetheless.For those unaware, we’re talking about the Willy Wonka “immersive experience” (the…

Even taking the base concept of The Unknown out of the equation, the world, as you’ve probably ascertained, is bad. It’s a bad place for bad people, and bad things happen in it.  Sometimes, humans like to comfort ourselves by thinking that we can contain the bad, the way that we did in Glasgow in early 2024 when a pop up called “Willy’s Chocolate Experience” was swiftly shut down by a confluence of law enforcement officers and the kinds of mothers who would like to speak to the manager. For the uninitiated, the…

Billy Coull, organizer of the now virally infamous knockoff Willy Wonka-themed family event in Glasgow last weekend, on Friday sought to calm furious parents demanding refunds for the pricey but decidedly lackluster “immersive” exhibit. In a statement shared on Facebook, he issued apologies to customers and reiterated a promise to refund everyone. “Willy’s Chocolate Experience,” the trademark-skirting name given to Coull’s botched venture, was supposed to offer young fans of Roald Dahl’s novel Charlie and the…

You’d think the biggest headlines surrounding an annual celebration of sci-fi and fantasy writing would be applauding the winners—but that’s not always the case with the Hugos. Its latest controversy involves works being deemed “not eligible” for consideration at the 2023 event, which was presented by Chengdu Worldcon in Chengdu, China. Now, we have a touch more clarity about what happened—and an apology from the organization as it looks to the future.The 2023 Hugos were handed out in October, but rumblings about the…

Alasdair Gray was one of Scotland’s most distinctive talents. A Glaswegian artist and writer, he celebrated his native city in tales that combined fantasy with dark urban realism and in paintings that evoked civic life in vivid detail.He wrote Lanark, one of the greatest British novels of the 20th century; adorned many of the city’s bars, restaurants and stations with his distinctive murals; and inspired a generation of younger Scottish writers, including Iain Banks and Irvine Welsh.“He was a modern-day William Blake,”…

Are you ready to O.D. on Jesus and Mary Chain? The group’s latest single, “jamcod,” which will appear on their upcoming Glasgow Eyes LP, finds frontman Jim Reid singing, “Tears are what you want, tears are what you got,” before the band’s trademark noise, led by Jim’s brother William’s guitar, kicks in and he builds to the titular chant: “J.A.M.C.O.D.” The group will achieve full overdose potential when Glasgow Eyes comes out on March 8. The band recorded the album, which contains typically iconoclastic-looking…

Scotland’s foremost country music venue has voted narrowly to ban the use of the Confederate flag because of its “toxic” associations with slavery and white supremacy.Members of Glasgow’s Grand Ole Opry voted 50 to 48 to maintain a ban brought in by the venue’s managing committee last month. The emergency general meeting on Monday evening was the culmination of a bitter internal dispute that resulted in the resignation of the committee’s president two weeks ago.The row centred around the use of the red and blue cross in a…

This crushingly intimate drama occupies a space barely larger than a bedroom in the rundown council house where much of the story unfolds. Even on its few ventures outside, the location filming is delivered in tight closeups, the environment beyond the figures little more than colourful smeary blurs of light. You would hardly know it was shot in Glasgow.The people at the centre of the story are young mother Grace (French actor Déborah Lukumuena, from Divines) and her pubescent daughter Ama (Le’Shantey Bonsu), Congolese…

Sam Smith has said they are cancelling their concerts in Glasgow and Birmingham due to a “vocal cord injury”.The 31-year-old singer, who uses they/them pronouns and is non-binary, was forced to end their Manchester AO Arena show on Wednesday after the fourth song.The tour, which is in support of their fourth studio album, Gloria, was set to play Ovo Hydro in Glasgow on Thursday and Resorts World Arena in Birmingham on Saturday.The dates had been rescheduled in April by Smith due to illness.In an Instagram story to Smith’s…

| Fantagraphics is to publish Scrooge McDuck: The Dragon of Glasgow, a new hardcover graphic novel set in the Don Rosa Ducks universe, and gtelling the story of Uncle Scrooge's earliest days in nineteenth century Glasgow. Written by Joris Chamblain, drawn by Fabrizio Petrossi and translated by David Gerstein, Scrooge McDuck: The Dragon of Glasgow will be published on the 23rd of July, 2023. Return to Uncle Scrooge's epic past in this all-new standalone Disney graphic novel… full of thrills and chills in the long-ago…