Massive Attack

Incongruous fact: Massive Attack were once heavily supported by Neneh Cherry. But that Robert Del Naja and Andrew Vowles returned the favour and worked on Raw Like Sushi is not too surprising. After all, the Bristol-based pair started out as producers and went on to influence artists from Mos Def to Madlib to Madonna (?), not to mention defining an entire genre.
 
Now, the legendary trip hop duo is coming to Australia for the first time since 2003. Their fifth official album has generated muddled reviews, and the Guardian noted that they still sound as “listless” as ever, but fans of anything they made pre-2000 will know that this is, in fact, a great thing. more... - Millie Stein

15-16 MARCH / OPERA HOUSE / $119

I’m thinking I might not tell you about this one event. See, I know it’s my job as an editor of a hip Sydney events guide to tell you about it, but some things are just so great, and so secret, and so preserved, that I fancy keeping them all for myself. It’s a conflict of interest, of a sort. But my commitment to the public good always wins out in the end, so it is with great hesitation that I present to you: bams & ted. It’s a little stroke of genius wrapped in a pretty tulle ribbon. It’s an art installation, a vintage shop, a dress-up box, and an immersive cinema fantasy in one. It’s everything I want to be, and its launching phase two at the Gaffa Gallery Arcade Project come Thursday eve.

There are some other good things in the rest of the week, too, I guess.

In the meantime, if you’re reading this thinking ‘I could do better’, why not raise your hand to be our new deputy editor? It’s a grand ol’ adventure in the Land of the Internet. Join us.

RIMA SABINA AOUF

Wilderness 

We're surrounded by strangely shaped trees bearing no resemblance to those that feature in the European canon, and the vast majority of our landscape is uninhabited, extreme and alien, even to us. It is with this in mind that Wilderness, a collection of contemporary painting, is drawn together. more... - Trish Roberts

UNTIL 23 MAY / AGNSW / FREE

The Beauty Queen of Leenane 

There’s something disarming about 'irishness'. It has a geniality to it that speaks of the salt-of-the-earth everyman that every other man wants to have a pint of Guinness with; it’s only as the play progresses that sinister undertones begin to germinate and a compelling psychological dimension reveals itself. more... - Anna Harrison

UNTIL 13 MARCH / WHARF THEATRE / $31

bams & ted   

Vintage pop-up shop bams & ted in the Gaffa Gallery’s Arcade Project have curated three collections rotating around a different movie. Tonight they launch ‘Francie’, based on the dashing femme fatale of Hitchcock’s 1955 To Catch a Thief — think French Riviera resort-wear, ginormous jewels, slinky black cat burglar suits and, if we’re lucky, a handsome man called Cary Grant who is available for rental by the hour. more... - Angela Bennetts

 UNTIL 1 MAY / GAFFA / FREE

The Scare

WIN ONE OF FOUR DOUBLE PASSES

The Scare have stripped back the distortion and slowed things down to a danceable groove, working the angles into more, ahem, angular angles featuring biting guitars and wirey bass fighting it out underneath singer Kiss' attention-demanding vocals. more... - Jai Pyne

FRI & SAT / SPECTRUM / $15

Free Hip Hop Classes 

If you think you can dance or you want to be just like your idol Nacho Pop, get your best B-Boy outfit on and head to Eveleigh. Get yourself ready for the Platform 3 Hip Hop Festival, coming to CarriageWorks mid-March. more... - Rhiannon Sawyer

11AM / CARRIAGEWORKS / FREE

Hymn to Beauty Film Series 

As kimono clad onlookers a few floors above traipse around the Hymn to Beauty: The Art of Utamaro exhibition ogling delicate ukiyo-e woodblock prints, rest your weary geta clogs in the downstairs theatrette. In Zatôichi, tonight, meet an Edo-period superhero: blind gambler/masseuse by day, master swordsman at night. more... - Kate Jinx

 UNTIL 18 APRIL / AGNSW / FREE

Up the Cross

Kings Cross has a rich history of fateful meetings, missings and other miscreant behaviour. In the summer of '70-'71, photographers Rennie Ellis and Wesley Stacey were in town to capture exactly that. more... - Kate Jinx

  UNTIL 8 AUGUST / MUSEUM OF SYDNEY / $10