MUSIC

Joanna Newsom

(Manchester, Brighton, Bristol)

The release of a new Joanna Newsom album is an event of some significance. Her pace is that of the tortoise: slow, steady, but triumphant: she’s touring Divers, her first release in half a decade. Four albums in she remains peerless, her watermarked vocals impossible to counterfeit. There are splashes of mock-Renaissance bard in brief harmonic curlicues, as well as frontier pioneer-like songs with strangely twisting lyrics. Her voice swoops and rises like a flock of birds, careening unpredictably around the hills and valleys of her songs. JLA

The rest of this week’s best live music

TALKS

Peep Show Farewell

(Greenwood Theatre, London, Thursday)

Bringing a touch of brilliance to the banal, Channel 4’s Croydon-based sitcom has long been a pop culture powerhouse. Besides its quote-a-second script (gems include the perpetually stoned Super Hans’s warning not to trust “people” because they “like Coldplay and voted for the Nazis”), Peep Show’s magic undoubtedly lies in the unlikely camaraderie between its leads. In the real world, chronic over-thinker Mark and Jez – whose life is one part drugs to two parts delusion – probably wouldn’t sit next to each other on the bus, let alone share a fingernail-sized flat. However, almost 50 episodes, countless cock-ups, umpteen crappy jobs and innumerable existential crises later, telly’s favourite millennial odd couple are still going strong. To mark the show’s ninth and final series, stars David Mitchell and Robert Webb and writers Sam Bain and Jesse Armstrong will be in conversation with The Guide’s own Julia Raeside, following a sneak peek at the duo’s latest mishaps. HJD

The rest of this week’s best talks

COMEDY

Beardyman

(Hull, Cambridge, Norwich)

The level of invention going on in musical comedy these days is quite something. While there are still plenty of skilled performers with guitars and keyboards, there’s also a new breed of acts exploring the wilder shores of hip-hop and electronica. Darren Foreman (AKA Beardyman) operates in a similar space to Rob Broderick’s acclaimed Abandoman, creating impressive rap pieces entirely prompted by audience suggestions. But Beardyman pushes things further through his multilayered tracks, largely created with loops of his own beatboxing. Very little instrumentation is involved; at the core of all his compositions are the noises he can make with his own lips, teeth and tongue. The end result is hugely entertaining and feels as if you’re witnessing something utterly unrepeatable. JK

The rest of this week’s best live comedy

CLUBS

Halloween parties across the UK

The best of the capital’s raves include Secretsundaze’s offering Carnival Du Freak (Shapes), where dressing up as something seriously twisted is encouraged; soundtracking the melting facepaint are the Black Madonna, Trus’me and Kassem Mosse. Chilling the blood with icy techno and tech-house is Drumcode’s takeover of Tobacco Dock, with Boddika and Pan-Pot among the guests. Maya Jane Coles, Damian Lazarus and Mount Kimbie go for billowing gothic techno grandeur at Building Six in the O2. Clutching a bucket of pound-shop sweets at the more low-key end is top underground label Apron’s night in a wee Stoke Newington spot DOT Cafe, with Greg Beato playing spooked-out house jams. Glasgow has Peter Van Hoesen playing alongside Pressure residents Slam, as well as Ivan Kutz and Petrichor, and Australian DJ Bella Sarris at SWG3. Nottingham has the return of Wigflex with Ron Morelli, Pearson Sound and Shackleton at The Brickworks, while in Bristol Rinse FM host and underground talent Krystal Klear heads up Vanishing Point’s night at Patterns.

All of this week’s best club events

TV

Broad City

(Monday, 11pm, Comedy Central)

A bit like Flight Of The Conchords but without the songs, Broad City follows two likable characters around New York – and charts their surreal experiences in the city. Tonight, Ilana and Abbi contend with the impossibility of life in the summer heat, and try to get an air conditioner by any means necessary. The trip includes an in-depth discussion of “swamp ass” and a forensic look at the Colin Farrell sex tape. A mission to steal an air conditioner from Ilana’s old college dorm room ends in a familiar pot-fuelled derailment. JR

THEATRE

Dry Land

(Jermyn Street Theatre, London, Tuesday to 21 November)

In the New York Times last year, its chief theatre critic Ben Brantley wondered why young women were such a potent force in theatre these days. While we have had the likes of Laura Wade, Polly Stenham and Lucy Prebble over here, Brantley was reacting to a debut play by Ruby Rae Spiegel, a 21-year-old Yale undergraduate. When Dry Land premiered off-Broadway, Brantley gave it five stars, describing it as “tender, caustic, funny and harrowing, often all at the same time”. Now it runs as part of the American season at Jermyn Street Theatre. A four-hander set in the locker room of a Florida high school, it covers such issues as abortion, female sexuality and the pressures of adolescence. MC

The rest of this week’s best theatre

FILM

Spectre

After the upheaval of Skyfall, the hallmarks of the traditional Bond movie are very much back in place here – and the good news is, Bond’s lightened up a bit, too. There’s the expected polish to the action set-pieces and international intrigues, which acknowledge both Bond movies past and the post-Snowden present. On the downside, there’s little for the women to do apart from look alluring, and a lot of nonsense to forgive in a plot that feels more retro-fitted than meticulously planned. SR

The rest of this week’s film releases

Alighiero Boetti

(Luxembourg & Dayan, London, to 12 December)

Anyone with a passing knowledge of arte povera (the mid-20th century movement that valued everyday materials) will be familiar with Boetti’s Mappa works. Embroidered world maps, in which each country is stitched with the design of the respective national flag, their production was outsourced to a group of women in Kabul. Yet this exhibition shows just how diverse the Italian artist’s output was. Taken from a single private collection, the show demonstrates Boetti’s fascination with both systems and abstraction. Highlights include a text painting in which all the words have been removed, leaving only punctuation; one of the first uses of photocopying in art; and a grid of wood blocks, engraved with various symbols, which are only able to fit inside their tray in one mysterious arrangement. OB

The rest of this week’s best exhibitions

FILM EVENT

Into Film festival

(Various venues, Wednesday to 20 November)

Thanks to mobile cinemas and pop-ups, this huge, free children’s film festival reaches all corners of the country – even those where there are no cinemas to host it such as the Scottish Highlands and rural Northern Ireland. Being for young people, and not during half-term, there’s a gently educational aspect to it, but what better way to learn about issues like cultural diversity or emotional intelligence than through movies such as Paddington or The Falling? The selection is huge (150-odd films), and guests include Romola Garai, who’s giving a Q&A after Suffragette, and cast members of Bill – though you’ll have to move very quickly as many events have already been booked up. SR

The rest of this week’s film events

HOME ENTERTAIMENT

Master Of None

(Netflix, from Friday)

There are hints of Louie and Chris Rock’s Top Five in this comedy, created by and starring Aziz Ansari. Master Of None follows Dev, actor and thwarted lothario, as he tries to find love and success in New York. So far, so so, but Ansari uses this set-up to riff on a range of subjects, from ageism to the portrayal of minorities in film. He’s lured in some fine guest stars, too, including Clare Danes and Eric Wareheim. GM