How to tackle such a many-pronged festival? The centrepiece of the bash is inevitably the two sold out David Byrne and Brian Eno shows (12/04 and 14/04). But besides that the musical menu has a comeback show from the irrepressible adoptive Berliner Peaches (10/04), Squarepusher (24/04) and exciting The Knife side project Fever Ray on a bill with the less exciting Royksopp (11/04). There's even a splattering of beatboxing and UK-African music in there. Meanwhile on the experimental side, Fennesz's guitar-exploding album Black Sea gets a showcase (21/04) as well as a preview discussion (20/04) and Spiritualized 's Jason Pierce adopts his J Spaceman mantle for a collaboration with avant guard jazz pianist Matthew Shipp (20/04). With tickets still available for the above you could do a lot worse. The other knockout blow could come from The Juan MacLean and Chateau Flight, playing an audiovisual double header that promises to meld quintessential New York DFAness with ultra-warm French house (19/04). Even on a Sunday night that will surely be a stomper.

NB: Ether 2009 runs from 09/04 till 24/09.

It must be satisfying running a deep house label with output so consistently good that you can afford to hold some material back, strictly for sole use in your own DJ sets. This is the case for Steffen Berkhahn (aka Dixon) who co-founded the mighty Innervisions imprint with Kristian Beyer and Frank Wiedemann of Ame. After months of message-board speculation, it was finally announced in the summer of 2008 that the Innervisions collective would indeed be forming a super group; with the concept being they would perform synchronized live shows. Named A Critical Mass, Dixon, Henrik Schwarz and both members of Ame will kick London's Easter weekend off with what is their first performance in the UK and only their third session to date. With the Horse Meat Disco promoters and Daniele Baldelli holding court in Room 2, we would strongly advise making this one of your picks out of all the big nights in town this Easter.

NB: for those interested in the science behind successfully executing a complex live gig, the members of A Critical Mass will start the event at 10pm by hosting a workshop on how to use the brand-new Ableton Live 8 and Ableton Suite 8 software.

Making a living in 1980s Belfast involved a great deal of inventiveness and risk taking. At least, that's how Fifty Dead Men Walking contextualises Marty McGartland's involvement with the IRA and the British police: an inevitable consequence of the circumstances for an intelligent hustler who needs to provide for his family. Far from glamorising McGartland's double life, Canadian director Kari Skogland highlights the many moral and ethical conflicts underpinning the situation that led him to flee his country. Jim Sturgess captures this tension with an impressive balance between mischievous boy and world weary man. Ben Kingsley, as the British liaison with conflicting interests adds some gravitas to the distribution which contributes to the rendering of a real life story that is gripping and well documented. The only false note is the casting of Rose McGowan as Grace Sterrin, IRA femme fatale. It would appear that she can't open her mouth, on film and off, without betraying her character with a rather poor imitation of an Irish accent and public endorsements for the IRA.

NB: post screening catch Ben Kingsley for a Q&A. Fifty Dead Men Walking is released in London on 10/04. Also of note is the re-release of Francois Truffaud's The 400 Blows and the release of both Let The Right One In and Tony Manero (on 10/04).

Tony Manero is a difficult film to categorise -- shocking, chilling, exciting, Alfredo Castro's Raul is neither hero nor anti-hero. Obsessed with the character that launched John Travolta's career, Raul sets his sights on not just a performance at the bar he lives above, but also success through a TV talent competition. His dedication is relentless, stopping at nothing to get closer to the myth of his hero -- set against the back drop of Pinochet's dictatorship, a time of fear and control in Chile's capital Santiago. Despite the violence within the film, director Pablo Larrain never changes pace -- the tempo is as consistent, detached and unemotional as the lead character, lending a revolting fascination to his journey, and his actions a disquieting acceptability. With subtle mirroring of the 1977 original, down to a mocking final scene that firmly distances Raul from Tony the hero, the "dancing to escape reality" motif is twisted and defamed, but gripping and entertaining nonetheless.

NB: post screening there will be a Q&A with Alfredo Castro. Then at 9pm the after party for the film will be held in the ICA's bar. Tony Manero screens at the ICA till 30/04. Also of note is the re-release of Francois Truffaud's The 400 Blows and the release of both Let The Right One In and 50 Dead Men Walking (all on 10/04).

Another huge night in Farringdon, with clubland's favourite Texan staging a Spectral Sound take-over. Matthew Dear has never been up there trying to compete with boffins like Hawtin or Garnier for the crown of the most technically adept DJ. Instead, the American's on-deck talents lie in that great, indefinable currency of knowing exactly how to excite a dancefloor. The closest thing techno has to a Bowie or Byrne figure, Dear is likely to swagger charismatically through a multitude of pulsing sub-genres with varying moods and intensity, but the beauty is that you can never be sure. Spectral's Ryan Elliot and Seth Troxler will be there backing up their boss, with the three in rotation all the way through until 8am. As is always the case with arguably the planet's leading club, it's never just all about one big name, so revelers will find Get Physical founders M.A.N.D.Y. running operations next door. The party-minded duo is likely to concentrate on upbeat electro and tech-house reductions, but much like Dear, they like to keep things unpredictable and fresh.

Should you wish to get your disco on in London this Easter weekend there is ample choice. The pick of whats on offer though is undoubtedly Tropicana's Escape From New York party. The first in a series of monthly terrace parties at the newly opened Queen Of Hoxton, this 15 hour extravaganza takes full advantage of the glorious roof terrace area at the venue which is reminiscent of many a building in the East Village district of Manhattan. In such surroundings, Tropicana have conjured up a transatlantic line-up that is just as impressive. Representing the Five Boroughs of NYC we have Brennan Green who has put out some superlative records from Studio and Runaway on his Chinatown imprint with DFA's Justin Miller also making the trip. Giving the Brooklyn boys a run for their money are the always dance inducing Trevor Jackson, sometime DFA artists Mock & Toof and Rekids mainstay Toby Tobias.

Whilst our secular society may view Easter as a great excuse for a four day bender rather than a chance to consider the ultimate sacrifice of a deity for his mortal playthings, those looking to find a nice balance between physical and spiritual pleasures should check out Milky Disco. A night of deep cosmic disco, sun dappled balearic beats and frankly purely hedonistic Italo, it should provide just the right mix of earthy treats and mystical ecstasy for those who have escaped their family's cloying embrace. Organised by Lo Recordings, also responsible for the Milky Disco compilations that give the party its name, the night sees some of the biggest names on the beardo disco scene forfeit their souls to preach from Cargo's pulpit. For your time you'll get a live set from the long lost Black Devil Disco Club, plus DJ turns from the likes of Soft Rocks, Padded Cell's Richard Sen, Black Mustang and Dissident's Gatto Fritto, and as the night is completely free to get in we'd say that's pretty good value.

Within Roni Horn's circle there is a fantastic anecdote of a collector eagerly approaching to shake Horn's hand exclaiming; "And I always thought Roni Horn was a woman!" Horn just smiled taking the comment in her stride. This ambiguity and nonchalance are part of her personality that shine through a body of work both praised and misunderstood for its simple poignancy and quiet importance. Horn's epithet as one of the few major female minimalists does not suitably convey the broad scope of her work. With Roni Horn aka Roni Horn Tate captures her wry wit with a neatly edited collection, from strikingly simple sculpture -- precious sheets of gold laid bare and round pools of glass throbbing with darkness and light -- to clean photographs that force the eye to focus on subtleties within searingly conventional portraits and landscapes. Horn's skill is in ambiguous details: You Are The Weather (1994-1995) shows Horn exposing nuances in personality from what is essentially the same image taken 110 times, while her portraits of the Thames show simple ripples given a different subtext with ambiguous phrases describing the "personalities" concealed in water.

NB: runs till 25/05. Also of note at Tate Modern is the extremely comprehensive Rodchenko & Popova show which runs till 17/05.

Francois Truffaut's seminal The 400 Blows, which charts the descent of young teenager Antoine from trouble-maker to delinquent, is getting a re-release via a new print. This Nouvelle Vague masterpiece, shot almost in documentary style and partly based on the auteur's own childhood, shows just how easily spirited high jinks could be misinterpreted for something more sinister in the strait-laced post-war French society Truffaut so masterfully depicts. Poor Antoine's misdemeanours seem inconsequential compared to the current ASBO-strewn landscape. Unsympathetic teachers and uncaring parents conspire to get Antoine out of Paris and into a camp for delinquent children after a failed attempt to pawn a stolen typewriter. The film's final scenes reveal some painful home truths about parental neglect as Antoine is interviewed and prodded by the camp psychologist. The final image, of Antoine cornered by the camera and staring defiantly into it as though straight at the audience, feels as freshly indicting as when it was first shown half a century ago.

NB: The 400 Blows screens at the Cine Lumiere till 21/04. The film also screens at the BFI Southbank from 09/04 till 24/04 in conjunction with the BFI's Nouvelle Vague season (runs from 09/04 till 30/04).

Inventive, unconventional and exploratory, Dutch record label Unsounds has built up a catalogue of contemporary works that, at their best, redefine concepts of music, drawing out a lineage that embraces improvisatory, microtonal, avant-garde and transcendental sensibilities. For this celebratory evening of new sounds, Greek Cypriot composer Yannis Kyriakides will lead a host of artists, with a performance of Folia, his new work with Andy Moor, guitarist for Dutch anarcho punks The Ex for almost the last two decades. Artistic director of Dutch Ensemble MAE, and a member of the composition faculty at the Royal Conservatory Of The Hague Kyriakides produces work that traces an arc across musical genres, uniting digital media, sampling and laptop experimentation in an emotive, direct manner, both enriching and suggestive. An improvised saxophone set by British musician John Butcher, an always potentially wild percolating experience, plus an audio and light installation by Angie Atmadjaja and new work by Rus Pearson will compliment this adventurous study in new musical avenues.

NB: you can also catch John Butcher on 15/04 (8pm) at Cafe Oto along with Steve Beresford and Tetras.

Twelve audience members at a time will be able to view this intricate installation created by choreographer Angela Woodhouse and Jerwood Award-winning visual artist Caroline Broadhead. Addressing the notion of seeing and being seen, this examination of the performing body is danced by Stine Nilsen of Candoco Dance Company twenty-two times over four days. Each audience group will see a subtly different version of the piece, depending on how they enter and arrange themselves in the space. An extraordinary carpet of mirrors reflects and distorts Stine's delicate movements, also allowing the audience to watch themselves watching her. The installation is in the Founders Studio at The Place; this smaller, non-typical performance space allows a very direct involvement with the work and with the reaction of other audience members, bringing an immediacy to the piece that would be lost on a larger stage. A thought provoking performance, well worth a look.

NB: Sighted runs from 15/04 to 18/04 and is part of The Place's Spring Loaded festival which runs till 16/05.

The microacousmatic group Tetras gather together Thanos Chrysakis (who has released music on the Aural Terrains label) on laptop and piano, alongside Jerry Wigens (clarinet), Oli Mayne (vibraphone and synth) and James O'Sullivan on guitar. Meanwhile Steve Beresford remains a mainstay of the impro scene (via the London Musicians Collective). A former member, with Gavin Bryars and Brian Eno, of the Portsmouth Sinfonia, his sets today are an amalgam of playfulness and dexterity, integrating piano and electronics with toys. John Butcher is a saxophone alchemist, his approach maybe influenced by his PhD in theoretical physics. A member of the pioneering Austrian group Polwechsel, Butcher takes the manipulation of multiphonics (split tones and false notes) bequeathed by earlier improvisers such as Evan Parker in new directions: focusing on creating rich, slowly-changing strata of sounds (layers of hums, buzzes and brittle metallic noises). A trio of acts with a close ear for epiphanic moments and explorations.

NB: you can also catch John Butcher on 14/04 (8pm) at Kings Place for an evening of music by Dutch label Unsounds (curated by Yannis Kyriakides).

Norwegian filmmaker Bent Hamer first came to cinema screens in 2003 with the slightly bonkers Kitchen Stories. Chronicling a bizarre (fictional) scientific study in '60s Sweden, the film was a surreal and very funny story of two slightly peculiar men. With O'Horten, Hamer returns to the fertile soil of the idiosyncratic solitary male. As (the marvellously named) Odd Horten -- lifelong bachelor and long-distance train driver for the Norwegian railways -- retires after 37 comforting years of schedules, timetables and routines, he speculates things might be a bit different going forward. After all those years spent travelling, Bard Owe's timid, slightly confused Horten is finally going to go on one of life's little journeys -- and after all those years on the rails, life is about to go completely off the rails. With distinctly Scandinavian deadpan humour (familiar to fans of Finland's Aki Kaurismaki) the quirky O'Horten is about (accidentally) breaking out of a treadmill routine, discovering spontaneity and (belatedly) seizing life.

NB: O'Horten is released in London on 08/05. Also of note is the re-release of Francois Truffaud's The 400 Blows and the release of both Let The Right One In, 50 Dead Men Walking and Tony Manero (all on 10/04).

Robin Deacon is a performance artist from London who has been making solo performances for the last 15 years. An accomplished performer and writer of his own material, he has a matter of fact comic presence about him, which he brings to his often geeky material. Prototypes, featured as part of this year's SPILL Festival, is no exception to this rule. Indeed, it is an example par excellence, for in Prototypes Deacon returns to an old hobby of his; model railways. Revisiting and reconstructing the railway kits of his youth, he brings a dry humour and eye for the absurd details that only the true enthusiast can catch. He uses model railways as a metaphor that both structures the show and allows him to set his imagination loose reflecting upon the passing of time from the then of his adolescence to the now of the show and beyond into the future.

NB: Prototypes is performed on 16/04, 17/04 and 18/04 and is part of this year's SPILL Festival (runs till 26/04). Also of note in the festival is Jan Fabre's Orgy Of Tolerance (15/04 and 16/04) and Forced Entertainment's Void Story (21/04 to 25/04).

If you didn't manage to secure some Whitest Boy Alive tickets before Christmas do not despair. Erlend Oye will be behind the decks for the afterparty. The spectacled music genius, who shot to fame with Kings Of Convenience, a two-man outfit utilising acoustic guitars, wistful vocals, and the softer side of computer music to make hipster pop ballads, is back in town with his new project, loopy looks and timeless tunes. Expect to be spiritually elevated into a happy state of trance dance with all time favourites "Fine Day", "Always On My Mind" and other feel good melodies. Not your conventional kind of DJ, Mr Oye often sings over his own tracks and has been known to dance with the audience while the beats drop sans his hands. Oh, and if his DJ-Kicks album is still not part of your CD collection, buy it ASAP, it will be a rare collectible soon. Oye will be joined by Highfish, fellow bandmate and minimal DJ, for a night of truly tasty music exploration.

As Manchester strummed along to the twee delights of Tony Blair endorsed Britpop, Bristol was busy overtaking as the UK's second city of electronic music. With Massive Attack et al gaining global attention and word spreading of Reprazent, "Madchester" had lost its pegging before anyone could say "Hacienda"? Given the city's reggae roots and the crucial involvement it would go on to play in the movement of trip hop and drum and bass, it's unsurprising that Brizzle has been at the forefront of dubstep's development. Producers like Shackleton, Headhunter and Pinch have all made important contributions towards morphing the Croydon sound, but so far the major-player has been Laurie "Appleblim" Osborne. The once co-owner of the sadly-deceased Skull Disco collective brings his new Apple Pips label to the capital for their first take-over event this side of the M4. Appleblim tops the bill with a two-hour set, whilst further punch will come from long-term collaborator Peverelist, rising garage-head Brackles and Skull Disco associate Geiom. Meanwhile, original soul-man Marcus Intalex and Calibre head up the drum and bass over in Room 1.

Forced Entertainment are back in London with the world premiere of their latest show Void Story. One of Europe's most established experimental theatre ensembles, the Sheffied-based group is in London for five days with the SPILL Festival. Turning the group's experiences of constant touring into the subtext of a show, Void Story follows the journey of two figures through one desolate cityscape to the next. Theirs is a journey through failures, through hostile contemporary landscapes. With text and direction by Tim Etchells we can expect sharp writing and precise, sparse direction brought to the stage with wit and depth by the versatile and talented group. While this may be their 25th year Forced Entertainment remain alive, still searching, and one of the key points of reference for performance and theatre in the UK today.

NB: Void Story is performed from 21/04 to 25/04 and is part of this year's SPILL Festival (runs till 26/04). Also of note in the festival is Jan Fabre's Orgy Of Tolerance (15/04 and 16/04) and Rob Deacon's Prototypes (16/04 to 18/04).

Sometimes one man is all you need, if he looks 17, describes himself as an old dark home, and sings about the colour blue. Dug up from the ashes or the deep blue sea, or maybe the Red River Valley, North Dakota, Tom Brosseau is the precious thing you didn't know you were looking for. Delivering moth-eaten truths with his whisky-clear drawl and guitar, voice pitched high, head hung low, Brosseau's angel-singing traverses the devil, lonesome valleys, fragile minds, and how to grow a woman from the ground. So far, so Leonard Cohen. But that's no bad thing. Telling stories is Brosseau's forte. 2006 record Cavalier (recorded with PJ Harvey associate John Parish) has the plangent twang of an F Scott Fitzgerald novel; dripping with melancholy, you can hear the menace behind every platitude. "The hardest thing to do is to keep a smile, though this may be true I still go the extra mile", he says in "My Heart Belongs To The Sea". We'll go with you, Tom Brosseau.

After their recent successful productions with Russian actors, not least in Shakespeare, Cheek By Jowl return to London with Racine's Andromaque. This time the long-standing partnership of director Declan Donnellan and designer Nick Ormerod work with a French cast to bring to life the passion of Racine's classical poetry. Set in the aftermath of war, the play shows the gods wreak new destruction through the conflicted desires of captive Trojans and victorious Greeks. Through unrequited love and the politics of revenge, the roles of prisoner and sovereign prove to be tragically intertwined. Over 20 years ago, Donnellan and Ormerod famously produced the first performance of Andromaque in English. Seen already in Paris and in various cities in the UK, this production, which arrives at the Barbican with rave reviews, promises to be as significant as the first -- finally performed in French.

NB: runs from 24/04 to 02/05.

Hal Ashby's achingly stylish film adaptation stars Burd Cort as 19-year-old Harold who is depressed and obsessed with his own mortality. His repeated attempts to provoke a reaction from his vacant, socialite mother by staging increasingly elaborate suicides fail miserably. Enter Ruth Gordon as Maude who is almost 80, willfully carefree and determined to remain unfettered until her last breath. Harold meets Maude at a funeral service as she hijacks a car. The two become entwined in an unbearably poignant love affair with life and death. Imagine the vast, barren romance of Badlands superimposed onto the perfectly paced sceneography of Once Upon A Time In The West, inject the detached pathos of Natural Born Killers, discuss the results in a Freudian analysis session... you're getting close. Originating from Essex via Texas, Lightspeed Champion (aka Dev Hynes) is an enigmatic performer, an illogical yet apt accompaniment to this cult classic. A former member of Test Icicles, the in-joke that went above and beyond the reach of most audiences, Hynes is a commanding, perhaps unsettling presence. But relax, smell the sunflowers. It will all make sense in the end.

NB: post screening Lightspeed Champion will perform an acoustic set of songs inspired by Cat Stevens' original soundtrack to the film and Roots And Shoots DJs play in the Benugo Bar.

Although the landscapes and architectures on which photographer John Riddy trains his calm, controlled lens range geographically from China to South Africa, and temporally from Renaissance to modernist, his work is linked by the rigour and sculptural scrutiny that defines his visual vocabulary. For his latest show Riddy focuses on the tones and textures of London -- as indicated by his title, Low Relief, denoting both concern with architectural details and, as he puts it, the reassurance that half-recognised landscape features provide. We must admit to feeling disturbed as well as reassured: Riddy presents a rarely seen London, emptied of people, noise and bustle, making for a plangent, but sometimes austere visual experience. But the "relief" of certain photographs is immediately apparent, as in London (Garrick), 2008 (2009), where the windows of a soot-stained building provide a glimpse of gilt-framed canvases. This theatrical shot exemplifies the layering -- physical and art-historical -- that Riddy achieves. Contrasting starkly with the sunshine and holiday crowds of the spring city, Low Relief provides a welcome moment of meditation.

NB: runs till 01/05.

If a trip to tucked away Shoreditch gallery Paradise Row gives one the feeling of looking for a well concealed rabbit hole, then stepping into the current Gosha Ostretsov installation does not disappoint as a fantastical world turned upside down. Nominated to co-represent Russia in this summer's Venice Bienale, Ostretsov's graphic comic-strip work depicts a doom and destruction reality within a parallel universe in which humanity struggles under the ruling fascist New Government. The installation focuses on the people's hero, the aptly named Robbing Good, who has risen from a gas works contract gone wrong to defy the New Government by taking from them to give to the embattled poor. The gallery doors open to reveal a startlingly dark back alley hell-hole or paradise, with stroking severed limbs, abandoned sex shops, and a dismembered gas pipe inhabited by a snarling white cat. The impressively scaled installation is complemented by paintings and prints on display in a more traditional adjoining room.

Keeping within what appears to be a theme of dark analysis and interpretation of cultural values, in an adjacent gallery fashion designer Jean-Charles de Castelbajac shows work that questions contemporary culture's dependence on mass-creation and manufacture. Known as a designer for what he terms "cultural hijacking" of contemporary imagery, de Castelbajac commissioned Chinese artists to reproduce Western masterpieces super-imposed with iconic brand logos. The layered images are polished and faithful in reproducing the familiar works and imagery, but like a pile of discarded Chinatown handbags are so falsely pristine that the shiny new combination appears to be void of meaning; the old has been regurgitated but creates a new object devoid of any of the original subtext.

NB: both shows run till 02/05.

A season of plays by Wallace Shawn opens at the Royal Court with one of his most influential works. The Fever is a self-accusation, dissecting an inexorable complicity of liberal affluence in the state of suffering. Shawn's spare prose abounds with heightened imagery, as a Westerner in a poor country is driven by fever to spew forth a catalogue of their life: the perilously slim volume of what they've actually done. The play was conceived to be performed by any actor in more intimate setting and indeed first performed by Shawn in a living room. So although skewering liberals was Dominic Cooke's avowed intention in taking the helm at the Court, there is a dissonance in the calculated non-artifice of his production here, or indeed hearing us culturati commenting on the virtuosity of a performance that berates precisely the value of such commentary. But if virtuosity is required, it's hard to imagine a better performance than Clare Higgins' deft unravelling; nor the ultimate potency of Shawn's parable.

NB: runs till 02/05. Also showing in the Royal Court's Wallace Shawn season are Grasses Of A Thousand Colours (12/05 till 13/06) and Aunt Dan And Lemon (20/05 till 27/06). You can also catch a series of Wallace screenings and readings from 18/04 to 26/06.

When you step into the gallery space at Gagosian to view Cy Twombly's new series The Rose it's hard not to feel perplexed at the spectacle that unfolds, precisely because it seems so contrary to the world Twombly otherwise inhabits. Here are a series of paintings that willingly follow a structure and adhere to a formula so simple one cannot fail to grasp it in seconds, so that, beyond the masterful use of colour and technique that informs each envelope, the question remains as to why a painter whose use of form is so compelling in much of his earlier work has chosen so deliberately to subsume it here. However, it is precisely this mediation that proves so compelling. With this homage to Rainer Maria Rilke, Twombly appears to be trying to comprehend his own remaining time left on the planet through the same expansive medium Rilke found so compelling; the rose.

NB: runs till 09/05.

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