Month: July 2022

2021 Gigs – Part 1

I think it is about time that we conversed about the elephant in the room, namely the small matter of the worldwide pandemic that ripped our normal lives apart. Early breaking news stories in January and February 2020 began to indicate that something extraordinary was about to happen resulting in the first lockdown in March which for us in the North of England never really lifted for nigh on eighteen months.

There was a certain surreal novelty to the first few months as we pounded the deserted streets on our daily exercise, inadvertently serving to appraise us of our still new local area and the weather was thankfully very kind. We organised home offices with trips to the horror establishment of IKEA to purchase desks and got used to queueing everywhere and discovering new words like furlough and lateral flow tests!

Once the initial spell wore out, the isolation kicked in and both Gill and I had unpleasant bouts of Covid and I personally found the period astonishingly tough and it wasn’t even as if I was living on my own, so I can only imagine the challenges faced by millions of other people, and I am sure we will all have our personal tales and experiences. I know people who took it all in their stride and I am glad they could cope admirably with the enforced change, but I was not in that number.

I think the absolute nadir was reached at Christmas 2020 when the ability to gather with family and friends was severely curtailed. On a very cold 29th December we arranged to meet our good friends Jo and Paul at a local park, resulted in us finding a muddy picnic bench to sit on.

On the bench was left abandoned a plastic sword which we christened the sword of Gryffindor, which at the very point became the overriding pandemic symbol for us! We imbibed whiskey and brandy laced coffee until it went dark and then we separately walked home with tears in our eyes because we had nowhere else to go and like 99% of the population, we were compliant with the Government rules!

The Sword of Gryffindor. Image Credit shpock.com

Music also dropped off my radar for a fair while and I didn’t invest in the podcasts or live streaming gigs as I stubbornly wouldn’t settle for anything less than the real live experience. Now people who know me would say I am generally by nature a pragmatic, glass half full kind of chap, so apologies for the maudlin tone of this article, but it has tended to pour out of me as I was typing away, however I think it is high time l lifted the mood now.    

So, three very instrumental elements contributed to the upturn in fortunes. The first was the very existence of this blog and the therapeutic weekly routine it instilled. Alongside this, was my burgeoning interest and following on Twitter via interaction and invaluable support from some terrific and knowledgeable like-minded folk who shared my musical passion, who I have affectionally coined as ‘muso geeks’!

The second was the introduction of the vaccines which led to the very exciting third development, the return of live music. So, from the last rather strange pre-pandemic gig of Nada Surf on 12/03/20, it was 477 days or 11,448 hours to 03/07/21 (but who’s counting!) before I witnessed another gig, which is not unsurprisingly my longest dry spell ever!  

Nada Surf. Image Credit Rolling Stone

Leeds Venues 4 to 5

Our initial destination en arrival at our first attendance at the Live at Leeds multi venue event in May 2014 was the huge Leeds Arena about 3pm to collect our all-important wristbands. As is my responsibility at these events I checked the timetable and map and swiftly morphed into my ‘sherpa’ role.

The first port of call was the Leeds Belgrave Music Hall and Canteen and what a great inaugural venue it turned out be. It is located in the Northern Quarter and as you know, any aspiring city needs to have a Northern Quarter! It first opened in 1934 as Leeds Children’s Palace, dually serving a function as a recreation hall and nursery school.    

   

Leeds Belgrave Music Hall and Canteen. Image Credit Yorkshire Evening Post.

The three-storey building fell into repair until it was restored under its current guise in 2013. It is an Aladdin’s cave as it contains two kitchens, two bars and most importantly a 300-capacity multipurpose event space as it hosts comedy, art exhibitions, films alongside live bands. There is also a fine roof terrace which we visited briefly after purchasing a terrific local cask ale from one of the bars.

The venue itself had a good vibe and contained a decent vantage from all angles to the stage. It was about two thirds full even at this early point in the afternoon perhaps due in part to its proximity to the ticket outlet point but also due to the quality of the venue.

We saw half the set of Pet Moon from Oxford. The band is essentially Andrew Mears, a former member of the city bedfellows the Foals and of prog band Youthmovies Soundtrack Strategies. You could discern those clear influences in the math rock derived sounds emanating from the stage.

Prior to attending our next venue, a quick football score check was required as it was the last day of the football reason with my team Preston’s play-off opponents being confirmed as Rotherham United. As any regular subscribers would know by now you don’t need to ask who subsequently won the play-off match!

Still contained within the Quarry Hill district you would find the Leeds College of Music which moved to its current location in 1997.This establishment has had many different names since it was founded in 1965 and it is now listed as Leeds Conservatoire. In 2011, it was awarded All-Steinway School status, becoming uniquely the only conservatoire in England to have 90% of its pianos from the renowned Steinway family.

Leeds College of Music. Image Credit konsultanpendidikan.com

As with many institutions of this ilk, they have a list of previous alumni including many from the jazz domain but also Badly Drawn Boy and Ryan and Gary Jarman from local combo The Cribs. In a slightly more obscure vein, the members of We Are Domi, who represented the Czech Republic at the recent 2022 Eurovision Song Contest met and formed whilst in attendance at the College of Music.

The Conservatoire hosts an annual programme of concerts in its 350 seated auditorium which has the highly original title of ‘The Venue’. Three years after our attendance in 2017 the performance space was revamped with a rooftop extension.

The band on stage when we arrived were Arc Iris, an indie band from Rhode Island and contain Jocie Adams, a former member of the Low Anthem who was also briefly a NASA technician. To be fair, the music was too loungecore and wonky structure for my tastes, which then presented the conundrum of  how to shuffle out politely as there weren’t many attendees and it was not one of those venues where you could watch from the back and head out accordingly.

In those circumstances I always adopt the approach of leaving mid-song whilst the band are in flow and distracted, which is exactly what we did, heading on to the next venue and continuing the gig journey!