Month: July 2025

Manchester Venue 178 – Stage and Radio

A couple of years ago I was persuaded to make my debut in attempting an escape room with my pals  Clare, Hayley and Lottie, the venue being located down Port Street buried deep in the Northern Quarter. My first sighting of this concept was on the Crystal Maze TV programme in the early 1990’s which was very popular with hosts including Richard O’Brien (Rocky Horror Show) and Ed Tudor-Pole (lead singer of punk band Tenpole Tudor). It then evolved in 2003 into physical locations across the world, totalling 50,000 by 2019.

The Crystal Maze. Image Credit justwatch.com

It is based around a team using mental agility to solve clues and puzzles to ensure you can escape the room (or rooms) within a specified time limit. In our instance it was an interesting dynamic to watch four project managers and their different approaches, a couple were in the hyper harum-scarum camp and the remaining two in the considered analytical mould (myself contained in the latter more horizontal category!). The synergy coalesced and everyone wholly contributed to enable us to make our exit in time to head to the nearest pub for an after action review!   

Further down the road you will find the Port Street Beer House which does exactly what it says on the tin with a rotation of 18 keg and 7 craft beer lines. They opened their doors initially in 2011 and were the forerunners of the craft beer pubs that now proliferate widely across Manchester. They have a compact bar area downstairs with a function room upstairs and outdoor seating available for those sunny evenings. 

They stage ‘meet the brewer’ sessions, one of which I inadvertently witnessed, where they ran through the merits and tasting notes of each beverage on sale. They also introduced the innovative concept of the Indy Man Beer Con, which was a four day festival and reportedly the first of its kind across the country specifically for the craft beer trade. The successful events ran for eight years being before stalled by the pandemic.

Port Street Beer House. Image Credit pubgallery.co.uk

On the corner of Port Street and Great Ancoats Street a remarkable discovery was made in 2016 when preparations were being made to build a 13 storey skyscraper. Builders were astonished to find an ancient underground pub, complete with untouched brandy bottles and personalised crockery emblazoned with the name of the former landlord Thomas Evans. He owned the Astley Arms pub in 1821 which was eventually demolished in 1986.

Next door to the Beer House is Manchester Stage and Radio which is located within a 200 year old four storey warehouse, which is so synonymous with many other venues in the Northern Quarter. I have just discovered it has a long and illustrious history with the site being the city’s oldest nightlife venue. It originally opened its doors straight after World War 2 in 1946 and was a renowned jazz venue for many years led by renowned promoter Eric Scriven. It was named Club 43 after its address of 43 Port Street and luminaries such as Miles Davis, Ronnie Scott and Ella Fitzgerald graced the stage there.

An old flyer for Club 43, probably dated early 1960’s. Image Credit crj-online.org

Fast forward half a century to 1998 and at an ‘In the City’ showcase Muse and Coldplay both played, and the rumour goes that the latter were scouted by the Universal Records representative Debs Wild at that very show, thus subsequently signing their first professional recording contract. It was then for a spell a salsa dancing location trading as Cuba Café. In 2016 it morphed into its current iteration and three years later it moved under new ownership, and they developed it into a specialist electronic dance venue.

They have an outdoor space and upon entering you have a jazz influenced ground floor bar and upstairs is the Attic with seating and table service which can be hired out for functions. They have also converted the downstairs space into a dimly lit nightclub with a capacity of 150 and an accompanying licence until the post witching hour of 4am.

They have greatly improved the sound and acoustics by subtle but effective changes such as repositioning the booth. The booth is also adaptable to allow it to collapse so allowing bands to play. The initial launch involved CROP Radio undertaking an epic 15-hour live stream, I am sure punters needed some kip after that one!

On one of my sporadic visits to the establishment I discovered my attendance was on one of the live music nights and a chap called Steve Johnson was playing in a corner of the main bar.   

Gigs from Abroad Part 23 – Belfast Part 2

My second trip to the fair city of Belfast was on the lads first post-covid trip in 2023 as we thought we would reboot the annual shindig that year by going for a nearby location instead of mainland Europe.   

We headed over on an early flight from Manchester to the International airport with five of us in total but additionally with Moggy and Gareth ploughing an alternate furrow into the City airport. Late morning found us tucking into a huge fry up in one of the numerous cafes dotted around the city streets.

A proportion of the travelling crew were fans of the Slow Readers Club who happened to be playing in town that very evening. In fact, Moggie and Gareth had earlier had a star spot when they encountered members of the band at the airport, and it transpired after a brief chat and photo shoot they were also on the same flight.

After we located and booked in at our hotel in the Cathedral Quarter and Jez Catlow found his room which was down an ‘infinity and beyond’ corridor. He was also not assisted later on by the fact that his door card needed resetting a couple of times which involved each time a long trog to reception and back! 

John Hewitt pub. Image Credit niplanner.com

Our first port of call was just around the corner to the John Hewitt, the namesake being a poet and socialist who opened the Unemployed Resource Centre in 1983 which evolved into the public house and restaurant in 1999. It is the first social enterprise bar in Belfast. They had some fine ales available and regular live music, and we did return the following night to endeavour to catch some tunes but were denied entry as they had closed the doors due to the rest rooms being unavailable. 

Our next venue was the Belfast Kitchen Bar which prior to its opening in 1859 was a women’s boarding house. It was located next to the Empire Theatre so hence regularly full of actors and thespians. In July 2004, it was controversially and shamefully demolished to make room for the Victoria Square shopping centre. The bar then moved to a new location nearby in 2005 and they host regular live music including a chap called Gerry on our sojourn there.

The next hostelry of choice was the Belfast Garrick on Chichester Street, it was a homely traditional pub with three bars. It has been in situ at that site since 1870 and evolved into its current name in 1892 with a purported nod to the fashionable Garrick Club that was in vogue in London at that time. They have regular bands performing and on the night it took me a little time due to the hubbub in the establishment before noticing there was a ceilidh band playing quietly away in a corner by the door.

We then grabbed some tucker before heading down to the main event at Belfast Limelight 2. The venue has been in operation since 1984 and consists of three separate spaces, the first being the rooftop terrace the Rock Garden which stages live shows, the second is Limelight 1 which is the newest kid on the block and Slayer and Steve Earle have played there. We were in Limelight 2 which is the slightly smaller venue, which was in place when the club first opened, and luminaries such as the Strokes and Joe Strummer have performed in that space.    

Slow Readers Club on stage at Limelight. Image Credit limelightbelfast.com

Slow Reader’s Club evolved in 2009 from the ashes of 2000’s rock band Omerta and the four piece contains Wythenshawe siblings Aaron and Kurtis Starkie. In the spirit of the 1980’s ethos, they have been patently DIY in their approach via relentless gigging, social media endorsements and the self-release and design of their first two albums. These components all resulted in developing a loyal fanbase which reminds me of the Hold Steady level of fervency. Their third and fourth albums bore the fruit of these endeavours as they both hit the Top 20. They are not totally my bag, but they put on a decent show live and are firmly in the Interpol/Editors mould.

Also in the audience was my pal and superfans Ian Watson and his wife Elise who were travelling around watching the band and attended the Dublin show the following night. Post gig, we decamped to the nearby Belfast Pug Ugly’s Draft House which was a tidy little bar with an orange exterior. On an elevated stage there we saw a chap called Eamonn playing.  

The following day we jumped on the train to the bonny town of Bangor with its funfair and its seaside walks. The second pub we visited was the famous Trident pub immortalised in the opening lines to Stiff Little Fingers ‘Alternative Ulster’, namely ‘There’s nothing for us in Belfast, The Pound’s old and that’s a pity, Okay, there’s the Trident in Bangor, and then you walk back to the city’. We stayed there a while and watched a chaotic Grand National.  

Bangor seafront. Image Credit sunnybangor.com

When we landed back in Belfast, Uncle George, Jez and I had an excellent curry in one of the local restaurants before heading back to Belfast McConnell’s near our digs.  It was a cavernous pub with several rooms, and we negotiated our way past the bouncers into the large music room. There was a bash em out band called Aidan’s Boys, and the venue was absolutely bouncing with a terrific atmosphere. We leaned on the corner of the bar and sampled a couple of fine Guinness’s.

On the Sunday we worked our route via a couple of hostelries prior to arriving back at the airport. We had a less troubled route than Moggy and Gareth whose flight was cancelled, and they were subsequently put up for a night in a hotel before departing the next day. They were also fortunately provided with a small stipend with which they chose to spend on more ale!