Author: jimmyc1968

Manchester Venue 175 – Night People

Manchester Night People was located on Princess Street about equidistant between China Town and Canal Street, just around the corner from the Satan’s Hollow venue. I can find very scant history online for this establishment, but I think it opened in around 2017, and I believe it closed post-covid for a 6 month refurbishment, but it looks like it never subsequently reopened.

I visited there four times in total, and I know they were included on the Psych Fest roster, an event I have never yet attended but also for the now defunct Dot-to-Dot festival which I was present at for several years.

I recall they used to stage Northern Soul shindigs for the Twisted Wheel events and due to the age now of many of the participants they staged it on a Sunday afternoon. I am sure the intimate downstairs setting would have made it an ideal location for such a gathering, and I recently located a flyer of the legendary Geno Washington and the Ram Jam band playing there in 2018. I would estimate the capacity of the venue would have been somewhere around 200.

 

Night People flyer. Image Credit mdmarchive.co.uk

My first visit was in February 2018 in the company of one of my Northeast correspondents Jamie Young. We were already attending a gig at Night and Day that evening so grabbed the opportunity to undertake an earlier foray to the new venue on the block! We met initially in the iconic Marble Arch public house before sampling some tea at the Mackie Mayors food hall and then headed down to Night People.

The first act was the Mancunian band slowhandclap who appear to play a lot of gigs at the Northern Quarter venues, and they provided a slab on noisy post punk. Also on the bill were Chester two-piece DEH-YEY who like many duos produced a fair old racket of fuzzy dark sounds with the driving force being the guitarist/vocalist Cash Burns. They have released a slew of singles thus far and have garnered a support slot for the much touted Belfast band Enola Gay.  

Three months later as part of Dot to Dot we saw an American singer songwriter called Kyle Craft. He was born in an isolated Mississippi river town in Louisiana and his first introduction to guitar music was a random purchase of a David Bowie compilation at his local Kmart store.

I think we can all attest to our own individual epiphany to hearing music that will go on to change and influence our life. My personal individual ‘journey’ (a much over used reality show phrase nowadays) was via my dad’s Neil Young and my brother’s Husker Du records and also hearing Stiff Little Fingers for the first time as a young pup at an early school disco.

An early 2018 sighting of Fontaines DC at the venue. Image Credit whenthehornblows.com

Kyle subsequently moved to Texas, and he formed a band called Gashcat who then broke up a couple of years later with the slightly bizarre reasoning of ongoing adverse comparison to Neutral Milk Hotel! In 2016, he recorded his debut album ‘Dolls of Highland’ on Sub Pop Records and then gathered together a live band callee Showboat Honey and secured a support slot with Drive-By Truckers.  

On the afternoon I saw him they produced an excellent set of deep fried Southern rock , where I could hear shades of Green on Red, Lone Justice and The Band, his strong vocal complemented by a fine backing band was a good combination. My next trip was again linked to Dot-to-Dot and the band on show this time was a local combo called ELM.

My final visit was on 26th February 2020 when the spectre of Covid was just beginning to gather pace. I attended with my pal Paul Wilson who had other Preston folk in tow including Aidy and Janet from Lostock Hall. I recall we met in one of the Wetherspoons before having a bevy at the timeless Lass O Gowry. Throughout the gig between bands there was a DJ set from writer and broadcaster Dave Haslam who is primarily famous for being DJ for over 450 sets at the Hacienda nightclub incorporating a Thursday night residency at the Temperance club night from 1986 to 1990.  

The first act on stage was Mick O Toole and the main support were the Gallowgate Murders, a five-piece Celtic punk band from Edinburgh who had only formed the year before. The headliners were the Rumjacks, a rumbustious combo from Sydney in Australia who were also in the Celtic punk mould. They were formed in 2008 and they were renowned for their energetic live shows and lived up to their billing. Their most famous song ‘An Irish Pub Song’ went viral and has garnered over 85m hits on YouTube.

The Rumjacks. Image Credit iheart.com

I recall a generous chap we had never met buying us a round at the bar before Paul and I entered the thrashing, flailing white hot intensity of the mosh pit. It had been a fair while since I had been in such a vibrant pit and my first since turning 50, and I had to recalibrate instantly to peel off my outer layer of clothing and take my watch off for safe keeping and then dived back in.

It was a very small area not helped by some inopportune bruise inducing shelves around the perimeter, but we were in there for the last hour of the gig, and it was a bloody good sweaty fun, more so in hindsight when the first lockdown kicked in a couple of weeks later!

Liverpool Venues 13 to 16

I am this week commencing with the continuation of my sally down the Beatles influenced Mathew Street. On one of its corners bordering Stanley Street, you would locate Liverpool McCooleys whichis a sports and music bar that first opened its doors in 2017. The venue has a sister site located across town in Concert Square. The Mathew Street branch are an Irish Bar built over two floors, and they recently expanded to include a rooftop bar which accommodates a capacity of around 150 punters.

When its first opened, its overall size of 6500 square feet gained it the instant accolade of being the largest Irish Bar in the city and it has the traditional wood decor. They have regular music performers and on the day of my visit a local artist called Martha was strumming away in the corner.   

Liverpool McCooleys. Image Credit Liverpool Echo.

A couple of doors away is the Liverpool Legends Sports Bar, which does exactly what it says on the tin with live sports blasting out all day. They have stretched the concept of the happy hour to the limit by expanding it to 11am to 9pm from Sunday to Thursday. There are musical interludes every evening followed by regular DJ sets; on the one time I have visited I saw a double act called Dewey and Bill playing.

Liverpool Coopers Town House which isburied away on Cases Street near Clayton Square has a long and illustrious history. The pub has been around since 1890, but the story really starts on 16th January 1925 when a lady called Ada Cooper took over the license for the hostelry which at that stage was called The Sefton. She was an immensely popular landlady, so much so the pub became affectionally and informally known locally as The Coopers.

In the 1980’s, The Sefton was under the auspices of the Tetley Walker brewery, but the tide was changing in this decade into the free houses ethos, and this new approach resulted in the pub being renamed the Coopers in 1985. However, their early days were a challenge as in 1986 the majority of the street was demolished to create room for the Clayton Square development which resulted in its isolation from the city centre for three years.

Liverpool Coopers Town House. Image Credit Liverpool Echo.

To mitigate this commercial hit, the brewery asked John Hodges, who ran the nearby Empire pub, to take an additional rent free tenancy to preserve the licence. He developed the Coopers into a music-themed community establishment and when the area opened back up in 1989, he sold his current tenancy and moved in. Over the corresponding 35 years he maintained the popularity of the pub, and they have regular karaoke and live music nights.

The legacy of Ada was not forgotten as on the 100-year anniversary of her arrival celebratory events were held and a commemorative plaque was unveiled there. Through social media the small pub has attracted faithful clientele including Liverpool fans who live in Belgium and Copenhagen who have visited there year on year when attending Liverpool matches and it also has a commendable social media presence with 100,000 followers and over a million likes on Tik Tok. I saw a singer called Kerry on my one visit there.

Further down the same street is Liverpool Rocking Horse. The pub is located in the previous home of a TSB bank and prior to that Blacklers Department store. Blacklers was in situ there for almost the entirety of the 20th century before closing its doors for the final time in April 1988. Contained within their children’s clothing department since the 1950’s was a famous rocking horse called ‘Blackie’ (a name now from a bygone era).

‘Blackie’ the Rocking Horse. Image Credit Museum of Liverpool.

When the store closed Blackie moved on a free transfer to Alder Hey Childrens Hospital where it remained for 16 years as a well loved feature in the central admissions and cardiac clinic. In 2004 it was given a makeover after sustained usage on the wards, and it went into deserved retirement when it was donated on to the Museum of Liverpool.

So, naturally the name of the new hostelry that opened in 2021 was thus pre-ordained. It is an identikit sports and music bar with performers on 7 days a week. When I graced its doors, I was treated to a few tunes by a singer called Vera.