Category: Liverpool

Liverpool Venues 2 and 3

Liverpool has always been a challenge to access via the train network, so it has not been a regular haunt for gig attending. I must grudgingly concede that the many of the Northern trains are now being improved but the Liverpool routes appear to be at the bottom of the upgrading schedule.

I regularly commute to Liverpool with work thereby having to tolerate the inferior rolling stock. Recently I arrived at Lime Street for a return journey and was astonished to see a new Northern train waiting on the platform, with advanced accessories such as tables, though my joy was short-lived as I realised there were two trains on the platform and sighed when I saw my actual commute of Ivor the Engine was awaiting behind!

I have witnessed Jesus and Mary Chain nine times in total across the years ranging from that infamous show in Preston Clouds in 1985 through to a gig at Manchester Albert Hall a couple of months ago. Many of those shows have been chaotic but their gig at the Lomax takes the biscuit!

Gill, John Dewhurst, and I headed over on a Friday night in 1998, with Gill generously offering to be the designated driver. We scouted around a couple of boozers then headed over to the venue on Cumberland St, off Dale St in the city centre.

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An ultimately unsuccessful gathering to save the Lomax. Image Credit Liverpool Echo.

The club was a three floored iconic site for up-and-coming acts with a 300 capacity. Bands such as Radiohead and Muse had graced the stage there.  It was also known as Foxys and it looks like the venue was permanently closed in 2015 following a police investigation where the owner was jailed for six years for openly selling cocaine on the premises.

It was an intimate venue, but the band were literally falling apart on stage exemplified by continuous acerbic exchanges between Jamie and William Reid and many false starts, Gill was ready to jump on stage and bang their heads together! It was a raggedy set with a far proportion off their latest album ‘Munki’.

The only song that really stood out for me on the night was a rousing version of ‘Reverence’ with its haunting screaming refrain ‘I Wanna Die Just Like Jesus Christ’. Based on that performance it was absolutely no surprise it transpired to be their final tour, prior to their reformation around ten years later.

On five occasions, I have attended gigs on my birthday, Neil Young on my 19th birthday, Against Me on my 32nd, an Alicante gig on my 50th and a King St event on my 51st. They have also generously allocated me an extra bank holiday this year the day after my birthday to attend a Lovely Eggs gig. Rumours that it is due to a Queen Jubilee event are patently untrue!

The fifth occurrence was on 02/06/11, my 43rd birthday. Gill and I had booked a night in Liverpool and after visiting a restaurant in Liverpool One, we dived into a random pub called The Ship & Mitre on the way back to the hotel.

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The Ship & Mitre. Image Credit Liverpool Echo.

It was approaching last orders and we sat quietly in an alcove in the corner and were soon the last punters in the establishment. Then somewhat bizarrely and unprompted one of the bar staff grabbed an acoustic guitar and the other chap called Simon Cities provided the vocals. We watched three to four songs of their sea shanties to not appear impolite before taking our leave, requiring them to unlock the door for us, it was literally a bonus closed door gig!

A postscript is that the documenting of the JAMC gig completes all the gigs I attended in the 20th century, however do not be too perturbed as there are veritable shedloads of 21st century gigs yet to review!

Liverpool Venue 1 – The Royal Court

Mainly due to unreliable transport links I have been an irregular visitor to Liverpool for gigs though I have visited many times with work. I have always found Liverpool to be a vibrant and interesting place to frequent.

My first visit on a train was a mistake as for only the second time in my life I boarded the wrong train, not my fault honestly guv, and of course this error was compounded on arrival at Lime St Station by the fact that I missed the hourly train back to Preston by a wafer-thin margin of 2 minutes!

Coincidentally I was on Lime St station yesterday travelling back after a dramatic day at the cricket watching Lancashire at the quaint Aigburth ground. I have once caught the ferry across the Mersey and yes, they do play that track but thankfully only a 10 second excerpt! I have also attended the Grand National twice without finding the winner.

I never attended the infamous Eric’s venue thus my first two Liverpool gigs were at the Royal Court Theatre in Roe Street in the city centre which is very close to Lime St station. The current Royal Court was built in 1938 in an Art Deco style, and it was fortunate to survive the subsequent blitz. It is noteworthy for being the home of the stage debuts of Richard Burton and Judi Dench in the 1950’s.

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Liverpool Royal Court building. Image Credit Liverpool Echo

It gained Grade II status in 1990 and was taken over by Rawhide Comedy Club in 2005 and it is still operational today producing comedy skit performances with titles such as Little Scouse on the Prairie.

In the 1980’s it was utilised as a music venue and the likes of Rage Against the Machine and David Bowie graced the stage. The three levels of Stalls, Grand Circle and Balcony equated to a capacity of 1186, and it was a grand old venue. I unsurprisingly frequented the cheap ‘seats’ of standing in the mosh pit.

My first visit was on 2nd May 1989, and we commuted there in John Dewhurst’s work van. I recall it was a scrum at the bar prior to the Pixies hitting the stage at 9.15pm. the place was about half full and they had just released their third album ‘Doolittle’.

As ever with the Pixies, it was a vibrant tropically hot mosh pit and I recall them playing ‘River Euphrates’, ‘Mr Grieves, ‘Debaser’ and ‘Monkey Goes to Heaven’. My two highlights were the contrasting ‘Hey’ and the primal ‘Tame’ replete with Black Francis screaming like a banshee! They did an hour set and we had a debrief in a pub in Ormskirk on the way home.

My second and final visit was 19 days later to see REM, and it was on a very warm Sunday evening. The daytime was a combination of sunbathing and of Uncle George and I buying some tickets for an upcoming PNE v Port Vale play off which we unsurprisingly lost! 

We travelled over in George’s trusty yellow Cavalier. On arrival in Liverpool, we landed in an Irish pub near the station and were subject to some sustained cadging from a fellow punter. This cadging theme continued in the next pub, and we made a sensible decision to head into the venue.

REM took to the stage at 9pm. It was an early tour for them, and they were a country mile away from the polished article you saw a decade later, as Michael Stipe was a particularly shy performer at that juncture, but he still oozed charisma. He resembled an eccentric David Byrne and at times was muttering away into a loudspeaker about diverse subjects of CND and Greenpeace.

Michael Stipe in loudspeaker mode. Image Credit Pat Papertown 2

They opened with ‘Pop Song 89’ and I recall them playing ‘Disturbance at the Heron House’, ‘Orange Crush’ and ‘World Leader Pretend’. He then somewhat ironically introduced ‘It’s the End of the World as we Know It (And I Feel Fine)’ as the best song ever written. They performed two encores encompassing eight tracks including ‘Stand’ and ‘Finest Worksong’ and finished with a cover of Velvet Underground ‘After Hours’.

On the commute out of the city, we were very nearly side swiped by a speeding cop car! I recall 5 Live had commentary on a Nigel Benn v Michael Watson boxing match prior to stopping to refuel in Ormskirk with a Chinese takeaway. Just around New Longton, outside Preston, an REM track came on the radio to top of a fine night.

A postscript here is that for the first 77 gigs I attended I used to write a full review of the entire minutiae of the night and these two Liverpool gigs have finally exhausted this archive.