Tag: Dinosaur Jr

Milestones Part 1 – Gigs

This week I am launching another new strand relating to the significant milestones I have achieved in my gig-going life thus far and this initial article concentrates solely on the gig numbers. I previously elucidated my interpretation of what constitutes a gig at some length in a blog that I drafted back in the mists of time named ‘Definition of a Gig and a Venue?’  

Thus, I won’t repeat my cogitations from there but will suffice myself with saying that as the years have progressed, my qualifying criteria of a ‘gig’ has softened immensely to allow more gigs to gain entry to the Jimmy Archives. Therefore, as long as I witness someone on a stage nowadays playing music, they can be counted!  

Everyone has a first gig and my contribution to that grand compendium was Slade at Lancaster University back in December 1983. My 50th was to see Wonderstuff and Darlings Buds at the fabulous Manchester International 1 and the 100th was Dinosaur Jr at Manchester Academy 2.

Darling Buds. Image Credit thenewvinylvillain.com

As I have got older, I seem to be attending an increasing number of events and the overall numbers have skyrocketed as a result, so much so that after a few cheeky gigs in Lanzarote, it became apparent that my next show at Manchester Gorilla on 13/05/22 would be my 1000th gig.

I am not going to list all my landmark gigs, but I will pick out some highlights, thus my 250th was my one ear splitting foray to watch My Bloody Valentine at Manchester Apollo on their comeback tour. I don’t think I am unique in saying that this was the loudest show I have ever attended, and I personally have a very high bar in that regard. I know a few readers on here saw their recent shows, but I decreed once was enough mainly because I have never worn ear plugs to gigs, probably to my own detriment, but I am too far down that path to change now!

My 500th was Cymbals down in the basement of Leeds Wardrobe with the 800th being the terrific Belly at Manchester Ritz, Tanya Donelly still having a terrific voice. Number 900 was Helicon at Manchester Peer Hat.

Since then, I have rattled upwards even further with Snuff being number 1200 at Manchester Breadshed, 1300 was Public Service Broadcasting at Manchester Albert Hall. I have also recently gone past the 1500 figure which was at a new venue so I will cover that one in a future article.  

Inadvertently, but somewhat appropriately on the night there was a proper gathering at my ‘chiliad’ (had to look that one up!) and chiliagon is also apparently a term for 1000-sided polygon, now thinking about it I cannot visualise the scale of that diagram and how that might look. Anyway, returning from my digression, Gill and I met Marcus initially for a cold one in the Lass O Gowrie.   

There was then a little breakdown in communication, but we managed to catch up with Tris in the Gorilla bar attached to the venue where she had run into a former colleague Andy and his friend Paul who were also attending the gig. Thankfully Tris had clocked that it was an early show starting at 8.30 so a quick drink, photo shoot and a scoot round to the entrance was in order.

Pre-gig team photo with L-R Tris, Andy, myself, Paul, Marcus and Gill. Image Credit kind anonymous punter.

We accessed the venue, and I was a little giddy as my usual reticence gave way to informing a couple of random punters that this was my 1000th show, either being met with ‘well done, that is a fine achievement’ or on the converse side total bemusement!

The band that night was Mattiel who constitute of singer/songwriter Atina Mattiel Brown and guitarist Jonah Swilley and originated from Atlanta, Georgia in 2015. Mattiel Brown was raised on a self-sustaining farm in a rural setting, which was apparently quite an isolated existence, and she threw herself with gusto into visual arts, which fed into her subsequent music creation.

When we saw them they were promoting their fine third album ‘Georgia Gothic’ and they had strengthened out the band with the addition of a bassist and a drummer, and they produced an enjoyable slab of garage rock. The downside was that the gig was over by 9.45pm and one couldn’t fail to notice many punters being caught out by the early show. I was almost craving gig 1001 to follow it but instead we headed to the hostelry, ending the evening in the Peveril of the Peak. 

Mattiel. Image Credit ATO Records.

Touching briefly on gigs attended with other people, I have individually attended over 500 gigs with both Gill and Uncle George and just under 300 with John Dewhurst. Also, Uncle G, John and I (The three stooges) have very recently just gone past 250 shows together.

Manchester Venue 74 Soup Kitchen – Part 1

The Soup Kitchen which has recently been rebranded simply as Soup resides deep in the Northern Quarter on Spear St, within stumbling distance of the Night and Day venue. During the Covid apocalypse an eminently sensible decision was made to pedestrianise the nearby Stevenson Square area to create a European style outdoor seating vibe and thankfully this ethos has been retained post-pandemic.

Manchester Soup Kitchen. Image Credit Pinterest.

The upstairs room is laid out in a canteen style with long wooden benches to create a communal atmosphere. It has decent but slightly overpriced tucker available and has a plethora of craft ales to imbibe. Downstairs resides the venue with a small bar to the right and stage to the left with a 150 capacity. When approaching the room limit, it can get very busy down in the slightly damp cellar setting.  The unisex toilets would be best quantified in the ‘basic’ category, but it all adds to the grungy allure of the place. They have a lot of upcoming bands and DJ’s who frequent their busy live roster.

I have attended Soup fourteen times in total and first heard of the venue when the much-hyped Milk Music from Washington DC played there on 17/05/12. They had only released a couple of early singles by this stage, and they had an engaging slacker vibe about them, despite the venue only being half full. There was little audience participation until they somewhat oddly woke from the slumber on the last song to create an impromptu mosh pit!

I must say since this gig the band completely dropped off my radar until I began researching this article and was surprised to find they are still in existence. I am just now listening to their debut album ‘Cruise Your Illusion’ which has shades of Neil Young, Dinosaur Jr and Meat Puppets therein which sounds like a tidy combination to me. They were supported on the night by an appearance from Eagulls who I cited in last week’s Beacons Festival review. They were my only two viewings of the Leeds based band, coincidentally within a couple of months of each other.

Milk Music. Image Credit VICE.

Many of my attendances have been part of multi event wristband events such as Dot to Dot or Off the Record festivals and one such appearance was a couple of years later to see Remember Remember. The Glasgow band was initially the brainchild of Graeme Rowland who released a 2008 album with participation from other collaborators. By the time I witnessed them in 2014 they had morphed into a seven-piece band and had just released their third album ‘Forgetting the Present’, before they subsequently split the following year.

They were on Rock Action roster run by Mogwai, with whom they had supported. They were also in the fully instrumental post-rock genre, but they were of a gentler variation than their label counterparts and I enjoyed their show.

A year later I saw Worriedaboutsatan from Bradford, their name deriving from a track by Belgium band Deus. They were formed by Gavin Millar around 2006, before being joined by Leeds College of Music pal Tom Ragsdale. They have a crossover post-rock/electronic template and have supported luminaries such as 65daysofstatic and Maybeshewill. They garnered considerable radio airplay, and their music has also somewhat bizarrely been featured on Coronation Street!