Tag: Go Team

Manchester Venues 149 to 150 – New Century Hall

Of the four main city centre train stations, Victoria would probably be my least attended as it has always been slightly on the wrong side of the tracks for me! Now if you depart the station down the approach heading alongside the tram tracks towards Shudehill Interchange but deviate marginally to the left down Hanover Street, you reach the Sadler’s Cat public house.

Sadler’s Cat pub. Image Credit secretmanchester.com

The Sadler’s was originally known as the Pilcrow which was purpose built as part of a regeneration programme commitment by the Co-operative Society, following the demolition of the Crown and Cushion pub to make way for a new public road. The current name reflects the commemoration of the very site of the first hot air balloon flight in 1785 and the pilot being one James Sadler who took his feline friend with him on the trip! The pub is contained within the NOMA complex and is now owned by the Cloudwater brewery and is a good basking spot in the summer with a suite of outside tables.

Staying with the Co-op theme, across the square from the hostelry you find the New Century Hall which was built as their 1000 capacity Insurance Society building in 1962 and sits adjacent to New Century House. They had many major acts play there in the 1960’s including Rolling Stones, Tina Turner, Jerry Lee Lewis and the Kinks. There is also an anecdote of the Jimi Hendrix Experience performing there in 1966 and a young John Cooper Clarke being denied entry as he was not wearing the obligatory tie, despite being bedecked in Fred Perry and a striped sports coat, bouncers eh! 

John Cooper Clarke. Image Credit pinterest.com

It is a three-storey building with the basement containing the Access Creative College where you can obtain degrees in music and gaming. The ground floor houses the Manchester New Century Food Hall where I first visited in December 2022 on a Christmas works do where we partook some tucker from one of the many food vendors and watched the England v Wales World Cup match. Where the big screen showing the match was located, there is normally a stage, and I have seen a couple of local singers perform there.

Upstairs from there is the Manchester New Century Hall which on first sight I was instantly impressed by with the wood surrounds and tasteful lighting. Even when busy it remains an accessible venue with ability to scoot down the sides to obtain a spot nearer to the stage. I can see myself in the future checking their listings from a venue viewpoint ahead of many others in the city where they become an almighty scrum when reaching capacity, the Albert Hall being a case in point.

My first attendance was in May 2023 with Gill and our good friends and fellow rabble rousers Jo and Paul. We had a couple of drinks around the Kampus area near Piccadilly and in the Northern Quarter. The band we were going to see was The Beths from Auckland in New Zealand. They were promoting their hugely recommended third album ‘Expert in a Dying Field’ which I have given serious airplay to as I love the upbeat nature of it, and I thoroughly enjoyed their set. Their sound reminds me of a fellow upcoming band called Fortitude Valley.      

Manchester New Century Hall. Image Credit manchestereveningnews.co.uk

My next attendance was with Gill in June 2024 where we only shamefully discovered the Abel Heywood Hydes brewery pub for the first time, but we have rectified that by attending a couple of times since. The band that night was the Lovely Eggs who I didn’t enjoy as much as their previous times I have seen them.  

There then followed two attendances in Sept 2024. The first was remarkably for me to see Ride for the first time, however I had previously seen an individual set by Mark Gardener at Preston Continental back in November 2011 where they also showed a screening of ‘Anyone Can Play Guitar’ which provides a story of the Oxford music scene featuring Ride alongside many other bands.    

For the uninitiated, Ride were prime shoegaze pioneers releasing two highly touted albums on Creation records in the early 1990’s. They broke up in 1996 before reforming in 2014 and were touring their latest album ‘Interplay’. The sound quality was poor early on but once they sorted that out, they were excellent.

My latest visit involved a large group of us including my pals Jason Gill and Barry Jury going to see the Go Team for the fourth time and for my first time for 14 years. They played in full their superb debut album ‘Thunder Lighting Strike’ with other tunes interspersed in their set.           

As a postscript I have managed to obtain some degree of numerical symmetry as New Century Hall was the actual 150th Manchester venue that I had visited.                                                                                                                                                         

Manchester Venue 8 – Academy 1

Manchester Academy was built in 1990 about 100 yards from Manchester Students Union on Oxford Road and was renamed as Academy 1 in 2004 when the Academy venues merged. It is the largest of the group with a capacity of 2600, but I have always found it to be an accessible venue and tend to head down the right side to endeavour to have the best vantage of the stage. Generally, though it is a decent view from any area in the venue. The bar by the entrance however is brutally hard to get served.

Since my first visit on 24/05/91 I have attended there 30 times placing it at No 3 on the venues most attended list. That first gig was a starry double bill of Wedding Present and Buffalo Tom and was the first gig where we caught the 1.20am ghost train back. That train became a staple for many years after. I saw the Weddoes there again in 2007.

My next two visits in 1992 and 1993 involved stalking Sugar (Bob Mould’s new band after Husker Du) on their initial tours. The following year I saw Kristin Hersh (previously of Throwing Muses) and remains one of only about five gigs I have ever driven to, because quite frankly why would one want to drive to a gig?

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Sugar publicity pic. Image credit Spin

In the tail end of the 90’s Billy Bragg played twice with a Spiritualised gig in the middle of those two.  In 2000 I had high hopes for Queens of the Stone Age but despite a great first track it disappointedly petered out.

2002 saw Rocket from the Crypt imitators The Hives in town, the gig did not work for me at all. That was followed by two gigs involving legendary bands I had chased for a while, Sonic Youth and Fugazi. Both were excellent but on reflection Fugazi shaded it. The band contained Ian MacKaye (previously of Minor Threat) and they cut an intelligent and engaging presence.

Somewhat unsurprisingly I have caught every Mogwai Manchester date and they graced the stage four times between 2003 and 2011, all of consistently high quality. The only gig I have never attended due to illness was a Hundred Reason show, so I immediately rectified that by catching them on their next tour in 2004.

The Vines and Mercury Rev were splendid gigs and I also saw Go Team and Nine Black Alps there in 2006. Later that year I saw a proper high energy set from the Subways which turned out to be my 100th gig in Manchester.

We went to see Explosions in the Sky in 2008 missing an important North End relegation game against West Brom. We were keeping ourselves updated and confirmation of the final result – a 2-1 win induced whoops of delight which coincided with a very quiet passage on stage generating quizzical looks in our direction from the band!

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Explosions in the Sky on stage. Image credit asialive365.com.

Further gigs followed from Ash, Buzzcocks and Hole. The final one inducing regret that I didn’t see them earlier in their career as their performance felt somewhat staged. The Hold Steady on 10/12/08 was as ever a positively uplifting experience.

I thoroughly enjoyed Eels in 17/03/13 in attendance with super fan Gary Moore who now runs the Schooner pub in Gateshead which stages live music. I have not yet had the opportunity to visit said establishment.

www.theschooner.co.uk

My two most recent gigs there were to see Toots and the Maytals, decent but too quiet and a 25th anniversary gig with Feeder in 2018.