Tag: Hold Steady

London Eleventh and Twelfth Trips

I have travelled a few times down to London with work and at one stage was visiting a company who were based nearby to Moorgate station and adjacent to London Finsbury Square. In 1784 the Square witnessed the first successful attempt of a hot air balloon flight and there is also a memorial installed there to commemorate the 1975 Moorgate tube crash where 43 people perished.  

Finsbury Square. Image Credit londonplanning.org.uk

In the summer of 2017 after leaving a meeting I was headed back to the tube for the journey home and heard music playing. In the early 20th century, the square was home to the London Royal Yeomanry and on that day the Band of Royal Yeomanry (Inns of Court & City Yeomanry) were playing a gig.

Their regimental history dates to 1548 and the band formed in 1961. They perform at many events, including D-Day memorials in Normandy and 6 Nations matches at Twickenham. They still maintain their original ceremonial uniform of French blue jacket and trousers, chain mailed shoulders, George boots and spurs and Chapka helmets.

Band of Royal Yeomanry Band. Image Credit flickr.com

I have always been a huge fan of Hold Steady and have now seen them nine times in total and they sit in bronze medal position of my bands most seen list. That figure would undoubtedly be higher if not for the fact that they have not played a Manchester date since 19/10/14. The reason for this dearth is that they have chosen since then to just play an annual three-day residency in London with no other regional dates.

As a result, we decided to make a pilgrimage down to the smoke in 2019 as I was missing my Hold Steady fix! Their base for their seasonal jaunt is in the thriving Camden suburb of the city. I met Uncle George and John Dewhurst off the train, and we dropped our bags at the handy location of Euston Premier Inn.  We then headed off on the Northern tram line to find our first hostelry, the Dingwalls pub on Camden Lock overlooking the canal.

My first visit to that establishment was in 1987 when I saw Brilliant Corners supported by a yet undiscovered Happy Mondays. The pub has certainly gone through a regentrification phase since then, but they still have live music there on a regular basis.  We also had a foray to the Old Eagle public house and to refuel we hit a local pie shop but there were unfortunately no butter pies on sale!

The Hold Steady show took place at London Camden Electric Ballroom. The Ballroom is a long-established venue and has been in place for 80 years. It began its days as an Irish club where the crooner Jim Reeves used to play and adopted its current name in 1978. There used to be a weekend indoor market staged there and was in place until 2015. It survived potential demolition in 2004 when there was a proposal to redevelop Camden Town underground station.

Camden Electric Ballroom. Image Credit Electric Ballroom

There are two dance floors and four bars contained within and it has a capacity of 1500 and there was good viewing of the stage from any vantage point.  They launched straight in with the vibrant ‘Stuck Between Stations’ and didn’t let up for the next 24 tracks, it was another thoroughly enjoyable performance.

It was also appropriate as a milestone event as it was Uncle George’s and I 500th gig together, a mere 32 years since our first, a staggeringly good Pogues show at Manchester International 2. Our 100th was also a belter with Black Rebel Motorcycle playing the Mill, a small club in Preston.  

After the set had finished, George and I progressed onto London Camden Monarch for number 501. The original Monarch prior to 2000 was in another area of Camden which then became the music venue Barfly. The new Monarch opened in 2008 in a new site on Chalk Farm Road and the DJ on the opening night was none other than Amy Winehouse!

The pub subsequently closed in 2020 but reopened the following year under the new moniker Monarchy retaining the live music in a downstairs events space called the Vault.  On the night we visited a local indie band called Stay Club took to the stage.    

Manchester Venue 122 Deaf Institute – Part 3

Today I conclude my tales of gigs at Manchester Deaf Institute Music Hall. Apparently contained within the venue is a hidden back staircase which allows bands to enter the establishment without using the front entrance and there is also an in house apartment.

Deaf Institute Music Hall. Image Credit Visit Manchester

In October 2018 Palace Winter were on the bill, my attendance sparked via a recommendation from my friend Jez Catlow. They provided an extremely engaging set of cinematic dream pop. The band comprises of Australian singer-songwriter Carl Coleman and Danish producer/pianist Caspar Hesselager, and they base themselves in the intriguing city of Copenhagen. Their name derives from an old hotel (Winter Palace) in the South of France that Carl stayed at in the summer of 2014. The tour was promoting their second album ‘Nowadays’.

In early 2019 Uncle George and I met up to see the Canadian punk rockers F##ked Up who on this occasion I didn’t enjoy as much as previous times I have seen them, the sound quality perhaps being a contributing factor in that regard. John Robb was a fellow attendee, and we had a brief chat during their set.

Later that year Craig Finn & The Uptown Controllers were in town, Craig being the lead singer of one of my favourite bands Hold Steady. His solo stuff has a gentler vibe than his main band material but still contains the requisite social commentary and life affirming lyrics. My entry point here had been their second album ‘We All Want the Same Things’ with my favourite being the mournful and beautifully crafted ‘God in Chicago’ and I was very content that it was included in their set list that evening.

My first visit post-Covid was on another Jez recommendation involving a band called The Clockworks. They are a post-punk combo from Galway who made the old-fashioned move to London in 2018 with the primary intention of furthering their career. They recorded their debut album ‘Exit Strategy’ in Abbey Road studios in 2023.

The Clockworks. Image Credit poklub.de

On the night, they nearly caught us out with an extremely early stage time, but luckily, we checked up on that when ensconced in the Sand Bar across the road, so didn’t have too far to scamper and I thoroughly enjoyed their set.  

Next on the roster created a new personal best for me. The only previous time I had seen Loop was at my final ever visit on 04/12/89 to the much missed and in my opinion the best venue in the world Manchester International 1 where I recall their thunderous aural attack reverberated off the very low roof in that venue. The date of the Deaf gig was 21/05/23 thus creating a paltry time gap of 33.46 years between appearances!

Of my fellow peers, the aforementioned Jez has achieved the longest time span of 43 years from seeing The Vapours supporting The Jam in 1979 to a reprise performance at Bearded Theory festival in 2022.    

Loop. Image Credit pinterest.com

Loop are a drone band from Croydon who I first became aware of in the late 1980’s and adored their beautifully sonic debut album ‘Heaven’s End’, complete with the inspired addition of a soundbite from Hal the computer in Space Odyssey 2001 at the completion of Side 1. I played that record within an inch of its vinyl life!

They split in 1991 with a subsequent reformation in 2013 and played their first comeback shows as they co-curated the final ever Camber Sand All Tomorrow Parties event. They eventually produced a new album called ‘Sonancy’ in 2022. They were excellent on the night with my preference being for the earlier material. I also met fellow Twitter muso Peter Latimer for the first time at this gig and despite the fact that he is from Blackpool, he is still a fine chap!       

My final gig was in November 2023 when Stuart Braithwaite from Mogwai formed a super group called Silver Moth including members from Abrasive Trees, Burning House, Prosthetic Head and his talented music wife Elisabeth Elektra who provides the vocals. Elisabeth once graciously took a picture of me and Stuart when I had a rare fan boy moment at the Wickerman Festival.

They recorded the album ‘Black Bay’ within four intensive days on the Isle of Lewis and provided an intriguing set on the night. They were supported by Samana, who the year before had released their second album ‘All One Breath’. After three years of correspondence, I finally met another Twitter muso Paul, who is not from Blackpool, but is an equally fine chap!