Tag: Husker Du

Gigs from Abroad Part 5 – Australia Part 1

In February 2007, we were highly fortunate to head out on a month-long trek to Australia. On our outward leg we stopped off at Hong Kong and soaked up the culture of this vibrant city, heading up to the Peak and sampling some terrific food. The time/weather gap was best exemplified when we were in a bar drinking Tsingtao near the river at 9pm on a sweltering evening and a TV in the corner was showing the lunchtime Merseyside derby from a freezing snow-clad Anfield.

We flew onto Melbourne and then drove the Great Ocean Road whilst playing some Husker Du before heading north to Sydney. En route we stopped at various motels including staying in a small hamlet called Marlo. On arrival there, we were taken aback as the end of the track brought us to a hotel on stilts just before the sea. Visions of the Deliverance movie sprang to mind, but they could not have been more friendly and fresh fish and a crisp bottle of Oyster Bay whilst watching the sunset completed a fine evening.

Further up the coast we stopped early one morning at a beach where kangaroos sometimes resided. We unfortunately didn’t witness any roos but did hear some suspect rustling in the undergrowth before a giant lizard peaked his head out, suffice to say we left it to its own devices!  

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I did not see this particular kangaroo! Image Credit pinterest.

We undertook all the requisite tourist activities in Sydney, including a tour of the Opera House and its atmospheric concert hall, a trip to the Blue Mountains and in the incongruous location of a shopping arcade basement I sampled the finest ever Laksa I have encountered in my life. Sydney was a vibrant, enjoyable yet infinitely smaller city than I had envisaged it would be. We then flew onto Hamilton Island which was a gateway to the Great Barrier Reef where the main mode of transport was little golf buggies and the occasional bus.

Nearby our accommodation was the Reef View Hotel Bar where we one night we were having an aperitif and a chap called Piano Man started tinkling away. It was low quality loungecore and we escaped as soon as we were able. We undertook a brief stopover in Singapore on the way home. Quaffing a Singapore Sling in the famous Raffles Bar, a trip to the slightly surreal Sentosa Island and visits to a couple of the numerous fantastic food halls completed a rather excellent holiday.

Our earlier initial jet lagged arrival in Melbourne was around midnight and when the taxi landed in St Kilda our first sight was of a couple of lads spilling out of a local pub and brawling on the grass – welcome to Australia! The following day we caught one of the archaic trundling trams into the city, where we had our first ever drink in a bar opposite Flinders Street station, which felt like a landmark moment as you are literally at the other end of the globe.

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Melbourne Tram circa 2007. Image Credit youtube.com

Melbourne was a pleasant bohemian style city though many of the pubs seemed without local knowledge to be hidden in basements, so much so one night we encountered a Scottish chap who upon hearing our accents, politely enquired ‘Where are all the f%@$*£g bars in this toon’?       

Manchester Venues 44 to 46

As you traverse down the rather exposed A6 into the City Centre from Salford Crescent station you encounter the Old Pint Pot pub overlooking the River Irwell. It was originally a school and was called Adelphi Riverside in the eighties before obtaining its current moniker in the nineties and has been a regular haunt for Salford University alumni for many years.

It is a Marston’s Brewery pub and apparently has recently gone through an extensive refurbishment with the introduction of a state-of-the-art unique overhead beer dispense system called Palm Pour.  There is also a fine beer garden with a vantage over the river.

My first visit there was for a beer prior to watching AC/DC at MEN Arena in 2001. On another visit whilst meeting Gill after work I arrived first and upon entering the establishment my ears were assailed by the unmistakable sound of Husker Du’s sonic cover of the Byrds ‘Eight Miles High’. This remains one of my favourite ever Huskers track and I have never heard it in a pub environs before or after that day!  

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The Old Pint Pot. Image Credit scoopergen.co.uk

I have always been fond of this pub, and it remains a focal gathering point within the auspices of Sounds from the Other City festival. At the 2017 festival in the Old Pint Pot Main Bar, we saw a terrific band in an Americana vein called the Roasts, though searching now I cannot find reference of them, but I most certainly saw them! We also saw another act called Lord Kessell and the Drums.

On my first visit there in 2012 we saw a decent local post rock band called Day for Airstrikes, whose first full length album ‘Widows’ released in 2006 (not to be confused with Sennen’s debut album of the same name) through Piccadilly Records.   

There was a more conventional stage in the Old Pint Pot Upstairs and at the same event in 2018 we watched TV AM. At the following years event we saw a brief portion of indie band Pip Blom’s set, they were obviously a draw because we could barely push through the door!   

To exemplify the broad spectrum of venues utilised by the festival, the next one located just down the road is the Angel Centre, a healthy living centre offering free activities to the Salford community including events such as free E-Cig appointments and mental health and horticulture drop ins.

In the main room they had kitted up a small stage in the corner and a pop-up bar to the left. I have witnessed gigs there at each of the three SFTOC festivals I have attended.

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Angel Centre. Image Credit guerillapocasts.com

On my first foray in 2012 I saw Frazer King, a quirky six-piece band from the local suburb of Wythenshawe who were difficult to quantify but Ennio Morricone punk could be an apposite description of their sound.

In 2017 we saw a terrific band called Golden Dregs, led by driving force Benjamin Woods. They were a welcome blast of garage rock Americana and his vocals resembled Bill Callaghan of Smog; they went down a storm complemented by a cold brew from the bar. I completed the venue trilogy in 2018 by watching a local band called Cattle.