Tag: John Robb

Manchester Venue 129 – Cathedral

In 1215, Manchester Cathedral was built in the centre of the city with additions to the original design being built at periodic intervals over the next three centuries. It survived damage in the Civil War, the IRA bombing in 1996 and the Second World War, the latter causing extensive destruction that required a further 20 years to restore. Following the Arena bombing in May 2017 the Glade of Light memorial was built outside to commemorate the victims. The church is currently one of the fifteen Grade I listed buildings in Manchester and is situated behind the famous Sinclair’s Oyster Bar.

Manchester Cathedral. Image Credit hoteles.com

In the last 15 years the Cathedral has branched out and begun to showcase live music. My first attendance there was in 2012 where I encountered my pal Rick Clegg and his daughter Charlotte on the train over as they were heading on to an alternate Vaccines gig at Manchester Ritz. We parlayed in the pub over a couple of scoops and then headed separate ways.

A couple of years earlier I had attended my debut ecclesiastical event at St Phillips Church in Salford when watching Wooden Shjips. This was a similar set up with slightly more challenges in regard to viewing the stage due to the proliferation of pillars.

The band performing was Dirty Three, an Australian instrumental rock band I had seen once previously 12 years earlier. Their first ever gig took place on ANZAC Day on 25th April 1992 where Warren Ellis utilised a guitar pick up to his violin which created their trademark feedback driven sound which is a sight to behold when they are in their full flow of 10 minute opuses.

Dirty Three. Image Credit fromthearchives.com

Warren was born in Ballarat, Victoria, coincidentally a town Gill and I stayed in when we visited Australia, and he has also been a dual member of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds since 1994.  They are a terrific and thunderous live act, and on the night, the journalist/musician John Robb was also in attendance, with whom I had a decent chat.  

The second and currently latest visit was as part of the Manchester Dot to Dot festival in 2016. As ever, my gig ‘addiction’ resulted in a co-ordinated effort to attend all of the twenty geographically disparate city centre venues during the day, which was a logistical challenge.

Never one who has been able to embrace Gordon Gekko’s ethos of ‘lunch is for wimps’; a food stop was taken at the excellent chippy that used to be located at the city end of Oldham Street. This was immediately prior to heading over to the Cathedral, which for the record was number eleven on the venue hit list. The fish and chips were still being munched as I stood outside, and I could hear the band ending their set.

My instant thoughts were that I had made a major tactical error, and this would forever be classed as a ‘missed gig’, but I wandered in any way to pray for a miracle! Due to the nature of the event, there was very strict time periods allocated to each set, but remarkably in this case the gig gods were smiled benignly on me as the band returned to the stage for an unprecedented encore of one additional song.

The act on stage was Sundara Karma, who are an indie band from Reading. I had caught them very early in their career as they had only formed the previous year and were just at that stage leaving secondary school and it was five years prior to releasing their debut album ‘Youth is Only Ever Fun in Retrospect’. They were obviously acquiring some hype as they incited a very enthusiastic crowd reaction. With the near miss thus averted I progressed on to achieve the full twenty venues, ending the gig quest in Manchester Texture in the Northern Quarter.  

Sundara Karma. Image Credit schonmagazine.com

Gill and I had tickets for one other event there which was to see Low in April 2022 however we ended up being double booked so therefore could not attend. This was seven months before Mimi Parker’s tragic untimely death leaving me with memories of previous great Low shows I had been fortunate to witness, particularly at Manchester Hop and Grape and Lancaster Library.

Manchester Venues 126 to 128

I am returning this week to the annual Sounds from the Other City (SFTOC) multi venue festival held in Salford. I first attended the event in 2012 and have one outstanding gig to cover from that year. The selected roster of venues shifts each time and at this particular one stretched all the way down the A6 in the direction of Victoria station.  

Manchester Rovers Return is a big old-fashioned boozer with some original features dating back to the 1840’s and sits on the corner of Chapel Street and Barlow’s Croft, its previous moniker was the Lord Nelson. Geographically it is located nearby to the fictional Rovers Return on Coronation Street! I walked past very recently, and the hostelry is currently closed, and its future looks uncertain. On the day of the festival, we saw a short-lived Manchester band called Waterworld performing.

Rovers Return. Image Credit Pinterest.

A further dotting the I’s and crossing the T’s exercise on the 2018 shindig brings us to the Manchester Five Four Studios Attic. I have talked in a previous blog about this venue so will not belabour that here apart from to say we were positioned in the sunlit small attic room right at the apex of the establishment.

The lass on stage was called Anni Rossi who is from Minnesota and plays an electric viola that was intriguingly hand crafted by Thor Harris who is the former percussionist of the noiseniks Swans.  Her debut album was recorded with the recently departed Steve Albini and she has toured with amongst others Camera Obscura and the Ting Tings.

There were always colleges and institutes in the Salford area dating back to the 1850’s. From these evolved the University of Salford which received the Royal Charter from Queen Elizabeth II in 1967. There was a further expansion in 1996 when University College Salford fell under the University’s auspices.

Their community covers 23,000 students, 2,500 staff and 170,000 alumni worldwide and their site covers 160 acres of parkland next to the River Irwell and in close proximity to Salford Crescent railway station.  Contained within is Peel Park which was allegedly in 1846 the first public park in the world. They have appeared on University Challenge only periodically but on their appearance in 2016 they had John Cooper Clarke as their mascot!

The initial chancellor was Duke of Edinburgh Prince Philip, and the current is the TV journalist Lucy Meacock. Previous alumni include comedians Peter Kay and Jason Manford, actors Christopher Eccleston and Maxine Peake, artist L.S Lowry and TV presenter Sarah Greene. From a musical slant there is punk rocker Jon the Postman, Courteeners Liam Fray, Everything Everything lead singer Jonathan Higgs and of course John Robb.

Jon the Postman (on the right) outside Thirsty Scholar. Image Credit mdmarchive.co.uk

Jon the Postman is an interesting life tale as he was a local lad who was so named because he was in fact a postie by trade. His first ever gig on 29 May 1977 was in support of Warsaw, who later evolved into Joy Division. At the final ever gig at Manchester’s Electric Circus venue he closed the show with a rendition of ‘Louie Louie’, the backing band being the Buzzcocks. His debut album ‘Jon the Postman’s Puerile’ featured the first ever appearance of Mark E Smith who introduced the above-named track. He then ran the Fall’s fan club before travelling around Europe and living in San Francisco for five years. He was also featured in the 24-Hour Party People movie where he was portrayed by Dave Gorman.  

Manchester Electric Circus with AC/DC on stage in 1976. Image Credit Pinterest.

The venues within the University were reintroduced to SFTOC in 2024 for the first time in a decade and the central hub was Manchester The Green, a grassy area situated in front of the Museum and Art Gallery. They set up a music and beer marquee and I saw Atike B2B Una Lee, Good Afternoon and Good Afternoon v Matthew Rothery (Kiss Me Again) play there. They also had some tasty food options, with some salt and pepper chips being sampled in the afternoon and a pizza later in the evening whilst lounging on one of the plentiful deckchairs.