Tag: Joy Division

Manchester Venue 138 – St James and Emmanuel Parish Church

In the centre of Didsbury Village, School Lane crosses over at the traffic lights onto Barlow Moor Road where you will pass the slightly battered establishment of the Nelson public house. This is currently one of the stops on the famous Didsbury Dozen beer route which has been in place for decades, the dozen being subject to subtle changes as one place opens, and another closes. The crawl has seen a recent upturn in more youthful groups undertaking a Saturday sally round, which has been viewed as a positive as it maintains a steady footfall for the hostelries, but also a negative due to an increase in drunken antics.    

On the other side of the street is Manchester St James and Emmanuel Parish Church which is in front of Didsbury Library. It is the second oldest church in Manchester, with some elements dating back to 1275 and the Grade II listed building was extensively refurbished in 1986 and is affiliated to four local schools. It also contains a bell tower with the six bells originally being cast in Gloucester in 1727.

St James and Emmanuel Church. Image Credit didsburycivicsociety.org

This building has previous pandemic connotations for myself as I had one of my vaccinations here and also undertook a couple of shifts as a Covid volunteer. I have also attended the café located within.

A small matter of a few weeks ago we were in that very area when we discovered the residents were currently in thrall to the Didsbury Pride event taking place that day. Immediately sensing a bonus gig, I navigated the security into an extremely busy area behind the church where there many stalls of varying merchandise and also a stage at the very back where the Didsbury Choir were undertaking a jaunty set. Afterwards by chance we saw Tris and Ross perched outside the nearby Head of Steam so grabbed the chance to have a cheeky cold one with them!

Continuing down the road takes you past a couple of cafes including the bohemian bar and book shop Art of Tea and then onto the traffic lights with Palatine Road. If you take a left turn, and on that stretch of the highway, you can see on the right the remnants of Fridays nightclub which opened originally under the name of Riverside in the 1970’s. It was a renowned venue in the 1980’s and 90’s and many punters who survived the aforementioned Dozen gravitated there after closing time.

Fridays Nightclub. Image Credit manchestereveningnews.co.uk

It was made up of three separate rooms and based on the testimonials it sounded abundantly ‘cheesy’ with the traditional sticky floors and on Thursday nights all drinks were 80p until midnight. It also apparently had a draconian dress code in place. It continued into the new century and in 2010 launched a Polish party night to welcome people in the Manchester area who derived originally from Eastern Europe. It finally closed in 2016 before morphing into Bar Rogue which at some unspecified stage subsequently closed for good.

Further down Barlow Moor Road you arrive upon the Grade II listed Woodstock Arms which has a large outdoor area primed for summer drinking. I recall watching Portugal lose to Uruguay there in the red hot summer World Cup of 2018. It is also one of the prime locations used on the popular TV series Cold Feet and they also utilised houses on the streets nearby.

If you head across the busy Princess Parkway you reach the Southern Cemetery, which is the largest municipal cemetery in the United Kingdom and second largest in Europe. Notable people buried there are John Rylands, Sir Matt Busby, L.S Lowry, Tony Wilson and Joy Division and New Order’s manager Rob Gretton.   

‘Cemetry Gates’. Image Credit blog.sevenpounds.com

The location was also the inspiration for local miserabilist Morrissey to warble the opening lines ‘A dreaded sunny day, so I meet you at the cemetery gates’ on the Smith’s track ‘Cemetry Gates’. The title track apparently being deliberately misspelt and is based on Morrissey’s walks there with his photographer friend Linder Sterling who he initially met at a Sex Pistols sound check in 1976. Linder was also the frontwoman of post-punk band Ludus and designed the cover for one of the Buzzcocks early singles.   

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.