Tag: Lovely Eggs

Lancaster Venues 4 to 7

If you take a left turn outside the main entrance of Lancaster train station, there is a path that takes you over the hill by Lancaster Castle. The Castle itself has a long history including its role as a bastion against the Picts and Scots tribes and was the location of the trials of the Lancashire Witches and has rather grimly witnessed over 200 executions. As recently as 2011 it was a fully functioning HM prison and in recent years has also become a music venue alongside 50 others within the October Lancaster Music Festival, an event I have yet to visit.

The path then drops back down to the River Lune where I used to visit the Wagon and Horses and then onto the George and Dragon pub. If you then walk along the riverfront towards the centre this brings you to Lancaster Three Mariners on Bridge Lane.

Lancaster Three Mariners. Image Credit whatpub.com

The pub is the oldest in the city and the Grade II listed building dates to the 15th century and has an olde world feel with wood beams and low doorframes and is reputedly haunted. It is a CAMRA award winning pub and as a result you can purchase some tasty ales. One night in 2017 I saw an act called Acoustic Blues play there.

As you continue to walk past the bus station and up Bridge Lane you reach the highly recommended Bombay Balti House where I have been visiting on and off for around twenty years and attended as part of my 40th birthday celebrations.  

If you then turn into Church Street and past my favourite Lancaster pub, the Sun you arrive at Lancaster Study Room. This is a very chilled establishment which also contains a restaurant. Whilst visiting here on a night out in September 2016 there was a young local acoustic artist called Oliver strumming away in the corner.  

On the other side of St Nicholas Arcade shopping centre from there lies Lancaster Tap House which can be found down a quiet side road called Gage Street. As the pub name implies, they have a plethora of fine ales and over fifty bottled beers to peruse and choose from and is a terrific little bar. They have regular musical content and on one visit in August 2013 we enjoyed a set by a decent young local singer called Sarah Comer.

Further across town on Parliament Street, you would find the Lancaster Yorkshire House. It has more recently changed its name to Yorkshire Taps and is run by the local Mitchells Brewery. On a Christmas lads’ night out in 2013, we could hear music emanating from the function room upstairs so obviously had to investigate further.

Lancaster Yorkshire House. Image Credit tripadvisor.co.uk

In the small music room, a band called Two For Joy were on stage. They are led by prolific local musician and artist Ben Hall who is joined by other band members. They have supported local legends Lovely Eggs who have also played at this venue. Ben has also exhibited his art works in the city been involved in a musical side project called Mr Ben and the Bens. My records display to me that from a statistical viewpoint this became my 200th different venue visited.

Manchester Venues 77 to 78

For one of the main city train stations, Salford Central station is somewhat of an anachronism. I currently work very close to this station and have many colleagues who are commuting over from Preston who now don’t have a direct train to Central and have to change at Salford Crescent. They are due to close the station for a few months to upgrade and make the platforms safer, however they have missed a glaring opportunity to open up for wider use the other platforms that are available on the Piccadilly to Victoria station line link, more short sighted thinking relating to Northern based stations and on any initiative that sits outside HS2, methinks!

If you turn left as you exit Salford Central this takes you directly to the Salford Egerton Arms Hotel. The pub has sat at the Gore Street site since at least 1841. It must have been a pacifist venue back in the day as the pub’s coat of arms motto ‘Virtuti – Non – Armis – Fido’ apparently translates as ‘I trust in virtue not arm’s’. It is purported that the name derives from the Egerton family who owned the Tatton park estate around the time of the inception of the pub.

 

Egerton Arms Hotel. Image Credit Geograph Britain and Ireland.

The pub has been owned by the local Joseph Holts brewery, still arguably the cheapest beer in Britain. I first visited there in 2017 as part of Sounds form the Other City festival (SFOTC) in 2017 and we saw a three-piece from Leeds called Autobodies.

There was also a chap in residence on the microphone who was publicising his quizmaster duties later that day and he had the most amusing laconic style in his delivery. That evening we were in the Pint Pot pub preparing to head off for our train home and begun chatting to three lads who we discovered had become the actual quiz winning team and they had received a tidy price of free tickets to next year’s festival. At the 2018 event we witnessed a local band called Perkoset at the Egerton.  

Next door is a decent food establishment called Caribbean Flavas and we have sat in the window a couple of times sampling their wares whilst in the area. There has been an uplift locally with acclaimed Italian and Tapas restaurants opening up nearby the station.

Directly across the traffic lights and the busy Chapel Street you find the Salford Arms Hotel. The pub has the same longevity as the Egerton, and it circles round onto Bloom Street and has also doubled up as a working hotel in the past. I walked past recently, and I have identified that the pub is now permanently closed.

It always had a battered old boozer vibe about the place, and I first visited there when in attendance at the 2012 SFTOC event.  On a makeshift stage in the middle of the pub we saw a thrilling set of shoegazey noise from History of Apple Pie who had not yet released their excellent debut album Out of View. On our way out we saw them loading up their transit band and had a brief chat.

History of Apple Pie on stage. Image Credit NME.

We returned later to see a very early set from Birmingham’s post-punks Victories at Sea. Just checking back on the bill now I see that Lovely Eggs actually headlined the venue that year. In 2017, we saw Manchester based artist Maddy Storm and the following year we ended the festival with a fun set from Leeds party band Crumbs.