Tag: Manchester Sound Control Music Room

Manchester Venues 98 to 101

As I am sure regular readers of this blog can attest, I have always been a huge advocate of attending Manchester venues. This is even though for my first 49 years on this Earth I was living in Preston, which has involved an extraordinary number of train ride commutes, quite often in challenging circumstances due to Northern Train’s incompetence. Don’t even start me on their brazen temerity relating to a staggeringly unjust penalty notice I received from them recently for making the ‘catastrophic’ error of buying two singles instead of the intended purchase of an open return for virtually the same price!   

My first Manchester venue back in the mists of time in 1985 was the Apollo with the 10th being the short-lived Planet K in the Northern Quarter which I first visited in 1999. The 25th followed in 2011 with the Castle and the 50th was the Sound Control downstairs club venue in 2013.

The dramatic spike in numbers of venues visited on the numbers between 25 to 50 was in no small part to my attendance at several multi venue wristband events including Dot to Dot and Sounds from the Other city (SFTOC) festivals and it became a personal mission around then to see how high I could increase the overall number to.

When we relocated to Manchester in 2017, I had at that stage reached 76 venues and I knew the much sought after century was a question of when not if and I have since rolled on to run past over 150 and counting Manchester venues.   

At SFTOC they utilise a central gathering area of the Regent trading Estate located behind Islington Mill where they have drink and food outlets and have acts performing in the Manchester Regent Trading Estate Car Park. In 2017 I saw the local artist Dub Smugglers and the following year witnessed an act called Kiss Me Again.    

Manchester Regent Trading Estate Car Park. Image Credit soundsfromtheothercity.com

In a more recent year, they based the whole festival site around the Regent Estate, I didn’t attend that year, but I saw the feedback was unfavourable as punter’s preference was to have a suite of venues dotted all around, and they have not since repeated that experiment.

The other three venues in the vicinity are very novel as they based in the warehouse units which I am assuming are normally working areas at other times and can imagine they could have been fine sites for Acid House gatherings back in the day!

The first and largest one we visited was Manchester Unit 5 Regent Trading Estate. The first band I saw there was HMLTD, an art punk band from London town whose original moniker was Happy Meal Ltd. They were a vibrant bunch, and their garb embraced the 1980’s New Romantic era. The following year, I witnessed another London jazz infused artist called Laura Misch.        

HMLTD. Image Credit nme.com

When in attendance at the SFTOC 2018 event I reached my 100th Manchester venue which was a big deal for me as it had taken 33 years to achieve that aim, the venue itself was Manchester Unit 2 Regent Trading Estate. I was hoping and praying it would not be a limp act to celebrate this milestone and thankfully the music gods were smiling on me!

The band was an upcoming Australian artist called Hatchie and her backing band and they produced a terrific slab of dream pop which was perfect for the occasion. I attended the festival again this year and we saw an excellent set from the C-86 infused shoegazers The Early Mornings, who turned out to be the band of the day.  

Hatchie. Image Credit vrtxmag.com

The other area was the smallest one on the Reform Radio Stage within Manchester Unit 4 Regents Trading Estate where I have seen Bennett is Coming and a Spanish soul singer with African roots called Femme Fatene.

Manchester Venue 59 Sound Control – Part 3

There was an understandable backlash when the closure of Sound Control was announced, and a petition launched by one Preston punter (not me!), but they obviously do have damn fine tastes in that city! However as is often the way against commercial organisations, it was all in the end ultimately futile.

The next gig in the Sound Control Music Room in May 2013 was an interesting one. As we exited the station around 6pm we witnessed some activity outside the venue and grabbed the opportunity to check on stage times as the gig that evening was a dual headlining tour. As we enquired, a transit van rolled up and an intrigued observer jumped out and joined in the chat for us to then discover it was Patrick Stickles, the lead singer of Titus Andronicus.

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Titus Andronicus on stage. Image Credit buffablog.com

I first picked up on this unique band in 2008 via their remarkable but somewhat demented debut album Airing of Grievances, which was favourably reviewed at the time as the sound of a ‘violent, overblown and irreverent’ indie band, I have read many lesser appraisals. The band themselves were once in a Shakespeare musical question clue on University Challenge, unsurprisingly unrecognised by the University team. Titus was also the name chosen for the lead character in the remarkable Gormenghast Trilogy.

They were formed in New Jersey in 2005 and have cited Neutral Milk Hotel as an influence and you can hear that very band pervading through their musical output. They were strange but enjoyable and to exemplify this, their bassist in the middle of the set proceeded to impart a rambling surreal tasteless gag and without any preamble after it launched straight into the next thunderous tune.

In the gap between bands, we retired to the bar and whilst endeavouring to get served we were assailed by a random but regular holler of Hold Steady, the shouts emanated from a chap called Nigel who had recognised us from a recent gig, and we proceeded to see him sporadically at further gigs and chatted about music and his allegiance to Charlton FC. It was rapidly turning into a slightly odd evening.

Now I was once referenced in the NME review as one of a ‘couple of dodgy individuals pogoing at the front’ at a Snuff gig at Preston Caribbean Club in 1990, a quote I will be eternally proud of! However, I had never yet been featured in an NME photo, just missing out at a Screaming Blue Messiahs gig at Manchester International as I must have stepped back from stage as the camera clicked.

The main band this night was again F##ked Up who were in good nick with their lead singer Pink Eyes who has a habit of marauding the moshpit. There was a panoramic picture of him in the crowd in the famous music magazine next week. I hungrily scoured the hundred people pictured but would you credit it I was a yard to the left off camera; it was obviously never destined to be!

Three years later in 2016 I went to see the Connecticut post rock band The World is a Beautiful Place and I Am No Longer Afraid to Die. They were in the mould of luminaries such as Maybe She Will and Explosions in the Sky. They had entered my galaxy via their debut album ‘Whenever, if Ever’. They were an enjoyable interesting proposition live.

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The World is a Beautiful Place and I Am No Longer Afraid to Die. Image Credit godisinthetvzine.co.uk

My final gig was my own sabbatical to the venue as it took place 15 days before its closure on 01/12/17. I had only been resident in Manchester for three months so was still somewhat in a bit of a haze, so it was good to have a merry band of six over from Preston to see the legendary Rocket from the Crypt. We made the obligatory visit to the Noodle Bar down Oxford Road before discovering Refuge bar for the first time as it always thought previously it was part of the hotel!

Rocket were understandably a step down from the level of their astounding gigs in the mid-late 90’s but as ever were good value and my pal Paul Wilson obtained a selfie with the frontman Speedo post-gig. The boys headed back on the Preston train whilst I was still encountering the strangeness of a 10-minute commute back to the rental, though there was a detour to the midnight Tesco that evening for much needed unhealthy snacks!