Tag: Six by Seven

2023 Gigs – Part 1

Continuing the theme of previous years, I will now cover the 2023 gigs attended at venues already reviewed in previous blogs. Because I am sure you are desperate to know lets firstly cover the numbers bit! It turned out to be a record breaking year in that I attended 128 gigs in total which also encompassed 70 new venues.

So, I shall start with the familiar haunt of Manchester Academy 2 and cover my 41st and 42nd visits to that venue. In the cold depths of mid-winter in January Marcus and I headed there to witness the Delgados who are a four-piece band from Glasgow who produce some imaginative music. They formed in 1994 before disbanding in 2005 and then subsequently reformed in 2022 hence this comeback tour.

The Delgados. Image Credit nme.com

I had seen them once before on our honeymoon at Dublin Mean Fiddler in 1998 where they were on an excellent double bill with Nottingham’s Six By Seven. I thoroughly enjoyed their current incarnation as they cut an engaging presence on stage in front of a responsive crowd just glad to witness them back on the gig circuit and their tour culminated with a date in their home city.

The other attendance to Academy 2 also involved a further lengthy gap from my first sighting, in this case 20 years and one week exactly from when I witnessed the Northern Irish combo Therapy? at Preston Mill. Now to be fair I have always been fairly ambivalent about this band and their show on the night unfortunately didn’t alter my viewpoint.  

Prior to the gig there was an obligatory visit to the nearby mecca Manchester Big Hands where they periodically have live bands playing at the end of the room. That night I encountered a noisy Warrington psych rock band called Pray for Mojo who earlier in the year had graced the stage at Manchester Psych Fest. In 2022, they had released their debut album titled ‘Welcome to Mojopia’. They were supported by Swamp Kids.  

I shall now return to the Academy complex with a visit to Manchester Club Academy with the more than welcome return of the Raveonettes. The Copenhagen duo of Sune Rose Wagner and Sharin Foo were back on the circuit after a 4 year sabbatical. They were in fine form and played a greatest hits set with my personal highlight being one of their early singles ‘That Great Love Sound’. They were supported by local noiseniks Dr Dr.   

The Raveonettes. Image Credit discogs

Prior to night one of my Mogwai triple bill (over four nights and two cities) Gill and I grabbed a table and had an aperitif in the Manchester Blues Kitchen Bar. The act on stage whilst we primed ourselves for the upcoming aural assault were called Cry Wolf.   

The next gig derived from my very learned musical twitter (I still call it twitter!) pal @parramaterial who recommended Black Doldrums on their latest tour that included a date at Manchester Gullivers. Thus, the troops were enlisted and four of us popped over to have a gander and they were wholly worthy of the effort. Black Doldrums are a North London trio who released their debut album ‘Dead Awake’ in 2022 and they created a hugely enjoyable psych shoegaze cacophony on the night.

Black Doldrums. Image Credit louderthanwar.com

In June I had a foray over to Manchester Didsbury Park Green for the summer festival where a lass called Sally Smith was playing.  The following week another twitter recommendation resulting in four of us attending Manchester Yes Pink Room to watch Screaming Females. Their driving force was Marissa Paternoster who initially formed the band in 2005 at a high school in New Jersey.

Obscure fact time, she was referenced as the 77th greatest guitarist of all time in the Spin magazine in 2012. They released eight albums in total, all on the terrifically named Don Giovanni record label. I happened to catch them and their very decent stagecraft on their final ever tour as they subsequently broke up later in the year. 

The next two gigs to cover took place at Manchester Ritz where Tony Dewhurst, Rick Clegg, Barry Jury and I (Gang of Four) went to watch the Gang of Four who entertained with their angular post-punk sound. In October we managed to purchase tickets to see the Pretenders and the eternally youthful Chrissie Hynde. Unusually, on arrival the queue snaked back to beyond the Sainsburys on the corner, but we managed to enter the establishment just in time for their excellent show and her voice still sounds terrific. She dedicated one song to Johnny Marr, who was in the audience watching on his birthday.  

Gigs Abroad – Part 1

I have been very fortunate to visit many foreign climes and witnessed many bands abroad but many of them have been of the on the hoof low quality holiday threshold. In that regard, my first gig abroad was at Majorca Santa Ponsa Square in 1997. In a rather quaint environment of a bandstand in the centre of a tourist square we saw a rather inferior Beatles tribute, but as with many of these gigs the compensation was the glorious sun and a beer in an ice-cold frosted tankard!

However, the second gig is in stark contrast to the first and at a completely different level. In September 1998, I married my ever supportive long-standing girlfriend Gill and we headed off for a few days to Dublin for our honeymoon.

It was a place we had always yearned to visit, and we thoroughly enjoyed our sojourn and we caught the city at a good time as we were in advance of it becoming a stag do destination and subsequent stratospheric prices. It is a very walkable destination and we embraced that approach dually soaking up the culture and visiting many hostelries and rather proudly we did not visit the same venue twice. We also found some fine restaurants dotted around the metropolis.

We headed out on the Dart (the local train) to visit interesting areas on the outskirts either side of the city, passing Ireland’s rugby mecca Lansdowne Road and walking on the pristine sands of Killiney Beach. I really found an affinity with this vibrant cosmopolitan city.

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The Dublin Dart. Image Credit TripSavvy

When I had booked the vacation, I thought it would be worthwhile identifying if there were any likely looking gigs that week and identified one at the Dublin Mean Fiddler. Fortuitously the venue was near the hotel and I recall in a pub next door to the venue on Wexford Road they were having a tribute night to Gene Clark, the founding member of the Byrds, who penned timeless tunes such as ‘Eight Miles High’ and ‘I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better’.

I had previously visited the sister venue Harlesden Mean Fiddler in 1987 watching the troubadour Townes Van Zandt. The Dublin branch opened in 1995, subsequently closing in 1999 to reboot itself as a new venue called the Village which is still going strong.

It was a small cosy venue with a downstairs bar and an upstairs venue. We arrived quite early allowing us to grab a seat at a table on a gantry overlooking the stage. At that point, it was the first gig I had observed purely in a seated position. The venue capacity is 550 and it was probably about half full that night. The support band was the Nottingham band Six by Seven who were touring on the back of their debut album ‘The Things We Make’, they created a fine racket with the standout track being ‘Something Wild’ and I would badge their performance in the ‘earnest’ category!

The headline act was the underrated Delgado’s from Motherwell who were uniquely named after Tour de France winner Pedro Delgado. They set up their own record label Chemical Underground which initially signed up a very young Mogwai and Arab Strap. They were fronted by the enigmatic Emma Pollard and they cut an engaging entertaining presence.

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The Delgado’s. Image Credit ohmyrockness.com

After the gig, we headed out to the downstairs late bar and gained entry despite my comedy fall at the bottom of the steps due in part to imbibing several bottles of Becks!