The next challenge that presents itself is how you travel to a gig. For the Preston gigs that was very easy and I did periodically jump on buses for gigs on the outskirts of Preston. For early Manchester gigs there was a driver, either my brothers rust buckets or Uncle George’s trusty yellow Vauxhall Cavalier with slidy leather seats. I have driven to a smattering of gigs myself but have always tried to find alternate modes of transport.
Then in the early 90’s following a train transformation there were suddenly decently timed trains so that became the new modus operandi. For about a decade there were airport trains coming through to Preston at 11.30pm, 1.20am and 3.20am, though I never caught the later one. I would badge those as the ghost trains or alternatively my friend Sue Harper used to class them as the ‘Star Wars Bar’ on her way back to Leylandi due to the characters you may stumble upon.
I loved the cross pollination of people who had been to different events, so you could have Kylie and Metallica fans alongside the obscure indie band I had been to see. I recall catching the 11.30 one time and there was a noisy boisterous lad who made many references to Chorley – pronouncing it ‘Chaarley’. So much so, when his station was announced and he got up to leave, half the carriage impromptu started chanting ‘Chaarley’ and his face was a picture to behold. On crowd humour, another time I was in a monster beer queue at Old Trafford Cricket ground whilst watching REM and one vociferous lad was on the phone trying to locate his mate and requested he put his hand up to identify himself, which resulted in about 100 people including me putting their hands in the air, prompting a burst of Tourettes from the lad in question!
The 1.20 was generally a reliable train but a couple of times turned into a replacement bus. One time we encounter a whole posse of hearing-impaired folk who were all signing on the bus, which created the quietest form of loud I have encountered. Another time the train ran but stopped at Bolton and when they announced you can go for a smoke if you wanted, the alarm bells were ringing, then when we saw the driver walk past our window, we knew our fate was sealed. The replacement bus never showed, necessitating a taxi back to Preston and then split taxis from the town centre home, the sun was coming up as I landed back at 4.07am, rather jaded next day! Thankfully I have always tended where possible to have the day off after gigs and I think personally a gig bank holiday should be introduced.
A central part of a gig night for me is good beer, so many pubs have been visited pre and post gigs and I can think of well over 150 pubs in Manchester visited in this regard. There are too many to mention but, in a discussion recently we recalled Log 36 and Log 42, the in-house beer of the Lass O Gowrie. Another worthy mention is when we were traversing Oxford Road heading to the Rain Bar and the unmistakeable chords of Foo Fighters ‘Monkey Wrench’ assailed the air. The source of this sound demanded to be located, leading to the discovery of the Temple of Convenience bar.
Bandits were splayed and quiz machines battered (very rarely on both fronts). Give us a Break quiz machines derived from the Dave Lee Travis show on Radio 1 were particularly fun especially in the early days when they were on Version 1 as the questions regularly repeated. We use to play one regularly in The Pickwick Arms on Meadow Street in Preston. Sample question – What year was Gone with the Wind released? – answer 1939 which was always Option D.
I am writing this on 22/03/20 and the world is currently in a tumultuous state so please stay safe and look after each other.