Tag: The Smiths

Manchester Venue 192 – Palace Theatre

As you stride down the hill from Oxford Road train station you reach the junction of Oxford Road and Whitworth Street where Manchester Palace Theatre is located, situated across the road from the Refuge Bar. The grand old building designed by architect Alfred Darbyshire at a princely cost of £40,500 first opened its doors in 1891, and at that stage was known locally as the ‘Grand Old Lady of Oxford Street’, and the sister theatre The Opera House across town on Quay Street are owned by the same company. 

Manchester Palace Theatre. Image Credit ticketsonsale.com

Their first ever production was a ballet version of Cleopatra where they had a seating capacity of 3,675 though that figure has reduced significantly over the years to its current number of 1955. The theatre struggled initially but garnered more success when they had more popular performers playing there. Luminaries such as Lillie Langtry, Charlie Chaplin, Judy Garland, Gracie Fields, Danny Kaye and Laurel and Hardy have graced that very stage.

It had an extensive refurbishment in 1913 and was reopened seven months later by Harry Houdini. It was unfortunately struck directly during the Manchester Blitz of 1940, but then had successful productions of Guys and Dolls, Hamlet and Look Back in Anger running during the 1950’s and 1960’s.

It had a fallow period in the 1970’s and was threatened with closure but the intervention of the Arts Council saved the day. As a result, some further renovations took place before reopening again in 1981 with a production of Jesus Christ Superstar. In 2009 as part of the Manchester International Festival a premiere of Rufus Wainwright’s Prima Donna opera was staged there.

Musicians to have performed there include the Platters, The Kinks, The Rolling Stones, The Who, Pink Floyd, The Smiths, Johnny Cash, Damon Albarn, and the indefatigable Sparks were astonishingly playing there back in October 1975!

Sparks. Image Credit pinterest.com

The current layout contains three tiers of seating in the Stalls, Circle and Grand Tier. On our first visit in the early 1990’s we were sat in the vertigo inducing cramped seats ‘in the Gods’ watching West Side Story where we had a literal vertical view of the stage, but lessons were learned and never again have I ventured back up there! There are a plethora of amenities including the appropriately named Stage Door Bar and the whole venue is available to hire if you had the urge to do so!

I have cogitated long and hard regarding what may constitute a gig and have surmised (at least in my own head!) that in the scenario where bands are essentially part of the story of the theatre production that criteria is fulfilled.  

Thus, in September 2022, Gill and I had an outstanding credit note from previous shows that were cancelled during the pandemic so we utilised that in purchasing tickets to go and see the longstanding production of Ben Elton’s We Will Rock You, which had originally opened in the West End in 2002.

For the uninitiated the show was about the band Queen, and it is apparently classified under the category of a Jukebox musical, for which the definition is that it contains an abundance of pre-existing well known popular tunes, instead of songs being written specifically for the musical. Despite all that, the show personally didn’t work for me, and I found it all rather disappointing.

On the converse side, the other musical School of Rock that we saw earlier in that year was on a completely different level. It was an adaption of the original Richard Linklater movie released in 2003, which is an excellent feel good movie with a starring role for the effervescent Jack Black. Jack himself is a talented musician and was one half of Tenacious D who had a big hit with ‘Tribute’ which featured a cameo from Dave Grohl playing Satan.

The movie is based around the premise of Dewey Finn (Jack Black) impersonating a substitute teacher and turning a class of talented kids into a rock band in order to perform at a Battle of Bands contest.

Some of the children have had interesting lives since the movie with Lucas Babin who played lead guitarist Spider going on to be a district attorney in Texas. Miranda Cosgrove who was the agent Summer Hathaway was at the age of 19 in 2012 the highest paid child actor and has also released a few records herself.

Letter to Brezhnev. Image Credit imdb.com

There was also Caitlin Hale and Angelo Massagli who played classmates Marta and Frankie who met years later and subsequently got married 22 years after the original movie. This also brings to mind the two main actors Alexander Pigg and Peter Firth in the 1985 flick Letter to Brezhnev, who married other people but then later wed each other in 2017. I have recently watched the film again and it certainly stands up to scrutiny and my abiding memory from its initial release was the phrase ‘Kirkby Girls’ being uttered by Margi Clarke in a deep scouse accent!

The theatre show was a faithful reproduction with extra gags included, and the child performers were absolutely superb making it a very fun night. It was topped off perfectly with the show finishing in synchronicity with us able to catch the last train home from the station opposite.     

Manchester Venues 140 to 141

If you head out the back exit of Piccadilly station you drop initially to the metro level and then the escalator gravitates down again to Fairfield Street at ground level and the accompanying taxi rank. Just beyond the cabs is a lift that takes you up to Platform 12 and then onto the next level and into the waiting area outside Platform 13 and 14. For more unscrupulous punters it could be used as a ticket barrier avoidance route!

Piccadilly Station with the lift in the right of picture. Image Credit showmethejourney.com

There are a plethora of breweries near the station ensconced in back streets and railway sidings. If you walk down Baring Street, you reach the hidden oasis of Mayfield Park, the 6.5 acre environmental green space encompassing the River Medlock which is the city’s first green space for over 100 years. To illustrate the industrial heritage of the area, thirteen Victorian wells were discovered in the construction and three were identified as still functional thus were then utilised to provide 20 cubic metres of water each to maintain the vegetation.  

Heading back from the park you would find yourself at Mayfield Depot which contains Escape to Freight Island with all their food and drink stalls and is also the location for conferences and fashion shows alongside the immensely popular Warehouse Project dance events. When waiting for later trains home on the overhead vantage point of Platform 14 I have regularly borne witness to the most extraordinary queues of customers awaiting access.  

Mayfield Park. Image Credit placenorthwest.co.uk

There was previously a venue alongside the Depot called the Fairfield Social Club on the wonderfully named Temperance Street where I once had tickets for a gig but unfortunately, they upgraded the show to another venue, and I never managed to attend there prior to its subsequent closure. It does now appear they have reopened Fairfield but in a different location over in Ancoats, near the Blackjack brewery, and they hold regular comedy nights there.   

Back on Fairfield St, you find one of Manchester’s most distinctive institutions, namely Manchester Star and Garter, the name of the establishment derives from the insignia pertaining to the Order of the Garter. It was originally built in 1803 outside the train station which had several monikers, including London Road prior to the current Piccadilly name. The build of the rail link to Oxford Road station in 1849 necessitated a brick by brick 100-yard movement of the venue, with its subsequent reopening in 1877.

Its initial incarnation was as a hotel containing an in house brewery. In 1986, the closure of the adjacent Mayfield station caused a chain reaction of the hotel also ceasing trading, and the area morphed into a brief ‘Dirty Old Town’ period. The building gained Grade II listed status in 1988 and reopened in 1991 as a live music site with its current pub and upstairs club lay out and has thrived despite its unusual location. It currently has a large Ian Curtis mural on one of its side walls.

It was threatened with closure again in the last couple of decades with the potential Northern hub expansion of the railway station. Their future however was solidified in 2020 with a ten year lease being purchased under the auspices of Mayfield Partnership.

It has been used as a location for many TV series including Band of Gold, Cracker, Prime Suspect and most extensively the recent Russell T Davies scripted landmark drama ‘It’s A Sin’. The venue is renowned for indie nights, Smile running for 20 years from 1993 to 2013 and the famous Smiths night which has been running for an even longer period than that.

The Star and Garter. Image Credit NME

It has hosted many diverse groups including Anti-Nazi league meetings, the 30-strong WBA supporters club of Manchester, Vampire Society and a comic night called Anti-Hoot which included the semi-legendary Bolton poet Hovis Presley!  It has mainly a rock/metal roster and was once coined as the ‘Temple of Doom’. Bands that have played there including Half Man Half Biscuit, Discharge, Frank Carter and the Rattlesnakes, Low and remarkably Status Quo in 1999.

For many years I intended to visit but without success, until finally a gig was located, and a sabbatical trip was arranged in March 2015. It does look a little like a haunted house from the outside, evoking comparisons to the Buffy the Vampire Slayer ‘Fear Itself’ episode, but that was instantly dispelled by the warm welcome in the downstairs bar!  We then sallied up to the 200 capacity venue room and the first act on stage was You Want Fox, a noisy female two-piece from Nottingham.

The headline act was the East Town Pirates who travelled in from Ipswich to air their stompy sea shanties and have been referenced as sounding like ‘Motorhead meets the Pogues’. I returned once more in 2022 to see a band called the Reverbs.

In December 2021, local legend Tim Burgess put on a record fair themed event which had a novel set taking place on a Sunday lunchtime at the Manchester Piccadilly Station Mezzanine. The first challenge was actually finding this location and it transpired to be in the aforementioned metro entry level. By the time we found the spot, we only caught the last three tracks of an acoustic set from Starsailor’s James Walsh, who had an appropriate fine busker’s voice which matched the setting!