Tag: The Vibrators

London Tenth Trip

A Northern invasion of London is always to be savoured when Mogwai decide to play in the capital city. Thus, when they announced they were to be incorporated in the bill for the Meltdown Festival in 2014 by playing Royal Festival Hall on the South Bank we jumped at the chance to attend.

Uncle George, John and Tony Dewhurst and I headed down on the Virgin express to and dropped our bags across the road at our digs at the handy Premier Inn opposite Euston Station. We met Nigel who had headed in from Brighton at a boozer in Borough Market where we discussed my gig list and the very early germination at that stage of the idea to create this very blog!

We progressed down the river and had a drink at the bar within the Globe Theatre. As we passed London Tate Modern, I witnessed a young singer called Jolie Fox on a makeshift stage. We continued down the river afterwards to then arrive at the London Royal Festival Hall.

Globe Theatre. Image Credit travellousworld.com

The Festival Hall was opened in 1951 after an expenditure of £2m and was built as part of the Festival of Britain which was instigated to provide a boost to the national morale after the Second World War. It sits alongside the Hayward Gallery, The Queen Elizabeth Hall, and the Purcell Room within an 11-acre site all under the auspices of the Southbank Centre, with the main venue having an all seated 2900 capacity.

It has been run as an independent concern since 1988 and the building has Grade 1 listed status. In 2014, their Festival of Love concluded with 70 couples, including 15 same-sex couples marrying on the main stage. On the musical front, Grace Jones and Patti Smith have played there and Brian Wilson premiered his sixth album Smile with a live performance.

Royal Festival Hall. Image Credit circular1.com

We mulched about briefly in the downstairs area and I purchased a new Mogwai t-shirt from the merch stand, Clinic had supported that night, but we had missed their set. We headed upstairs and grabbed our seats and admired the surroundings before Mogwai took the stage. I thought ‘Travel is Dangerous’, and a thunderous ‘Mogwai Fear Satan’ were excellent, with the latter track ending the initial set, before the aural assault continued into the encore with ‘New Paths to Helicon Part 1’ and We’re No Here’.   

Afterwards we jumped on the nearby tube for the commute to the final gig of the evening, but annoyingly I left my newly purchased T-shirt in the carriage when disembarking! Our destination was Chalk Farm station which takes you instantly into another of those innumerable London suburbs with its own high street, bars and community.

The tube station is next to the Roundhouse venue where many fine bands have undertaken residencies there, our next venue was not as highbrow and was namely London Chalk Farm Fiddlers Elbow.

Chalk Farm Fiddlers Elbow. Image Credit londonsubscene.net

It was a filthy rainy night (not in Soho!) and we struggled to locate the pub, but we landed eventually much to our relief. The hostelry was built in the 1840’s and was previously known as The Old Mother Shipton before holding the Fiddler’s name since the 1970’s. It is a Grade II listed building and a homely venue with Chesterfield sofas and a music room with a 150 capacity.

It is an independently run concern and they host alternate event such as poetry readings and book signings, but their main pursuit is live music, with both the Vibrators and The Damned having played there back in the day.

On the night of our visit, the band on stage were the MOBBS, who billed themselves as ‘garage punk rock ‘n’ roll at one hundred miles per hour’ but unfortunately, they did not quite live up to that rather enticing preamble!            

Preston Venues 35 and 36

At the bottom end of Friargate you would find the Sun Hotel. On the opposite corner from the Sun, back in the day there was a bakery that used to sell the odd combination of a Cheese and Beetroot sandwich, which remarkably worked but I haven’t sampled that grouping for a while. Now, whilst I am thinking about it, where did I put those cocktail beetroots and Cathedral City…!

Next to the pub you can take a turning into Great Shaw St which runs into Market St West where you pass the Market St Social pub, which is linked to the Plau bar, beyond there is the Playhouse. I used to very occasionally show up there to watch theatre performances but remember it mainly for when it was the location of the Preston film club which I attended a few times, though thinking back the only film I can recall watching was Luc Besson’s Subway featuring Christopher Lambert and Jean Reno. They always rather quaintly used to play the national anthem prior to every performance.

Across the road, in the 80’s was a tiny highly disreputable club called the Cherrytree which I never actually visited, but its reputation preceded it!

Back around on Great Shaw St you would find a former nightclub which had various names over the years including Green, The Club Royale, The Millionaires Club. The club was built in 1920 as a casino but its most famous era was in the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s following its name change to the Gatsby in 1970. I remarkably don’t recall ever visiting in that era. It was a recognised Northern Soul/Dance venue, but they apparently also had legendary student nights!

The Gatsby. Image Credit Flickr.

It had two bars and two dancerooms and was a live venue and bands such as Showaddywaddy, Mud and Bay City Rollers graced the stage there.

In the 2010’s it rebadged itself as Blitz, a specific live venue which is not to be confused with the current Blitz next to the bus station, which I know as The Venue which will be covered in a future blog – all still with me?!! 

I saw two gigs there, the first on 28/03/13 was Nine Black Alps, who I was watching for the fourth and most recent time. It was to a degree diminishing returns as they were not as sharp and effective as a band as they had been a decade earlier. The place was half full and they were supported by Youth Society. The venue was even less full later that year when I witnessed a rather tired set from old punks the Vibrators. The site was subsequently sold by UCLAN for student accommodation.

Back on Friargate, the Irish themed bar O’Neills opened its doors in 1996 and swiftly became a regular watering hole for Uncle George and I, quite often being the final pub of the night for a cheeky Guinness and Black. We were recognised to a degree so when they launched the Guinness Cold brand, we were asked to review a couple of free pints, and I can confirm unsurprisingly we readily agreed and the beer passed the test!

Preston O’Neills. Image Credit Trip Advisor

For a few years it also became the location for Christmas Eve gatherings and the pub in a later year also built a rooftop beer garden. The pub name changed over to Shenanigans in 2017 before being refurbished the following year into a more open plan establishment and reopened as the Northern Way.

In the 2010’s they started having live acoustic acts who played either by the front door or on the raised area at the back of the pub, I have quantified this as a single venue as the ‘stages’ were in effect in the same room.

I saw seven bands there between 2013 and 2017. They were namely The Two of Us, Balls Band, Danny Rose, Marcus and Jaidi, Kevin Harper, Eddy Bland, and Sheena Brown. The first named of those was of interest as this was Uncle George and mine’s 400th gig together!