Jon and Libby

The NIAMOS Radical Arts Centre - a place with an illustrious past Hulme has always been considered one of the poorest parts of Manchester. Engels wrote about it at length in the 19th century, but despite this, at the turn of the 20th century, local philanthropy meant that Hulme suddenly boasted not only a Hippodrome but also the Playhouse theatre, built side-by-side. It was in the Hippodrome that the BBC recorded some comedy classics in the 1950s, including the first ever Morecambe & Wise Radio Show. It also booked the Playhouse as a radio recording studio for 30 years. The Beatles even played a live gig there in their early days. Both buildings have survived the inevitable failure of half arsed urban regeneration schemes, and Hulme is on the rise again. The infamous Crescents are gone, replaced by smart housing association homes with gardens, and the NIAMOS Radical Arts Centre now occupies the Playhouse. Hallowed ground indeed! As I lugged Libby and the gear into the venue, one th...

  Back for the third time at Dubrek! Last week saw Libby and I hurtle (speed cameras permitting) back over the Pennines again towards Derby and the revered Dubrek Studio for our third performance there, this time for the second birthday livestream. Ably led as usual by Marjorie the Satnav, we avoided most of the traffic to arrive bang on time, and even found a free parking space right outside the venue. Google Maps (A.K.A Marjorie, because why not?) also has the ability to tell you when to set off for a gig. Save the destination on your phone and as the dreaded hour approaches, tap it to load it every so often, and it will calculate the current best route and give you an estimated time of arrival. At teatime, as rush hour subsides, the journey time tends to fall, but the time of arrival tends to remain the same until the optimum time to leave, when the arrival time begins to get slightly later. This is the best time to leave, so load up the car, get the tunes on, and go and have so...

The bay window at The Lloyds, where legendary producer Martin Hannett used to hold court. They say that Chorlton local and legendary producer Martin Hannett used to randomly mess with people's gear to throw them off their guard and thereby open up their creativity in the studio. Whether this was true or not, I don't know, but what I do know is that gear in all forms was definitely playing up when Marjorie directed us into Manchester on election night and to Totally Wired at The Lloyds Hotel. First the car park. Only one tichet machine was working, and it was refusing cards. Taking the warning signs of ANPR cameras seriously, I tried to feed it with enough pound coins to let me stay until at least 11pm. But the machine had other ideas, only accepting two of them. I could only stay until 10pm. I'd planned to stay late, then get home and stay up to see the first general election results come in. Grumpily, I walked through the curiously gentrified "urban village" and ...

Set up and ready to play. Soundcheck courtesy of the excellent Cyberwaste. The first gig of July led me back along the M62 in the teatime sunshine up to Todmorden, for Dave Walker's excellent EMOM upstairs at The Golden Lion. Can you believe it has been three whole months since I lugged Libby and the rest of the kit up the stairs to the performance space? Neither can I. It feels like about two weeks. The evening began a little late because Dave had been downstairs to alert people to the fact that there was actual live music about to happen upstairs, but people were eating and pudding waits for no EMOM! When we began, it was to a pleasantly full room, with younger audience members sat on the bar at the back. One woman even had a newborn baby swaddled to her. Hopefully, this is the start of the next generation of EMOM performer! First up was The Other Languages. Seated, and starting slowly with single notes, his set gradually developed and morphed through mellow Eastern plucks into a...

  Nowhere! Somewhere in Holmfirth. It's easy to forget that the whole summer hasn't been a cold, dank affair with low, forbidding battleship grey skies. Back at the end of June, the 27th to be exact, it was a joy to be cruising through the unfolding landscape above Glossop in the evening sunshine, sunglasses on, with Marjorie the Satnav leading the way through stunning ancient Pennine valleys and over Holme Moss towards Nowhere Bar in Holmfirth. Filter Zombies is someone I've wanted to see again since I caught him at our first outing to Derby in February. His sound is a complex one, melding house, post punk, techno, Soft Cell and even Cocteau Twins! A wild and accomplished ride. Check him out at a future event. Filter Zombies, proving guitars have a place in EMOM! After a couple of issues with sound, multicoloured Mho was up next. He always has as much going on visually as he has musically, and did not disappoint on either front. Call me crazy, but sitting around a corner, ...

Truly a tiny desk concert! Leicester is a long way from Darkest Cheshire, but when I realised Duffy's Bar, the venue for the June 2024 Leicester EMOM, is a dedicated rock venue, I was determined to make the trek over the Pennines, through the Trent Valley and onwards to Richard III's resting place. Why? Well, rock venues tend to have meaty PAs and dedicated sound engineers, and our sound is undeniably heavy.  Marjorie the Satnav was, as usual, right in her prediction that the journey would take exactly 2 hours and 2 minutes in the late Sunday afternoon sunshine (seemingly the last of the summer!), and after a slight panic when the NCP car park entry robot wouldn't read the QR code for my booking (tip, try the second robot), and a slight scamper through the city centre to get there, we entered the venue. It reminded me of the Old Bear's Head I used to frequent in my youth, and made famous in songs by The Macc Lads. Of course, with a 2-hour commute each way and a 6:30 sta...

A more intimate setting this time.   Sunday 16th June was a lovely sunny summer afternoon but for some reason, even though I had a friend with me who was curious to see what we get up to at EMOM events, I was the one driving. I bet Gary Numan (whom God preserve) never has to drive people to his gigs. So, anyway, we were Shrewsbury-bound with Marjorie the Satnav leading the way, to the June 2024 EMOM at Albert's Shed. When we arrived, we were joined by a few other friends who live close by, so no pressure to get the performance right!  This time, the sofa and club chairs that are normally way down at the front of the venue had been pushed in front of the stage. A very intimate setting, and potentially unnerving if no one claps! Seeing the whites of the audience's eyes is always an interesting experience! Due to roadworks, slow traffic, and parking in Raven Meadow instead of Barker street, we arrived slightly too late to catch Nick Gilling's performance, but picked up the act...