LIVE: SKY LARKIN / BAD GRAMMAR – 30/09/2013

– THE DEAF INSTITUTE, MANCHESTER – “Do you know who the support act are tonight?” “Radstewart.” “ROD STEWART?!” “No, Radstewart.” I can’t pretend I’m not slightly disappointed that the support act for tonight’s gig isn’t Rod Stewart. Sadly he’s headlining arenas in Glasgow for fifty quid this week, not playing the support slot at Manchester’s […]
– SOUP KITCHEN, MANCHESTER – I love a good story me, and boy, does Brian Christinzio aka BC Camplight, come laden with a whole heap of baggage. Namely the few the suitcases he packed in 2011, when he upped sticks from Philadelphia to set up home here, in Manchester. “Someday the press will awake to […]

LIVE: BC CAMPLIGHT – 28/09/2013

LIVE: WIRE – 26/09/2013

– GORILLA, MANCHESTER – Wire are one of those bands that you discover through reading reviews of other bands. For me it happened in the earlier 2000’s, when ‘art-rock’ was making big waves through bands such as Franz Ferdinand and The Futureheads, and every review seemed to reference these bands from days of yore called […]
– GORILLA, MANCHESTER – I’m a little dubious about tonight’s gig at Gorilla, the main reason being that Jon Hopkins’ recent Mercury Prize nominated album ‘Immunity’ has been played to death since I got hold of it a few months ago and I’ve never listened to it with anyone else around. For me the whole […]

LIVE: JON HOPKINS – 24/09/2013

LIVE: ELIZA AND THE BEAR – 20/09/2013

– PHONES 4U ARENA, MANCHESTER –  It’s a pretty big deal when a young British band, who have spent years playing every toilet venue in the UK and beyond finally get a break and get to play some bigger rooms. So it must feel pretty good to be in Eliza And The Bear right now. After […]
– THE RITZ, MANCHESTER – James Blake. Not to be confused with the James family of bland, Blunt or Morrison. Blake is a producer and musician of incredible skill and flair. He crafts his songs from a rich array of sounds and electronic production techniques; with nods to bass, dub step, hip hop, R&B and […]

LIVE: JAMES BLAKE – 20/09/13

LIVE REVIEW: FESTIVAL NO. 6 – 14/09/2013

– SATURDAY – I’m sure just like ourselves everyone here has checked the weather for the weekend and noted that today is going to be the best of the three days in Portmeirion, so we decide this is the day to make the most of the village and its surroundings. First port of call is […]
– FRIDAY – Last year’s festival wristbands cleverly had ‘I am not a number’ written on them, a nod to The Prisoner, the sixties cult sci-fi show filmed at Portmeirion. This gave you a bubbling anticipation of what lay beyond. But this year’s wristbands are different, gone is the ‘I am not a number’, and […]

LIVE REVIEW: FESTIVAL NO. 6 – 13/09/2013

LIVE REVIEW: FESTIVAL NO. 6 – 15/09/2013

– SUNDAY 15/09/2013 – It’s half five in the morning and the wind has now been giving our tent a bit of kicking for the last hour or so, so I decide it’s time to go outside and make sure all the tent’s guy ropes are still intact. As it turns out most of them […]
– GORILLA, MANCHESTER – Considered by many these days to be among the top tier of neo-psychedelic bands, there are some who look no higher than The Black Angels. Well worthy of this type of lofty praise, their style of late night psychedelia is good enough to impress on first listen – or to put […]

LIVE: THE BLACK ANGELS – 17/09/2013