LIVE: ROLO TOMASSI – 12/04/2010

– THE ROADHOUSE, MANCHESTER – What, with having a job, and enjoying things like showers and evening meals, I can’t make the 6pm doors at the Roadhouse. I’ve missed ‘Throats’, but a friend tells me it was ‘like being sonically raped’, so maybe that pie wasn’t such a bad idea after all. Alex, the singer […]
– CLUB ACADEMY, MANCHESTER – Although Robyn Hitchcock has been releasing records since 1981, I have to be honest that he has only just come to my attention with the release of his latest album, ‘Propeller Time’. I heard ‘Sickie Boy’ – the latest single from the album – on BBC 6 Music, and the […]

LIVE: ROBYN HITCHCOCK & THE VENUS 3 – 11/04/2010

LIVE: ROYAL BANGS – 07/04/2010

– THE DEAF INSTITUTE, MANCHESTER – With the students at home on their Easter break, and some football match in Salford apparently piquing the interest of anyone left behind, Oxford Road is deathly quiet. So too is the normally heaving Deaf Institute, and it’s to a practically deserted ballroom that tight-trousered local foursome, Hey Zeus! […]
– THE RUBY LOUNGE, MANCHESTER – Though performing with a backing band, Mount Eerie is at its crux the creative outlet of Phil Elvrum. Formerly operating as The Microphones, he ditched this moniker for the current one in 2004, even if he still occasionally dabbles under the previous name. Infusing the wholly characterless Ruby Lounge […]

LIVE: MOUNT EERIE – 05/04/2010

LIVE: CARL COX – 03/04/2010

– THE WAREHOUSE PROJECT, MANCHESTER – I’ve not had it for a while – that tingle that tinkles down the back of your neck as you approach the door that separates you from your night out, from your disco destiny. But this is a big one and my neck’s tingling like Cheryl Tweedy herself were […]
– THE RUBY LOUNGE, MANCHESTER – I slowly sink into my couch with each stylish pair of killer heels that totter by. It’s not so much the thought of being stood in the mosh pit with four inch spikes wielding down on my toes. No, it is the glares from my wife searing into my […]

LIVE: 1913 – 02/04/2010

LIVE: JERRY DAMMER’S SPATIAL A.K.A. ORCHESTRA – 30/03/2010

– THE BRIDGEWATER HALL, MANCHESTER – Alarm bells are ringing. A respected character from British music history has been given the budget and stage space to indulge a passion. Yep, in every pop band there is a Damon Albarn, desperate to elevate out of the pop sphere, to do something “serious”, something “worthy”. Jerry Dammers […]
– ACADEMY 3, MANCHESTER – They’ve been away and now they’re back, with a cracking new album and live show to further blow our tinnitus fizzing ears. ‘Coconut’ released on the 1st of March has been widely praised, and much has been made of the input of DFA’s Tim Goldsworthy on the sessions Stateside for […]

LIVE: ARCHIE BRONSON OUTFIT – 28/03/2010

LIVE: SIDEBURN LAUNCH PARTY – 26/03/2010

– THE BRITISH LEGION, WIGAN – It’s cold and dark and I’m walking down a street just on the outskirts of Wigan town centre looking for the British Legion. Now I know you might be wondering what the hell I’m doing spending my Friday night at the Legion, well it’s not because I’m meeting up […]
– THE RUBY LOUNGE, MANCHESTER – Blessed with chunky frames and even chunkier beards, Glaswegian monsters, Take A Worm For A Walk Week, pick up the grooves of Clutch and add a dram of caledonian insouciance. That the quartet don’t take themselves at all seriously is a boon – their début album, ‘The Monroe Transfer’ […]

LIVE: THE TWIGHLIGHT SAD – 25/03/2010