LIVE: THE BLINDERS – 27/04/2019

-THE RITZ, MANCHESTER- If you’ve had any interest in guitar music over the past eighteen months, you’ll have heard their name, they’ve made it sure as hell that everybody who needs to know, knows. The Blinders have been of interest to many, especially this past year, after the release of their debut album, Columbia, to great praise […]
-BAND ON THE WALL, MANCHESTER- Tonight is special for BC Camplight. He’s too cool ever to say so, but it is clear. After everything he’s been through over the last decade, to have an intimate solo show like this in the city that has become his home and has offered him the opportunities that he […]

LIVE: BC CAMPLIGHT – SOLO SHOW & Q&A – 30/04/2019

LIVE: CABBAGE – 25/04/2019

-YES, MANCHESTER- After listening to Cabbage over the past couple of years or so, I knew there was something I was personally missing. Certain music press were raving about them being the band we needed, pushing a political mess into people’s faces. For myself, just hearing their recordings, I wasn’t completely on board the “Cabbage […]
-THE DANCEHOUSE THEATRE, MANCHESTER- Of the many venues that an indie-folk band could play, one that doesn’t immediately come to mind is the Dancehouse. Plain and simple, it’s a theatre, but perhaps the setting of the gig reveals intention – to bring something different, to celebrate the album in question by placing it in the […]

LIVE: THE ANTLERS – 20/04/2019

LIVE: HEIR / HAYES & Y – 17/04/2019

-GULLIVERS, MANCHESTER- Here’s the thing….Manchester is very proud of its music scene (and rightly so), not to mention intent on giving burgeoning artists the opportunity to showcase their talents, to the extent that it will squeeze a gig in anywhere it can! Tonight proves to be no exception when Gullivers plays host to the fantastically […]
-DEAF INSTITUTE, MANCHESTER- Chaos. Total and utter chaos. That is what unfolds tonight at Deaf (an absolutely apt name for a venue where this band is concerned, sweet Jesus it’s LOUD tonight), the mayhem orchestrated by Daughters’ extraordinary frontman Alexis S.F. Marshall who is quite unlike anyone I’ve seen perform. An absolute whirling dervish of […]

LIVE: DAUGHTERS – 17/04/2019

LIVE: THE GOOD, THE BAD & THE QUEEN – 16/04/2019

-ALBERT HALL, MANCHESTER- Best known as leader of Britpop heroes Blur and virtual pop superstars Gorillaz, Damon Albarn has never been one to stick to one project and for that has become the most forward thinking and prolific artist of his generation. The Good, The Bad & The Queen is a project he launched back […]
-YES, MANCHESTER- Acid Child With a name as ‘incendiary’ as titled and opening for a headliner dubbed ‘electro punk’, you’d expect some questionable attempt at hardcore along with runic tattoos and enough profanity to warrant an OFCOM intervention… it appears my imagination dreamed big. They have a sound veering around that middle-of-the-road-psych you see with […]

LIVE: AK/DK / ACID CHILD – 12/04/2019

LIVE: THE SLOW READERS CLUB / LIAM FROST – 11/04/2019

-GORILLA, MANCHESTER- “REEE-DERS! REEE-DERS! REEE-DERS” Between songs, this low-lung call rings out around the walls of Gorilla like a football chant, like Utd fans singing “Roo-ney” back in the day. A quick scan of the crowd and it’s a real stew… some grey beards (perhaps surprisingly for a band of this relative youth) but up […]
-YES, MANCHESTER- Déjà Vega The 3-piece’s formula could be deciphered as: drumming reminiscent of one of those Palm Desert bands from the early 1990s, no doubt putting the kit’s structural integrity into question as the concussive quality surprisingly rings through a sound system I certainly wouldn’t count as Manchester’s finest. The bass playing, with a […]

LIVE: YAK / MUSH / DEJA VEGA – 09/04/2019