Gig Review: Montgolfier Brothers Manchester Central Library Reading Room May 15 2014

Gigs by the Montgolfier Brothers don’t come round very often these days and it seems like it takes being part of something significant to see them perform.  The grandeur of Manchester Central Library, hosting this as part of the Hey! Manchester Festival was the backdrop to tonight’s set.  Earlier, documentaries of Manchester’s past had been aired (although not watched by me who was late getting away from children handover duties).

The three albums to date are peppered with instrumentals that could accompany a social documentary although they rarely get a live airing.  However, tonight’s opener don’t get upset if I is stripped of its fly by night throwaway lines and strums us in gently.  Next is the pre-recorded spoken word quite an adventure,  featuring the late Dave Campion's living memories of aspects of Manchester life in the fifties.  The ‘acoustics’ of the newly renovated reading room certainly don’t need any further testing; unlike previous visits, the whole floor didn’t know about it when I pulled up a chair.

 The last LP, 2005’s All my Bad Thoughts, from which all but one of tonight’s songs are lifted from,  sometimes have a fallen narrative voice whose expressions of ill will seem implicitly contrasted with characteristics of  more positive and thriving past generations.  Koffee Pot has a palpitating undercurrent and a reflective sadness that brings to mind some of Low’s moments. Journey’s End, with its reflections on mortality seems to be given an added spiritual dimension being played in this space with its elevated glass dome ceiling beaming in its evening light.

It’s fair to say that there hasn’t been a great well of idealism in their lyrics unless you count those soon to be eclipsed first verses of the World is Flat. But situated in a library we are reminded of the wealth of knowledge contained within and Roger beckons the audience to check all this out.  Behind them as the threesome play out with It’s over, it’s ended, it’s finished, it’s done (which was pre-empted it with a suggestion that they may not play it if there are enough refuseniks), some attendees wander about and peruse the bookshelves, a testimony to a more literate Manchester music heritage.

Thursday 1st May 2014

While walking through the covered Mersey Square with Sam, I had noticed a ‘Check it!’ stand inviting members of the public to have their blood pressure checked. I had my blood pressure checked in recent years where it took three separate appointments for the nurses to be satisfied with my readings. I think most of the life style things are on the right side of the line – non smoker, middling alcohol intake with only sugar teetering on the wrong side. But I have concerns about Ed’s condition making him raise the volume levels when confronted with adversity and I wonder about the effect of the resulting tensions.

I was offered this test by a lady circulating around an open health check desk and was happy to accept. I waited in a chair to be seen to, and Sam was similarly seated with his ‘Don’t Question it, Check it!’ red balloon.  The lady told me that she was looking for adults over forty as a target demographic for getting into the habit of assessing blood pressure.

When it was my turn, I confirmed my status as a non-smoker and mentioned my three visits (‘that’s normal’ said the nurse).  After some vigorous tightening of my arm the nurse said the reading was fine: 125/86 which is apparently fine although looking at the chart it was on the ‘high normal’ side.  There was no advice other than continuing to have it checked with my Doctor’s Surgery.

Towards the end of Mersey Square, we realised that our balloon had broken free from the white stick it was attached to.  We turned around and saw it bobbing about ten metres back but when I reached it, the contact made was enough to pop it eliciting a great big bang on this High Street. Sam started bawling out.  I was careful not to look up and notice any shoppers that were doubtless surveying the bang and baby crying scene.  I initially turned away but thought it wasn’t good to leave this bit of rubber on the High Street.  I returned with the ragged bits which made Sam cry all the more.  I assured him I’d return to the nurse’s stall and get a new red balloon.

After buying groceries, we went to the bus station to our usual stop to catch the 307.  It was in its familiar bay from where it departs to eventually join our stop having been compelled to complete its lap around the station along the one way routes.  However, after the usual time had elapsed, our bus didn’t rematerialize. There was some mutterings among our queue before a worker advised that there were road works probably holding up its progress.  More minutes passed. It looked like it had well and truly departed. Sam asked ‘Why are we still waiting for the bus?’

 We decided to set off for a different bus stop where I calculated that the 313 bus would shortly depart and which similarly stops near our road.  I found no-one else there and a re-jigged timetable – it will not be here for another twenty minutes.  I saw a 372 bus and asked if they come near to our parts.  ‘No – that will be the 374’.  I found a 310 bus and asked if they came near.  ‘No’ said the driver, his eyes already back on the paper that was folded out in front of him.  A generous member of the public, must have sensed some bewilderment as she came off this bus and told me that I could catch the 313, a generous public gesture.   I think, if I had had my blood pressure checked at this moment, it would have been slightly higher than the 325/86 recorded earlier. Or was that that the number on other bus numbers I had canvassed?

From the chute to I am Kloot

Friday 15^th February 2013

It was still half term and I decided to take the boys to another Soft Play Centre, in Bramhall.  We caught the 378 bus to Bramhall roundabout, then walked along a busy road before taking a turn up a smart residential road. It seemed to tail off before unfurling as a steep road leading up to Stockport’s Rugby Club with its accompanying pitches.  The Soft Play Centre looked a tall but not expansive building from the outside but inside they make great use of its height for several tiers of soft padded climbing apparatus that leads to its tunnel slides.  All the tables looked on to these and it was easy to sit down and keep an eye on what was going on.  Both boys seemed to enjoy the facilities and Sam had no problems in navigating the stuff for older kids. 

Tonight I was going to see the band I am Kloot at the Manchester Ritz.  My ticket listed a 6:30 start and a 10pm curfew yet half hour into this time, I found myself doing the ‘my body –outside’ jigsaw with the boys.  After their baths, and pyjamas, I got away.  I joined the queues at the Manchester Ritz at 8:35 finding myself not to be the only non-early bird.  Support act, Jesca Hoop, was playing her last song. 

Before me in the queue to get in were some attractive ladies.  A guy at the entrance offered them tickets for the gig’s after show party.  Then I went through without any such offer before the couple behind me were given tickets.  The place was packed, as Manchester gigs always are with this band.  I recall first seeing them in 2001 in a similarly packed venue on the back of their 117 chart placing album Natural History.  Tonight has been an added night after the previous night’s date here sold out quickly.  I appreciated this addition – I’m never especially quick out of the blocks to buy tickets.

That early line up played scuffly songs with first hand lyrics about fallen characters. Those characters are still there but, in recent years, the music has been enhanced – brass, keyboards and another rather good and aptly hirsute guitarist.  Main man Johny Bramwell has an instantly recognisable cut throat vocal style which doesn’t need to flex itself out to full capacity.  His former life as a Johny Dangerously appears to have stood him in good stead for the between song banter but, as often is the case with comedians, this can bring shouty hecklers (which possibly weren’t so much in evidence on the first night with its audience of conscientious swift purchasers).  A rumination on the £18:50 ticket price is cut short by someone shouting something indecipherable and we never know what such a grounded band have to say on this ticket price.

They released their new LP Let them all in in the week that HMV went into administration.  The store stopped receiving new releases such as I am Kloot’s new LP, but even so the album hit the Top 10.  They start the set with some old classics From Your Favourite Sky and Autumn Rain. There’s newer songs with these musical enhancements.  Things get intimate, when the other members leave the stage, and Bramwell plays some solo numbers. With a full band the songs can take a crashing rocky turn with some flashing lights embellishments.  A favourite of mine is Hey Little Bird from the Moolah Rouge LP named after a Stockport recording studio.

I watched their contained set and then left.  I’d guess that there was more but I was feeling the loudness of it all and my head was aching.  I think this morning’s visit to a soft play centre contributed towards this (I read one review of the centre that said ‘My biggest problem was the noise level…I had a splitting headache after half an hour and it wasn’t even half full).  A full soft play centre and full concert venue was especially grating on the ears.

It's February half term

As the slanting snow came down, we headed towards the nearest Soft Play Centre.  The near full car park suggested that it was going to be busy and this was borne out by the noisy and frenetic atmosphere inside.  The lad at the counter underlined, in ink, the time that we were to leave (12:21) and tannoy announcements would be read out stating that an extra charge would be levied for anyone  staying beyond the designated hour and a half.

All of the tables appeared to have been taken up.  There was one where territory was marked with a bag and coat on the back of a chair.  I picked a chair on this table and the mother who had claimed this, didn’t return to it for another fifty minutes. ‘I don’t know whose it is’ she answered crossly to her child who was asking about a buggy (ours) in the proximity.  I didn’t look up to see if she was shooting me daggers.

Ed coped well with the busyess, noisiness and rampaging peers.  He was happy to play, sometimes with Sam, sometimes on his own.  But on one occasion he lifted a custard cream off someone’s plate. A lady was at the table at the time and looked on at this but didn’t intervene.  It looked like some deal where a table pays for a jug of squash and custard cream biscuits. When I saw him do it, I looked away and acted like I wasn’t his dad.  So many times when he’s done this kind of thing, I’ve gone forward, apologised, explained about his autism and boundaries then offered to recompense. But at this moment it seemed a chore – going forward, explaining away and offering to get new custard creams at the Play Centre’s counter.  The busy place with its rules and space premium had created a less generous atmosphere which had made my reactions less responsible.

Gig Review: Peter Hook and the Light at Stoke Sugermill 24th November 2012

The songs of Unknown Pleasures hadn’t been attempted live by the surviving members of that recording for some three decades, having been laid to rest with the passing of Ian Curtis.  Peter Hook, an original participant, and his band have relatively recently started to play its songs.  Having been unfamiliar with the Joy Division’s musical history, I belatedly took a punt on the LP in the run up to this gig, coming to it 33 years after it was released.  The watchful security, however, appear to be hedging their bets on age and hand out ‘I’m over 18’ wristbands to wear at the bar.

The Shinies from Manchester opened tonight’s proceedings.  Their enjoyable blissed out pop sound comes from the early 90s school; they wrap their vocal cords around songs in a way that makes their words hard to pick out. Unlike their predecessors, they are not rooted to the spot and move to their music.  Joy Division knew the benefits of a telling word or two and discernible lyrics and wonder if these boys could do with something like that to beef up their character but perhaps I wouldn't have reflected on this if they weren't supporting who they were

The Sugarmill is a great venue with its former loft offering balcony views and raised platforms around the edges. Behind the stage, there’s a draped banner with the LP’s artwork flanked at each end by Joy Division and Manchester but why not Joy Division and Macclesfield? – Two members came from the nearby town.  The gents toilets have..overflown – the sort which would have our wives (if we told them) suggesting we leave our shoes outside when we came back

While playing his traditionally low slung bass guitar, Peter Hook takes over singing duties. He acknowledges the passing of Larry Hagman but otherwise talks little between songs; there’s a newly written book at the back stall for those who can’t get enough Joy Division history. There’s no Ian Curtis mannerisms, of course, merely a raised right arm at times, as if orchestrating the up for it crowd (christened ‘mad fuckers’).

There are those in the crowd who would have remembered the band from the first time around.  One guy, we spoke to, brought his son who preferred the Joy Division carnation to the band’s later morph of New Order favoured by Dad.  It was mainly the older generation who were in the deep throng dancing down the front.  Any reservations about how this kind of thing would work are swept aside.  Hook and his Light carry the LP (‘When will it End’ was a high point with me), Love will Tear us Apart and other old songs with conviction.  The purveying reach of this band pulsates out into this rammed club making it an intense living show piece to the belated band, and the departed former singer.

Down and out in Oulton Broad

Saturday 29^th October 2012

We’re staying in Oulton Broad, near the Suffolk coast, with Jan’s Auntie Liz.  Liz’s partner, Mike, is a fan of the invigorating qualities of fresh air and the main bedroom window is open.  I closed it – these Eastern winds are chilly. Outside the house there’s dug up ground and signposts – apparently workman are there to locate a gas leak which is not reassuring.  I laid out our bags in the bedrooms where there are separate sleeping arrangements between us and the boys; there would be something of a war if both of them were to share the same bed.

Sunday 30^th October 2012

For our first full day, we visited Great Yarmouth, calling in first at a chip shop café.  It didn't feel an inspired introduction; there’s a smell of stale chip fat in there that either never left us or is prevalent all around the coastal town.   After a tray of chips we left the screwed down chairs and tables  and made the small walk to the ‘Joyland’ walled area of confined rides.  The Snails, actually a good swooping rattly ride for the kids, is always a hit and elicited great thrills with Ed.  Other things in Joyland have a retro appeal.  For Sam, who falls short of height specifications, there’s a Thunderbirds pay ride.  Ed joined for a modest Magic Roundabout rotating pay ride and just like Florence and Zebedee used to, they look less than animated about being on here.

It was damp and chilly walking around Joyland.  We mused over coming here at this time of year. It was quiet.  The beach was nearly empty and the donkeys had no takers.  We took a walk down the seafront road where we were to meet a friend of Jan’s from the Bounty Mother’s web site.  I hoped they weren't about to take their offspring to Joyland and was relieved when the warmer, indoor soft play centre at Sealand was suggested.

 I took a ten minute walk to the car park to put more money in the meter. Warmed from working at pace, I was approached by a beggar with piercings in one of his eyebrows.  He had been working more energetically than most - it was the second time he approached me.  The first time he asked for contributions towards the £1:80 to get him home.  A fund to help someone get out of Great Yarmouth on a day like this seemed like something worth rallying behind. However, this time, he just asked for something towards buying hot food. I said I had put most of my coins in the parking meter but he could have the remainder (34p) if he wanted it.  I half expected him to decline it – such is inflation, I’ve had amounts returned in the past by beggars for being disdainfully low.  However, he happily accepted it.  The changeability of his requests led me not to proffer advice (‘you know this lingering smell of grease? That’s from the café on the pier.  I suggest not going there’)

Monday 31^st October 2012

We were to take the boys swimming this morning with Jan’s Auntie Jeanie at a pool in Halesworth.  She kindly said that she’d also take one of the boys in the pool so this freed me up. Some rare free day time!  I went on to have a look around the centre of the town with its nice independent shops. In a book shop I saw some books by George Borrow, a Victorian native of Oulton Broad, the place where we were staying.   I decided to buy Wild Wales, apparently an 1849 respected account of travelling in this country.

In Café Frapa, an airy family run place with a delightful selection of cakes, I read a few short chapters of Wild Wales.  It is a twenties edition and its dust induces some cough wheeziness in me. Borrow talks of making the acquaintance of a put upon Welsh groom in his work place who was the subject of gawping and goading, something Borrow joined in with himself before realising that this guy could come in useful in familiarising himself with Wales and its language.  The groom confides to the writer that, with the terrorising he had to put up with he was thinking of suicide before he found the solace of the writer’s companionship.  There is a physical description of the Welsh groom stretching several pages before remarking ‘It is not deemed a matter of good taste to write about such low people as grooms, I shall therefore dismiss him…’  In chapter three, where he is up to Chester, he is berating an ex-slave from Antigua and endorsing the still then prevalent American slavery system.  There is a George Borrow Society; I’m not about to take out an application form just yet.

In the evening, Auntie Liz babysat for the boys, freeing us up to gratefully dine at the nearby Commodore.  In the quiet upstairs restaurant, the food was pretty good. Our view looked out onto the harbour, or would have if there was more illumination outside – instead it was more like looking onto a Azerbaijan oil field rather than Sydney Harbour.

Tuesday 1^st November 2012

We ear marked today to go to the zoo Africa Alive in Kessingland.  It’s always an enjoyable experience to come here: unlike other zoos, we don’t need to crane our heads around other viewers to look at the Lions; there’s a variety of views, elevated and level.  At some places like Lemur Island, there were no other people around for some distance.  The African theme is prevalent, notably with the native drums from the continent; there’s a booth where these can be played and in this vicinity someone is usually rollicking away on these, often a dad kid like me.

Towards the end of our trip, we took the boys to the Discovery Centre on the site.  Ed had his face painted in a ladybird style – red with black polka dots.  Sam was to have his face projected as a pumpkin. The girl face painting him was on the verge of completing his face when Sam got restless and, in an ensuing wriggle conspired to send Jan’s touch sensitive mobile flying to the ground where the outer glass broke. ‘Take him away’, she said irately. I paid up (the face painter only took payment for Ed) and led Sam outside where there were some playground facilities. From this vantage point, I had a view of what was going on through the windows of the Centre.  Through one I could see Auntie Carrie and Jan looking at the damaged mobile with a rueful look and a shaking of the head.  Separated from this in an adjacent office, a few windows to the left, I could see the young face painter relaying to her colleagues what had just happened.  She took on an exaggerated severe posture, with an outstretched arm pointed outwards.  This, I guessed, represented Jan.  Then she did a chastened, eyes down expression of someone tip-toing away which would have represented her own reaction to being caught in this scene.

Wednesday 2^nd November 2012

In the morning we rang the nearby Waveny River Centre and enquired as to whether they were running any boat trips this afternoon.  We were told that this depended on the numbers showing up.  And if it did run it would be an end of the season last trip out.

When the six of us (including Auntie Carrie and niece Amber) turned up the touristy part of Oulton Broad began to unfurl with its arcades, cafes and gift shops. We found ourselves to be the only ones eager to take the last boat trip out on this cold day.  In the morning, by way of a contrast, we were told that there had been a crowd of thirty to alight for this boat ride.  The captain, who had a reassuring Captain Birdseye beard, said that he’d take us out on an slightly reduced hour long journey.  This was fine with us. We sat on the deck on a bench that lined the sailors’ cabin.

The back gardens that lined the southern broads certainly belonged to a more affluent type of house owner.  Two months ago, while running, I passed Marple homes which had their boats in the back of their gardens on the Macclesfield canal which I thought was nice.  Here it was taken to another level. Ascending paths lead from the water to garages that housed personal boats.  One house, it was pointed out, was recently sold for 1.2 million. There is an element of looking on at how the other half live. 

Turning round for the journey back we caught the wind in our faces and, as the boys tended to veer too close to the edge for comfort, we went down the stairs and inside.  We had some hot chocolate from the staff, an end of term freebie on the house. After getting off the boat, I took the boys back to Auntie Liz’s while the ladies looked in the gift shop – there was much that was fragile here and we didn’t wasn’t to risk paying for any breakages by taking the boys  (or me) inside the shop.

Aunty Liz found out the source of the gas leak by ringing the National Grid line.  The person on the line couldn’t say but suggested asking the workmen outside.  The workmen confirmed that after a previous fruitless investigation, they had found the gas leak in next door’s house and, it has all now, reassuringly, been fixed.

Thursday 3^rd November 2012

We packed up for the long journey home.  Sam’s potty training, which had generally been working successfully during the week seemed to go to pot.  We scrambled through the change bag for a replacement set of clothes but these had a slightly damp smell feel about them.  A packet of wipes, not sealed in an air tight way by me, had probably leaked.

This shined the light on my weaknesses in the whole preparatory child management thing and Jan was seething.  The journey away was not fun as domesticity flaws at our house that was at this point 198 miles away became illuminated: ‘And that area around the dog mat – have you wiped around that recently?  When you’re cleaning you lift things up and wipe underneath - not wipe around them; it’s the same with the food recycling box…’

'...And you let them eat their porridge in the lounge in the morning...'

And so the narrative carried on like this, at full vigour, for the next hour and a half as our car made its way through those Suffolk A roads.

Marple 10k trail run 2012

Saturday 8^th September 2012

It was the day of the Marple 10k trail run which I have participated in for the previous three years.  It’s my favourite of all the routes but I wasn't in the best of spirits.  My chauffeur had been grumpy while driving me here and I didn’t have high hopes for my recorded time.  Since peaking at 51 minutes on the first attempt, my times had become steadily longer.  This year I’d not run for months at a time while struggling with heel issues and an injured toe.  I registered my entry with the organisers and listed my predicted time as just under an hour for which I was put in the last but one batch of runners for the staggered starting times.

Factoring in the start time plus the period that will lapse before I was given the green light to run, I figured I had enough time to walk to the centre of Marple and buy a bottle of water. Going against the tide of runners arriving for the event, my spirits lifted.  It was a bright day and there were lots of smiles.  Then, after buying some water, I was asked by an elderly lady if I could help her walk to a hairdresser’s where she had an appointment. ‘I must start walking some more’, she said.  I was happy to help.  I took her arm and relayed the places we were passing: Cherry Tree café and the tattoo parlour (‘No, I’m not going there’).  Doing this dressed in runner’s yellow material gave me a virtuous feeling which felt in tune with the Olympic spirit.  At the hairdresser’s entrance, she and a member of staff waved me off and I thought ‘Yep, that’s the right send off’.

As I stood in my group prepared to run, the organisers gave us a run down on matters relating to the run. ‘Have you heard about the horses?’ we were asked.  No, this hadn’t been revamped as triathlon type event where we were to consequently also alight on and ride a horse then part swim through the Macclesfield canal; we needed to be mindful of our equine friends on the first part of the trail.  During the run, I would let at least one of these pass first through one of the rails when it’s rider explained ‘Charlie’  was quite headstrong and committed to going first.

The first part of the run was on a trail path. Sometimes this was exposed to the hot sun depending on the tree cover.  A drinks station heralded the half-way point where we were then directed onto a transitional route to the canal path. Much of this was across the field around churned up, half dried mud. A ‘V’ turn heralds the fine canal side path with an occasional rise and droop over cobbled path bridges.  We would pass the odd dog walker or cyclist.  Looking to the other side of the water were some gardens which, on a day like this, made living in a canal side house here look rather lovely.  The gardens were all well-tended and spruced up with water facing patio boards or ornamental features.  Some had their own anchored boats

The finish is just before a bridge.  Up and over this it led round to the adjacent ‘Bell O Roses’pub whose beer garden contained a concentration of completed runners and their friends.  There was some applause for me and the cheers rose over time in proportion to the length of time later people took to finish the run.  It was now lunchtime and runners got a goodie bag, a drink and sandwich and hung out around the beer garden.  The sun was shining and all felt good.  Someone, a walker, who I overtook around 2 kilometres into the run eventually strolled past the finishing line and got the biggest applause although with no visible number I’m not wholly sure he was an entrant. In this spirit, other walkers subsequently got loud applause.

The perfect end would have been family waiting by the finishing line at which point my boys would have come running towards me where I would somehow have carried them aloft.  But in other ways this had all I could hope for.  I was happy with my time of 55 minutes and 12 seconds which arrested the decline of my finishing times.  And there were a lot of things to make it a good day: sun, scenery, good deeds, (firefighters) charity, atmosphere and winding down with a cold beer.

http://www.manchesterfire.gov.uk/updates/news/11september2012_marple_10k.aspx