LTW Newsletter 75
Welcome Warriors,
Fresh from last night’s amazing Grace Jones show in the unlikely environs of Halifax, I’m back in Manchester thinking about how great the show was and how the 77-year-old singer seems to have somehow defined and defied everything.
Firstly, the Piece Hall is a stunning venue - they have 30 plus shows this summer in this 5000-capacity outdoor space in the Yorkshire town that looks more like Venice than a small market town oop in the hills.
It's a stunning setting - like nowhere else in the UK and well worth a trip - the series of gigs have changed the town and vibed it up. Speaking to the promoter, it was interesting to find out that the bulk of the audience comes from a twenty-mile radius to the venue and that there is a whole raft of smaller towns that have a different music culture than the big cities…it’s fast becoming a two-tier of taste that sees the huge audiences of the UK’s smaller towns buying far more tickets for certain acts than the cities do - weird how different things can be a short train hop out of town…
Back to our musical week at LTW.
We are in the summer season - the big gigs - much talk has been about how the festivals are struggling and how big arenas are choking the live music scene - I feel mixed about this. Manchester has two arenas now, and the newest - the Co-Op had a much-publicised bumpy beginning but has now seamlessly slotted onto the local musical landscape with what seems like gigs every night and many people saying the sound and site lines are amazing.
At the same time, the smaller venue circuit seems to be burgeoning - walking home through town over the weekend, I walked past yet another new venue - Mother Macs - an Irish bar that will be booking underground bands. The new venue has popped up just by Oxford Road station and is already busy. With seats outside, it has one of those European city back street bar vibes and an impressive looking small venue through the window. The owner seemed unperturbed by the arena ‘It’s a different crowd’, he beamed.
These days, it seems that those Arenas have a band on every night and LTW, as well as digging out new stuff in the small venues, is also going to the arenas on a nightly basis.
Liam Gallagher was here last week, swaggering through the Oasis back catalogue, which is a celebration of generations' soundtrack. It is easy to be cynical about this kind of stuff, but there is a real joy about music that people loved in their carefree younger days and Oasis did have an innate understanding of how to press the generational buttons. Plus, Liam is still the UK’s oldest teenager, and his flock seems to have got younger as the band has transcended generations.
https://louderthanwar.com/liam-gallagher-co-op-arena-manchester-live-review/
Another potential generational icon from another time was Syd Barrett, whose moment in the sun was a brief flicker of genius before being burned out and becoming the most famous crash and burn icon in rock history.
Syd’s mysterious decades shuffling around Cambridge only added to his legend, and as Pink Floyd became the biggest band in the world over the seventies with their hi-fi soundtrack, Syd was lurking in the background like an uncomfortable ghost.
Who would have thought that decades later their vintage car collecting drummer, Nick Mason, would be the best keeper of the flame for the band and his Saucerful of Secrets project with Gary Kemp on vocals really should not work at all but sounds completely brilliant in their homage to the early Floyd and an unspoken homage to the great Syd.
https://louderthanwar.com/nick-masons-saucerful-of-secrets-oxford-new-theatre-live-review/
Operating beyond the narrative is always the best place to be and James, who never seem to get mentioned in passing in any capacity, still score number one albums and sell out arenas whilst much fancied fellow travellers have all struggled.
There is something effortless about their undimmed creativity, which they mix into their greatest hits set, and the band breezed through Manchester last week for another seamless evening of musical flexibility and adventure that our reviewer was enthralled with.
https://louderthanwar.com/james-co-op-live-arena-manchester-live-review/
With Glastonbury looming on the horizon its often easy (especially for the BBC!) to forget there are other festivals this summer. We sent one of our high decibel droogs down to the Download Festival to get immersed in the many wonderful variations of metal.
https://louderthanwar.com/download-festival-2024-weds-thurs-festival-review/ (Opens in a new window)
Mama Cass of Mamas and Papas is such a sixties icon with the perfect voice and harmonies and those sugar sweet hits that it's easy to forget that she was a real person - the curious trickery of fame sees people flash up as distant heroes but never more than in one dimension and this latest book on her attempts to find out just who she really was.
In the past few years, Nick Cave has been turned from an underground icon to a huge star. It’s a perfect piece of pop culture branding with his team sensing the David Bowie space as the grandee elder statesmen was up for grabs and shoehorned him into the space of the artful elder dodger - a true survivor who managed to make his music both daringly intriguing and crossover.
These days, it's all arenas and number one albums for ‘ole Nick, but at the beginning of this solo adventure, things were not so clear cut as we go back in time and celebrate his From Her To Eternity album
https://louderthanwar.com/nick-cave-and-the-bad-seeds-from-her-to-eternity-a-retrospective/
Sheryl Crow is one of those pop stars whose name you know, and yet you can't name more than one hit, but if you see her live, you know every song.
It’s a curious fame osmosis for the jukebox stars and their songs that do the talking and become part of the patchwork of 24-hour radio. Yet what is she like live? What does she actually do?” We sent along one of our writers to find out…
https://louderthanwar.com/sheryl-crow/ (Opens in a new window)
Fontaines DC have thrown out yet another curveball with their sound on the new single Favourite. From the claustrophobic dark hip-hop beats of Starburster, they have now jumped to a happy sounding Smithsonian song of the summer with a feel-good video to match. Bring on the fourth album! Read on…
Green Island Festival Various Venues, Hulme, Manchester 15th June 2024 On a sunny (and rainy if you were here early) Manchester afternoon, Hulme Community Garden Centre and The Nia Centre/NIAMOS have combined for a very special three-day festival, held over three separate summer days, to promote local diversity and international sounds, plus the best food money can buy. MK Bennett takes a slow walk.
https://louderthanwar.com/green-island-hulme-manchester-day-one-festival-review/
