Day 6: Manchester
Welcome
Yesterday we played a headline show in Manchester.
I began my day by attending the complimentary breakfast buffet of Holiday Inn Express Leeds – City Centre, an IHG Hotel. It was peak hour in the restaurant and putting a plate of food together was a stressful experience with hotel patrons fighting for space in front of the heated serving dishes and the toast creation area. I had a slice of toasted white bread, buttered, with scrambled eggs, and a side of cornflakes topped with milk and slices of banana.
With a full belly I headed out for a run along the Leeds and Liverpool Canal. I headed west, away from the city centre, and enjoyed a particularly serene section of the waterway which took me past historic buildings, bridges, and the beautiful Aire Valley Marina.
I had received a tip off that there was an afternoon event happening in the town of Stockport, in greater Manchester, so at checkout time we boarded our Civilised Sprinter and departed Leeds on the M62 motorway. When we arrived in Stockport an hour later it was tough to find a park. The Krazy Races Soap-Box Derby had everyone out on the streets on this sunny afternoon and the footpaths were lined with gazebos with uniformed teams standing around their highly engineered carts, waiting to answer any questions from the enthusiastic punters.
The racetrack began at the top of the hill where on the starting pistol your team had a few metres to give you a running push. Almost immediately the drivers had to choose between taking the left-hand side of the track and going through the purple silly wash or veering to the right-hand side for clean air. The first turn was a full throttle easy left-hander, and all the drivers we saw managed this with ease. They passed through a left-hand chicane and continued accelerating down the hill, a slope with a 16% gradient which necessitates a heavy braking zone at the bottom for the impending hard-right. You’re not going to win the soap box derby by using brakes though, so the drivers tended to lean their bodies to the right and careen through that corner, trying to get a good exit into the final straight.
At eleven minutes past 1.00 PM, we heard a rumbling sound in the skies to our north. This was the actual event we had come to witness, the arrival of a World War II Lancaster Bomber from the RAF’s Battle of Britain Memorial Flight. Four lovingly maintained 78-year-old Rolls-Royce Merlin engines purred noisily as the aircraft flew right over our heads, swinging into a tight banking turn to come around for another pass. Eric Coates’s famous ‘Dambusters Theme’ came onto the loudspeakers and the crowd cheered loudly as the plane approached again, this time from a different direction. We received a third and final pass from the bomber and then it sped off towards Cheshire, for it was a bank holiday weekend and this aircraft had ceremonial duties in many parts of the country.
Tristan displays his Pineapple Lancaster, created to commemorate the flyover by the Lancaster bomber of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight.
Feeling satisfied with our outing we walked back to the van and drove the remaining thirty minutes into Manchester to our venue which was on the north side of the city centre. Following an expensive restoration, New Century was reopened last year after lying dormant for twenty years. This iconic space was built in 1963, and the Mid-Century Modern design has been faithfully restored. The strip wood panelling, disco ceiling, and mirror clocks have all been retained and look of the room is striking. Jimi Hendrix, Pink Floyd, The Bee Gees, Chuck Berry, The Kinks, The Who and Jerry Lee Lewis; these are all acts who enjoyed this venue in its heyday, so it feels special that the city of Manchester gets to enjoy this place of great cultural significance once again.
It was such a pleasure having the whole afternoon to load-in and soundcheck. We took our time and got the on-stage sound feeling really nice. Everything worked for a change. Liz had bought herself a new tuner, which was actually a second-hand tuner made by a budget 1980s brand, but one that looks quite cool. Liz was now playing a Roland Jazz Chorus – a very reliable solid-state amp with a cool sound. My new small bass amp was able to be lifted into position by a single person. There are plenty of knobs and pressable buttons, and if I felt like it I could manipulate my bass tone in a very heavy-handed fashion.
Opening the gig up last night was someone I haven’t mentioned so far in the blog; there have just been so many things happening that I haven’t had the chance. Lande Hekt is a songwriter from Bristol, and she is supporting us for most of our UK and European dates this year. She is accompanied a fabulous band and they have played several great shows with us now, as well as generously lending us their amps when our rental gear had a few hiccups. Here they are performing a song about Lande’s cat Lola.
Our set was a bundle of fun. The Manchester crowd turned up, imbued with bank holiday joy and they were just a pleasure to play to. The highlight of the night was when Abi got up to play the bass with us. She had messaged the band a couple of weeks ago to let us know that she would like to play the bass on Dying to Believe at our Manchester show, and that she would have a sign so we knew who she was. This was accompanied by a video of her and her band playing a cover of the song. When we walked out to play she was there in the front row, right in front of me, with an almost-polite hand painted flag hanging over the barrier delivering her request. When the time came, we gestured to her and she climbed over the barrier and found her way up to the stage, donning the Ibanez Blazer and preparing herself for the count-in. She knew the part and played it beautifully. I discovered quickly that I don’t know any cool ways to hold a microphone and that I should have left it on the mic stand. Please enjoy a video recording of this very special performance.
You might be surprised to learn that Tristan no longer has any free time while we are on tour. He spends hours sitting at his laptop putting together these great videos of our tour exploits. I think we can all agree that his sacrifice is a worthwhile one.