I covered a few events for Manchester International Festival in July – this included a number of interviews with notable industry types and live performances by artists and bands of all shapes and sizes. The highlight for me was Dave Haslam’s interview with Bernard Sumner, in which Bernie pulled no punches when describing his relationship with Peter Hook. Ain’t gonna be no reunion!
Evidence:
Sinead O’Connor!
Bernard
LoneLady
Snoooooooop D Oh double-G
Here are some images from the first Ben & Jerry’s Sundae in the Park at Heaton Park, Manchester, this July. It was another good selection of music and free ice cream. I’m not a massive fan of Gary Numan, but when I saw him walking round in the artists’ area in a Nine Inch Nails t-shirt, I thought I would give it a chance. That was a good decision… Ash rocked, Fun Lovin’ Criminals grooved, Maximo Park bounced and Ocean Colour Scene took us back.
Evidence:
I shot these three bands for Rock Sound on Wednesday:
Attack! Vipers!
Circa Survive
Thursday
It wasn’t as busy as I thought it would be, but that was probably because most of the styoodents have buggered off home for the Easter holidays.
This would have been much better if the apostrophe hadn’t been missed, but I suppose if you’re careless enough to have set yourself on fire for what doesn’t seem like the first time, you might be in a bit of a hurry to finish your latest graffito.
Obviously, it could also be that this was a particularly sunny day and that the artist was merely in need of some skin protection from a passer by.
This was a mission. Originally, this gig was supposed to happen at Kro Bar. Easy enough, I thought. I phoned up to check the stage times and they had no idea what I was going on about. Much Googling later, I found that the gig had been moved to a place called Gullivers. Pirates, parrots and eye patches sprung to mind. It took me the best part of an hour to find a working telephone number, let alone an address for the place, but I got it in the end.
Anyway, I’d almost lost the will to live by that point, unlike End of a Year’s Patrick Kindlon, who looked like he was actively fighting off sure death in the form of a particularly bad case of the lurgy – for someone so ill, he had bags of energy.
Kids in Glass Houses played the Academy back in November. Everything was very dark and very purple, which made things a little difficult to shoot. What little light there was came from the back, naturally!
I first shot this band at the Star and Garter, about 5 years ago – a pokey hole of a venue, nut one that lets you get up close and personal with the bands. This has changed over time, as the venues they play have increased in size and the distance from the crowd has widened, but their energy has remained.
Aled seems to look ill all of the time these days – too many late nights have given him dark eyes like mine. Oh dear.
Mid-air geetar shredding: frozen. I was getting the crap kicked out of me at the front, so I set up on the side of the stage for a couple of minutes and got this.
I’m pretty happy with this.
I think I have owned one track by this band for about 10 years – Girls Not Grey. I thought they’d disappeared, but I think it’s more to do with the fact I’m no longer ‘down with the kids’…!
AFI at Manchester Academy
Anyway, not knowing much of their other back catalogue wasn’t an issue – still a pretty enjoyable show.
Karnivool circumnavigated the globe in March to play at Manchester Roadhouse:
I love how low the ceiling is there. I remember when I photographed Pitchshifter there in 1997 and they ended up paying for new ceiling tiles after the surfers and jumpers kicked through half of them!