Day 90 – A sad day for shoes
Today has been a sad day for footwear. Back when I was a a 23-year-old with the world at my feet and a job as an events manager which paid a tidy little sum my main outgoing other than restaurant bills and bar tabs was shoes, I was obsessed with them. For the first time in my life since I was 18 I was totally debt free. Out of my monthly salary after all bills were paid I still had an indecent amount left over to spend on myself. Though I smoked and had a fondness for Marks & Spencer sushi and sausage and onion cobs every Friday when I was too hangover to use the phone, I had no children, no mortgage and no monthly car insurance or pension payments. I was young, free, practically single and absolutely loving the independence of it all.
The boy was living a hand to mouth existence as he was still studying for his music degree but I was free to fund our outings and as one of the girlfriend of Manchester’s hardest working band I got to play the part nearly every weekend; we would all hangout backstage drinking down the riders, dragging on rolled up cigarettes and generally just hanging out feeling ever so slightly like the cool kids.
At the time I guess I knew the life we were living would not last forever. I was having a hell of a good time but work was taking its toll on my health and I’d dropped down to my smallest size since I’d had a minor eating disorder back when I was 18. I remember looking at my bank statement and feeling sad at how little I had to show for all the brilliant nights out and evenings just spent drinking red wine round a rickety table listening to music and playing cards in between musing upon our dreams for the future.
Other than Sylvanian Families I had never really felt the desire to collect anything. My sisters had their key-rings, their badges and even at one stage their dice and my brother had the monopoly on every phase and craze out there including Thomas The Tank Engines, Thunderbirds, Power Rangers and even at one stage care bears which was extraordinarily cute. It was when I realised I was spending much of my money on momentary pleasure products that I decided to start a collection and as I had no particular interest at the time in tea cups I decided I would collect shoes. As my regular readers know I am a slave to Kurt Geiger. The shoes they make are so well balanced you can stamp around in a pair of stilettos for sixteen hours straight without feeling an ache. They are creative, original and considering how well they last lusciously priced.
This then brings us to today’s dilemma. There is a man in Market Harborough, his name is Andy but I have always known him as the saviour of shoes. Many times I have brought him a forlorn pair at the end of their life and he has carefully restored them to beauty. One time he managed to restore my red or dead spike heeled stiletto ankle boots to spanking brand new in spite of me having ground the five inch heel to a mere three inches after a weekend in Liverpool visiting a friend where we danced till we dropped to sleep in his dorm just before dawn. Today Andy very kindly explained to me there was sadly nothing he could do for two of my favourite pairs.
One of them was the first pair of pricey shoes I had ever purchased. Brought in my lunch break from Berties at Kendall they were soft white leather with five inch thick wooden heels. Generally I believe white shoes should be saved till ones wedding day and even then they should be hidden and if possible cream but these were divine. Unfortunately as I tend to run in heels as well as walk whilst racing to get the bus back to see the boy after an after work drink my heel snapped on Deansgate. It was humiliating and I actually sat down and cried. I hadn’t even had any hooch but I was just so sad for my poor innocent shoe. Andy said it could be saved in an expensive operation but the job would have to be sourced out and the operators may well break the wood in the process.
The other pair are of the Kurt Geiger variety. I bought them foolishly after getting made redundant from Webb PR a month before Christmas. I was a little heart broken about losing the job and in a fine example of someone who had temporarily given leave to their senses and indeed their financial situation I sneaked away on a Christmas shopping trip with the boy, and bought three pairs of shoes in the sale. Admittedly they should have cost £400 and came to just £120 but still I had just been made redundant and with no job on the horizon it was a foolish mistake. I guess I have never regretted it because today, 15 months after the fact, I still have the shoes and they are still stunning. Unfortunately one of them, a pair of mustard yellow t-bar three inch heels was mortally injured back in May. I was chasing a story at the time and as I tore down the road the pin snapped and I had to traipse around on tippy toes the rest of the day. Andy says there is no hope for them and though I know I should consign them to the bin they are just too lovely, perhaps at some time in the future there will be better technology for such injured shoes? I live in hope.
- Today’s dress is from the wonderful Rebecca Allison. She sent this in a lovely package from the states and as well as a pair of earrings there was a beautifully written letter. I realise the dress comes up a little short on me but I hope you will not take too much of a hump at me modifying it for the workplace by pairing it with the skin tight Lycra number from Zara sent by the lovely Clara, believe me it is to protect your eyes from a legging lovely sight. Again if you do get the chance take a little look at her website. It is a fabulous way to start ones day and has given me goosebumps in the past with the sheer poetry of her posts. http://solsticetosolsticetosolstice.tumblr.com/
Day 60 – It begins; the boy and I part three
At last I hear you say, the end of the story is nigh. Today I considered not finishing this little modern-day romantic fairy tale because I have had a bloody awful day. I thought that if I was going to write this blog, I was going to do so by waxing lyrical on how utterly awful I am feeling; how sick I am of taking tablets which leave me nauseous and sleepy; and, how awfully cross I am about finding I have put on weight, another joyful side effect of quetiapine. Instead however I have decided to swallow down the bitterness and rather than dwell on the present pain to immerse myself instead in the ghosts of my past in the hope I can fight off the persistent pull of negativity which has been weighing me down since yesterday. 
And so the boy and I after spending a night and day together but had parted ways with no way of contacting one another. Luckily our mischievous matchmaking friend had more up her sleeve having decided we were the perfect match. The next day whilst I was daydreaming about the boy and puzzling over whether or not I should go on a date with the other Chris, the boy was sending a message to our friend along the lines of, “Niki I’m a total idiot, I forgot to ask her for her number. Please can you send it to me.” Niki did not hesitate to strum the strings of fate and shortly after I received a text from the boy asking if I wanted to come and see him play a gig at Glass in Fallowfield. In all honesty I wasn’t terribly impressed, in spite of taking a fancy to him whilst he was on stage, I was certainly not about to behave like some kind of groupie girl and go along to watch adoringly as he drummed away like a toy soldier. 
Instead I went out with some friends and it was not until he invited me on a proper date, to see Gideon and The Deadbeats, now known as The Ten Bears, that I conceded to come along.
When I went to meet him I arrived early so I could catch up with my friend and after admitting I was rather terrified about the prospect of going alone to a gig with a man I barely know she decided it would be best to come along to assist with the magic, and also because she really fancied seeing the band. As this was the wonderful hazy days before the smoking ban, the Academy looked rather magical and with the hippy smoke floating about it was hard not to relax a little and take in the music. Gideon Conn is a bit of a lyrical genius and when he played the little ditty, Londonderry, which is about a first date between two people who are from Derry gosh darn it not Londonderry, I leaned back into the boys chest and felt rather loved up. 
We ended up all going back to his place for some drinks after the gig and when my friend and her lover went to bed we shared a little kiss before I went on home. I was mad at myself because i was being so careful to take it slow, because I knew I really liked him and was aware most of the last years affairs had ended as a result of me becoming too quickly involved. Though the kiss was nice it was a little too much down to how much we had drunk to steady our nerves.
After this date I tried to back away a little bit and after talking to some friends decided the best thing to do was to play it cool. I was in the middle of doing a dissertation on dating literature and though I had condemned the Rules as utter rubbish more dangerous to women than sexist males there were a few things I had taken from it. For example if you make it too easy for a man it can take away the fun of the chase and they will soon be looking for another lady who is willing to treats them mean. Though there is no way of knowing whether the boy would have been as keen on me if I had turned over on the night we first shared a bed and given him a good snogging, I am always glad we took things a day at a time. 
It made everything so much fun and meant we went on a host of date nights including a disastrous cinema outing where I demanded we leave after 10 minutes because it was so dire and a pub crawl which was rather messy but all of them ended in the same civil manner with a bit of a peck and then a goodnight sweetheart.
As our first date was spent in the company of a chaperone, we have come to the conclusion over the years that the night on which we should celebrate our anniversary is the first date we had by ourselves. I was completely nervous about the whole experience as by then I knew I really rather liked him but was still technically dating the other Chris though I knew it was just a matter of time before it fizzled out. 
After several hundred outfit changes I settled on a knee-length reddy brown leather skirt, a pair of black Red or Dead pointy ankle boots with a silver spike heel and buckles which one of my exes had brought me, a black T-Shirt and a frilly sleeveless black polo neck over the t-shirt to hide the ridiculous print on the t-shirt. Over the whole thing I had to wrap myself in my Burberry Mac which I was cross about because it meant the first thing he saw when I walked in would be the coat and not the carefully chosen outfit.
We were both late for the date, though I had messaged ahead to tell him not to hurry he still got there before me and was sat with a drink and a cigarette looking nervous. I couldn’t spot him when I first came in and the butterflies in my stomach started to dance about. He smiled when he saw me and I myself felt all a flutter when I saw he had made an effort to look nice. 
I fancied him and we had the nicest evening chatting about music, life, art and even our mutual friends and our own families. The evening took a bit of a turn when he decided, or maybe it was me that it was only fair we brought a second bottle of wine so as not to leave the other person out-of-pocket. I am by my own omission a total light weight and when we got on the bus I was horribly aware that I had drunk too much. He had suggested going for another drink in Withington at Solomon and Grundys which would soon become our local hang out, but when the bus started to move I was suddenly aware of how much I needed to get some fresh air. Turning to him I muttered something vague about having had a lovely evening and how it really was time to go home, then I lurched off the bus. 
I still could have retained some of my dignity if he had not stepped off with me sensing something was amiss and had the pleasure of watching his date throw up outside a building site in Fallowfield, a friend of mine later moved into the flats and I never had the courage to tell her I had thrown up in the foundations of her flat.
In all credit to him the boy was an utter star. rather than leave me to stagger home poorly and vulnerable he looked after me and took me back to his house. He tucked me into bed fully clothed but got me lots of water and a bowl, just in case. He shared the bed with me but surprisingly enough didn’t try anything funny and when he got up in the morning to go to work he kissed my forehead and brought me a cup of tea and left me some money just in case to get a cab home. I was utterly humiliated and as soon as he had gone I pulled on my jacket and bolted out the door. After a daytime nap I came clean to my flat mates about the dreadful date and was subjected to hours of teasing and even drawings to illustrate the incident as well as cries of, “well at least you’ll know he is not calling you because you slept together.” After it got past three however they seemed to have exhausted their insults and were now acting quite sympathetically as it had become clear he was never going to text back. 
I started to cry a little and decided to stop obsessing about it and leaving my phone in my room I joined the boys for our Friends and scrubs marathon. When I came upstairs to bed later on it was to find he had sent me a message after all: “Hey sweetie, you looked really pretty this morning. Was horrible leaving you. Hope you are feeling better, thanks for a great date x The rest as they say is history.
- Today’s dress is on loan from my lovely Auntie Bridgeen. It is from Primark and she loves wearing it on holiday. I managed to do something to my hair in spite of being fed up, put it in a bun after washing it then letting it down in the rain, and am wearing it with a vest for the cold and some suede black boots and opaque black tights for the warmth. The giant took the photos today thus why they are as my mother said a lot more demure than usual.
Sound of Guns – Alcatraz
Release Date 08/03/2010 (Distiller Recors)
By Elinor O’Neill
Sound of Guns have been touring with Adam Green prior to the release of their new single, Alcatraz. Though they were talented musicians when they visited Club Academy in Manchester last month, they never got the crowd going in the way Green did. This was because, unlike Green, they couldn’t help but take themselves too seriously, and looked as though they were sulking throughout.
Looking at the information which accompanies their single one wonders if their management is to blame for their failure to just put a smile on it, apparently their music consists of riotous gang vocals, but one look at these skinny jeaned, floppy haired, frowning five-some is enough to reassure oneself that neither The Bloods or The Crips will be needing to work on their trash talk to take them on any time soon.
Alcatraz is decent enough, and will be lapped up by lovers of pop-rock and (again this is from the press release) “power chords”.
Though it has been beautifully mastered, lyrically it lacks the substance for musical longevity – but on the plus side it is great fun to jump about to.
Everything one reads about this group is complimentary, so I do hope they stick a flower in their guns and enjoy the fast-flowing river of positive critique they have been receiving; if they don’t, I fear they will fail to attract anyone other than the miserable-fringed- fair-weather-few.
The Drums – Live (Me – wishing I was not)
Sound Control, Manchester 06/02/210
By Ellie O’Neill
Oh the sound, the sound of The Drums. When I heard seven days ago I was going to see them, I got so excited I began practicing my dance moves and planning what to wear to a night I thought would be monumental. This was the act which I thought would propel Manchester’s new venue Sound Control to a whole new level of luxurious musical mania, an act which would test their control of sound, an act which would pull in the crowds so sadly sparse upon their opening night. This was their chance to be The Venue for music lovers to go to when they wanted to hear great music and to hear it lovely and loud with lots of beautiful bass.
Sound Control was brilliant. Other than an audience tending a little too much towards the student crowd, pulled in by the cheapness of the drinks. The sound delivered perfectly and the place was packed. The basement was once again closed, presumably not because numbers failed to reach full capacity, but because of the heating being broken, again.
There are two issues Sound Control will need to resolve before it reaches its hey-day, the first is the choice of act, no matter how I try to put a positive spin on it I think The Drums are dreadful. So bad at one stage I nearly leave but am persuaded by my companion that reviewing only the first ten minutes of the act would be a tad harsh. The second issue is the crowd, which I strongly suspect would be a lot more friendly if those who were only there for cheap bottles of beer would leave, leaving behind the kind of people the venue needs, music lovers.
The Drums put on a performance so self indulgent that one gig goer suggests they were getting a little too happy about themselves; I am tempted to leave the rest of the quote to your imagination but it is too much of a line not to share, “God, was it just me or were they practically tossing themselves off up there at how terrific they think they are”. I try to enjoy them, I really do, I loved Sound Control the last time I came here and genuinely had high hopes for the night but The Drums don’t deliver to a crowd which would generally be just as happy dancing to the music of, well anyone really and the free unsigned gig I went to at Fuel earlier in the night in Withington had much more gumption than anything they had to offer.
When I first came I was inspired by the potential of the venue as somewhere for lovers of good indie to desend, whether they were old-school rockers or drainpipe wearing T-shirt clad disco dancers. Today I was struck by the shallowness of the place. The few people who were making moves could have been doing so to their I-pod, it was like being at a silent disco where someone’s let off a silent scent and you don’t want to say anything for fear someone will think it was you. I would rather drink water or pay £4 for a beer in the place if it means not being surrounded by people whose only concern is reaching a state of sedation so thorough that they struggle to remember who they saw the previous night.
I don’t want to upset you too much with my description of The Drums, but it is after all a review of them so I must. In spite of having a back catalogue of some really great tunes which fully tested the Sound Control machine, they were as one guy beautifully put it “Aaaarrrgh, that was awful, just awful, I’m so glad to get out of there”. Unfortunately at the time someone who looked scarily like one of The Drums was standing next to him outside. I had looked forward to a crowd in this venue who would dance with no regard to posing or prancing, a bunch of gig-goers who would genuinely be there to greet the act with an enthusiasm and willingness to boogie the night away, unfortunately I was horribly disappointed. As well as being called “A nice piece of meat” by a man whose only intention tonight was to find himself a honey and having a drink spilt on me by a guy so coked up he had no awareness of his actions, I was struck by how few people were dancing.
The sound was awesome, but the performance was dire. They continually rocked out to their own tunes, failing to engage with the audience or even notice they were there, so struck were they by their own greatness. They could have been at Rockefeller centre or The Queens Garden Party, there was no adjustment for the crowd to which they played and most of the time they barely acknowledge those who had forked out £8 to see them.
I came here expecting to see an act who could inspire the audience, but what I saw was an act who hardly hold our attention and a crowd who leave the moment they stop, leaving behind them a tide of plastic cups more akin to the debris of the cattle-market that was once The Bop.
Cloud Sounds Interview
Cloud Sounds started out as a one man radio show ran by a local Withington lad, mainly from the comfort of his own home. In spite of apparently modelling himself on Oscar The Grouch, once one gets over his provocative sense of humour, (which leaves you shoving your fist in your mouth to keep from laughing as you wag your finger disapprovingly) Cloud Sounds is really just a six foot two inch teddy bear with a face better suited for TV than radio and one gets the feeling, if he abandoned the grumpy act, the ladies would be queuing up to talk music after every show. Even though occasionally coming across as a bit of a cross-patch, he is a savvy businessman when it comes to promotion. By making use of every social media platform available, he has ensured an admirable listener-ship and a respectable following none of whom could be bored by his bone tickling tweets.
Although the name Cloud Sounds has no air head attributes, his business sense and willingness to work hard to gain and keep followers means he has survived for four years in a market saturated by pod-casts. Part of the reason is his recognition of the importance of keeping his listeners keen, by treating them mean and teasing them with just one show a week. But perhaps the main reason for his success, is his refusal to compromise his taste and his carefully nurtured relationships with some of the UK’s most popular and talented unsigned bands.
Whereas other pod-casts usually only last a few months, after producers realise sourcing music is harder than it sounds, Cloud Sounds has continued with his weekly radio show. He manages to fit in working towards an MA in Arts Management, releasing the music of bands he likes through his own record label and even running a successful gig night at fuel once a month.
As the night is approaching its second birthday, I catch up with Ted to see how he enjoyed Christmas, what his thoughts are on Manchester’s music scene and his vision of a future for downloading music upon the guidance of respected gatekeepers.
**************
E.O: As an impoverished student, how is it you have been able to keep the monthly Cloud Sounds Present nights going?
CS: We get to use Fuel for free and as a venue they have their own PA. They often give you some money for the bands which comes in use, especially if they have come from a long way away. It’s not much, but it’s enough to cover the petrol money. We don’t charge entry for the nights so we don’t make any kind of return, but they’ll give us a couple of free beers and help out with promotion.
E.O: How do you go about promoting the Cloud Sounds night; do you have a team that can help out?
CS: We don’t have a huge amount of money, so we don’t print very many posters. Those that we do print, we put up around Piccadilly Records and Fopp and the Northern Quarter. What we tend to find is that because we are far outside of town, it is difficult to convince people based centrally to leave where they have started their night, this is why you will see most of our promotional material down here at Fuel and around Withington.
E.O: Have you considered starting up a new gig night in town to cater for the lazier lovers of unsigned bands?
CS: I’ve got lots of plans and ideas of which way we can be taking things. One of the plans is to take it in the direction of getting individual bands to play, bigger names than we can afford to pay at the moment. In order to get these, we might unfortunately have to start charging entry and that’s something we have been able to avoid doing at the Cloud Sounds Presents night so far.
E.O: You seem to be getting a lot of bands on from Wales of late. Is there any particular reason for this?
CS: I have focused a lot more on Wales of late, as that is where the music I like is coming out of. I think people appreciate the time and effort that we put into searching out bands. For me, the bands who have come from Wales are delighted to be getting played here, having never really gigged anywhere outside of Wales. They have travelled a long way and because of this they are usually well up for putting on a great show. For the end of the year Christmas special we put on a Welsh band called Y Niwl and they went down really well. They are Wales’ finest (and possibly only) surf band super-group and they were playing their first ever gig in England. They have ex-members in their make up of Gorky’s Zygotic Mynci, Eitha Tal Ffranco of Cate Le Bon’s band and Alun Tan Lan.
E.O: Does putting a lot of Welsh bands on, mean a lot of your fan base for the radio show are now stemming from Wales.
CS: We do get quite a lot of listeners from Wales. But then to be fair, at the moment if you look at where people are accessing the site from, we are getting people downloading the podcast from all over the world. It’s hard to see a pattern of where they are coming from especially, but we will see a couple of listeners from lots of different obscure places who have stumbled upon the site and then coming back to listen in to other shows too.
E.O: How do you manage to jiggle around studying for a masters in Arts Management with running the gig nights?
CS: There are three people who I would say together make keeping the show going, myself and two others. One is in charge of designing my website, he is a friend so is happy to help out free of charge. As we are re-designing the whole site at the moment, it’s a good way for him to showcase his talents and is a great help for me. The other person who helps particularly with the gig nights at Fuel is Tim from The Generalissimos. He does my sound on the night and has a hand in helping me decide which bands to put on, as I run a lot of stuff we get sent from various bands past him to get another perspective. His band have also played the unsigned night at Fuel on multiple occasions over the years.
E.O: What are the patterns of your listeners? Are a lot of them rather fickle in their habits?
CS: A lot of my listeners tend to just listen in for the Christmas special, so I try to put a lot of work into creating a good show. When I get back from Christmas, I usually have a lot more listeners as a result of the break and people just making New Years Resolutions to make more of an effort to listen in. There are some shows where we have done hardly any promotion, but for whatever reason we will just get a huge listener-ship. Then there are other times when you try and repeat the formula which you think may have made the previous show a success and the numbers go down again. You just can’t really tell what makes one show more popular than another.
E.O: What promotion do you put in place prior to the gig nights?
CS: There are some nights for which we do lots of promotion, but fail to get much of a mention in the press. We were plugged in The Guide by The Guardian just after Christmas which was pretty special. They did get the wrong date and were a little late on the information about the Christmas special (they listed it in The Guide in early January), but they said some really nice things about the show and it was great to get a mention.
E.O: How long ago did you start putting out the podcast?
CS: It was nearly four years ago now I started putting out and back then for a while I was doing a daily show on Unity Radio. We switched over to weekly slots and unfortunately, although they are doing really well, I had some difficulties with putting the show together. Unity were pretty small and I would turn up to record, having told my regular listeners when to listen out for me. I would have trouble getting into the studio as there would be nobody around to let me in. Now I do it from home it works out quite nicely. As it now gets released as a pod-cast, it means people are able to listen at their leisure once they have downloaded it for free.
E.O: The gig night coming up in March, what’s it for?
CS: As we cannot decide upon a fixed date from when the radio shows began, we have chosen to celebrate the anniversary of the Cloud Sounds Presents nights at Fuel. Although it is difficult to choose a birthday for the radio show due to all the stops and starts, it’s important as it is the root of everything else we are doing. When I started doing the pod-casts there weren’t many people out there doing what I was doing. At first I was just playing stuff I liked, often bands who I’d gotten to know and then I started moving more towards the unsigned stuff. There are hundreds of people now who put out pod-casts, but many seem to stop after a couple of months. I don’t think they really understand when they first start, the amount of work that goes into sourcing bands. It takes an awful lot of time and effort, but still there are a lot of people in Manchester who want to put out the tunes they like to listen to, stuff that isn’t necessarily available through Spotify or I-tunes.
E.O: How do you source new music for your shows?
CS: Back during the Myspace boom, everyone was doing Myspace and being really active about getting their music out there . It has tailed off a bit now, but I managed to form some good relationships with a lot of bands whose music I like and as a result I get a lot of their new stuff through to use on the show. I also get a lot through from PR companies and the Red Deer Club are especially good, the best I would say in Manchester. Sometimes I can get bands to email me individual MP3s of bits I want to play on the show, but you tend to find the better a band are, the more reluctant they are to send you stuff through. It’s the bands which are rubbish which usually do the most promotional work. What I do tend to find is we get a lot more through from bands who are interested in playing the gig night rather than sending in their stuff for the show, as you can reach a lot of people through the gig night and of course that means I will be mentioning them on the show in the run up to the gig, but it’s still good to get new material sent through.
E.O: What gig night’s do you particularly rate in Manchester?
CS: After a painfully long silence and some gentle encouragement: I guess they put some good stuff on at the Academy but I have been a bit busy of late to get out to many nights. Seems to be a lot of nights in Manchester who don’t really put on bands that I like to listen to, I feel as though the bands I play at the unsigned night are really very good and don’t understand why they aren’t getting as much of a chance to gig in more venues throughout the city.
I have never played a band that has gone on to become really huge. Wave Machine are obviously doing pretty well now, but even they haven’t yet become as big as I thought they would be. I haven’t yet seen any of the bands I have played over the years appear on the front cover of The NME. When I started doing the show the top two bands I was playing a lot of were Onions and The Loungs and I really thought they were very good at what they were doing. It was a few years ago now but I remember when I was listening to their stuff that I thought they were soon going to be two of the biggest bands in the country.
There are a lot of people out there, obviously not people who listen to Cloud Sounds, who just listen to what they are told to listen to and don’t put too much thought into trying to find new bands due to lack of time or inclination maybe. People tend to listen to what has been already validated and I have no doubt that if Onions were being plugged on Radio One and other more popular shows with all the power of the NME and their DJs putting them on their playlist, they would be huge by now and be featured in the NME but none of them are going to do that, perhaps because it’s the way they look or the way they don’t look.
E.O: How do you fit the show in around the masters?
CS: I usually have Christmas time off after the gig night and the end of year special, but this year due to deadlines I ended up taking six weeks off so it’s been great getting back to it. I do think it’s good to take a bit of time off as it does give people time to start to miss it and make New Year’s resolutions about listening to the show on a more regular basis, plus it gives people time to catch up on pod-casts and the special which is usually a good few hours of thirty tracks and the all important banter.
E.O: Have you ever considered doing live interviews on the show?
CS: This is something which has been on my mind now for quite a while. The difficulty is with doing the show from my house, is that they would have to come in through our home which isn’t really practical at the moment, also I only have one microphone for the time being. I say every year that I am going to find a way of doing it, so hopefully we will be doing them soon as it would be a good addition to the Cloud Sounds label.
E.O: Would you ever consider filming the show?
CS: Not really, for the same practical reasons, but it’s not something I would rule out. At the moment I am more interested in the idea of filming the gigs, as I am conscious of the fact that we have listeners from all over the world who I am frequently telling about fantastic upcoming gigs they aren’t able to attend unless they are really hardcore, so it would be good to share them on the show though I am not sure how difficult that might be.
E.O: What has been the best gig you have ever seen at Cloud Sounds Presents?
CS: This month it will be two years since we started putting on the gig night and I think the best nights I have seen are the ones where the bands really seem to be enjoying themselves. Sometimes you will see bands that have to play in front of ten people and I get very embarrassed when this happens. If a band is playing a gig to a big crowd of people it really makes a night, especially when you have the bands coming up to you afterwards to tell you how much they have enjoyed it. At Christmas time we had a band come up from Wales called Y Niwl which was put together by a lot of people in Wales interested in creating surf music. This surf band played for us at the special at Christmas and the bassist who plays with Cate Le Bon is a part of them. He came over at the end of the night and asked about Cate getting a slot on the night; now she is far too big to be playing here but it was really nice that he asked and although she is on tour at the moment if we could get here playing here it really would be very special.
E.O: What do you look out for in a band who you give air time too or who you like to put on at the gig nights?
CS: Of all the things I look out for in bands, the one theme that runs through both the bands I play on the show and those who get a slot on at the gig night is the fun factor. There has to be a level of enjoyment running through their music. Cate Le Bon who writes some really very dark stuff and even Sweet Baboo write heart breaking songs, but they then dust it through with an element of humour. If a band does not have this streak they end up being over the top, they would end up being Razor Light.
E.O: Have you ever considered increasing the amount of shows you play?
CS: I am happy enough at the moment with the amount of shows and I think the listeners are as well. I have tried myself to keep up with other pod-casts that run more frequently than once a week and although I try to download it and make an effort to listen through before you know it, another week has gone and all of a sudden you have a massive backlog to get through and that isn’t terribly appealing. Obviously it would be great to be doing a weekly show but without being paid for it is an awful lot of work, especially at a time when I am studying for the MA.
EO: Do you ever consider charging for the gig nights?
CS: No not really because it doesn’t cost that much to run, other than the small amount of money I pay for air time and initial heavy costs such as buying a microphone. I guess for the sake of the show there has to come a point where you are prepared to put more of one’s own money in and take a risk on losing it but it is difficult to know when this point has come.
Releasing the 7” with Onions and Generalissimos was a bit of a risk and to be fair we all knew that due to the cost of putting it together, we were going to make a loss no matter what. But we didn’t really put it together for money, we just had some good songs we wanted to get out there and we were really pleased with ourselves as we recorded, mastered, promoted and even designed the record sleeves without having to go to any outside companies. It is pretty cool to produce something you have made from scratch and though we are not making profit on them, they are selling well and more than half of the limited edition CDs are now gone. We wanted to break even if possible, but it was released more out of mutual respect and a love for the music these guys are playing at the moment; what was eventually produced was really worth something to all of us.
A lot of people always advise you to get into music for the love of it, not because you want to get famous or be paid for it. There are bands however who are getting the money, there has to be as great an idea as it is we can all keep going for free. At some point bands have to be recognised for their contribution as records can’t keep being released at a loss there has to be some kind of reward financially so they can continue without becoming so submerged in their day jobs they don’t have time to record, gig or create new songs.
E.O: Do you feel the government or the arts departments are supportive enough of musicians at the moment?
CS: Not really, I think popular music tens to receive a lack of funding because people still see it as a corporate venture where a lot of people are making a lot of money. It’s a nice idea but so few bands get signed and even those who do don’t necessarily make large amounts of money from it. A lot of bands are recording their music themselves and trying to get it out there in that way but there is an awful lot of music on the internet now and jus because its there doesn’t necessarily mean people will buy it or even listen to it.
Perhaps the internet emerges we will start to get gate keepers who advise people on where to go for good new music. They would be tested sources and if a music lover liked a started genre he would follow a particular gate keeper who would put him/her in the direction of new music so they wouldn’t have to filter through a huge amount of information which few people have time to do these days. Perhaps Cloud Sounds will in time become one of these gate keepers directing people to decent music. If his happens I think we will see an increasing divide between the god stuff and the X-Factor dominated pop charts. Some stuff will leak through to the charts and vice-versa but at the moment I honestly can’t tell you of any band I like in the top 10 chart.
E O: I see you have recently become a tweeter, how has this helped the show?
CS: I only started with the twitter account in the last few months and like the way you can get your personality across to your followers. Perhaps social media makes the show seem a bit redundant as I guess I could post links but I think people still like listening to the show and its the banter they enjoy in-between as much as the songs otherwise they could just download a playlist or some of the pod-casts out there which are just a DJs listing of his favourite tracks without any talking bits which are of course the part of the show I enjoy doing.
E.O: Any plans for putting another album out there?
CS: I was reading an article the other day about the best bands in Manchester and it got me a bit annoyed as I didn’t like any of them and I started to think I should perhaps put a pod-cast of bands in Manchester that myself and my listeners have enjoyed, bands which perhaps are often overlooked on the scene. It is too much of a financial risk at the moment to put it out during the next six months whilst I’m still studying.
E.O: Albums and bands people should look out for in 2010?
CS: Well Onions have been keeping quite hush hush about their latest project so it will be interesting to see what they end up producing. Then there is the latest album from The Loungs and I swear you would struggle to find a better album this year. Finally there is a guy called the Voluntary Butler Scheme; I played him on the show last year and since then he has got really big. So it’s those three really that people should be keeping an eye out for.
Day 33 – Socially unacceptable faux pas in the fashionable world of social media
Today was an incredibly exciting day for me for two main reasons. Firstly because I went to a meeting of Manchester’s social media café, (yes I know it sounds silly but they have quite interesting lectures and debates and a lot of very nice people go) which was held at the BBC building in Manchester. 
I heart the BBC, quite the opposite of the visitor to Craggy Island on Father Ted who was sacked by the BBC and therefore hated them with venom, I am the complete opposite, I love the BBC, nearly as much as I love JLS. They always do really great news coverage on their website and in spite of the occasional ill-judged decision are still putting out really interesting intelligent shows. As a result when I arrived there yesterday wearing what is essentially a slightly long T-shirt dress with a chiffon see through long black frilly short-sleeved shirt for smartness sake which I got from swap shop yesterday, I was feeling a little nervous; so nervous in-fact I tripped on the way in to the building and then gushed to the staff about going to the “mocial seedier cafe” meeting and giggled like a school girl when the man let me through the gates and escorted me up in the lifts.
I was in such a flutter and admittedly so nosy that I missed the room all together deciding the people inside didn’t actually look particularly social and carried on walking through the corridors in search of Jeremy Clarkson and the cast of The Wire; eventually however I forced myself to face facts and returned to the venue ready for networking and lectures about media cities and charity fund-raisers through the medium of twitter. The café is actually a really cool idea as it links up bloggers, business people, charities and journalists and is a way for people to give and get advice on various topics. 
I must admit me and the world of social media had a bit of a shaky start. When I went along to the first meeting I was very much set in my ways about wanting to be a print only journalist and thought twitter and blogs were for people with too much free time, a point which admittedly is hardly contradicted by my own posts and at times somewhat trivial updates about funny stories and the delights of dresses.
In spite of meeting some really nice people who were up for a giggle and a good old debate I just couldn’t shake the idea of a blog as being far too self indulgent and undisciplined; a bit like feature writing, which I love because it gives one so much freedom to write creatively within boundaries less strict than in newspaper copy which has to be to-the point and simple which is an art if you can do it. I was especially pleased when I passed my news-writing exam as I have an unfortunate tendency to get a bit carried away with long sentences, extended metaphors and ever so slightly off topic ramblings… What was I saying? Oh yes. Last nights social media cafe, well it was very good overall. There was a man who was explaining about the advantages of having an open data city in Manchester and the positive knock on effect this could have for our life. There was also a girl who is trying to raise interest and support for her charity project seven wonders of the world in seven days. Information on this can be found at http://www.7wondersin7days.com/about/
The one difficulty I have with social media in general is how much it tends to tie you to one place and how available it makes us to the outside world. Obviously this has its advantages for blogging and promoting charitable causes or for magazines or companies trying to generate interest in their product. For me however I have never been really that interested in my phone. I generally keep it on silent and just call people back when I have the chance. I like to concentrate on one thing at a time and if I am out with a friend I don’t bring my phone out of my pocket unless I am sat alone for a long period or if I am expecting a call on something which is time sensitive and even then I will only have it on discreet. I hate being tied to anything, especially a piece of technology and I must admit that although I recognise the necessity of people within the world of social media providing regular updates about their activities there were times yesterday evening, particularly when the lecturers were talking that i felt uncomfortable about how attached a lot of people were to laptops and mobile devices. 
I understand why they were, people had been encouraged before the event to tweet and video log the conference for those unable to make it, I just still can’t help but see it as a little unusual to not give a person your full attention especially when the person is speaking on a topic close to their heart. I guess this is the world we live in and maybe I am just programmed into paying attention for long periods of time from standing to attention during ATC marches and feast day masses so I shouldn’t judge but it does seem a bit sad at how much we are tied to a tool of communication which can at times seem to be more adept at blocking our social interaction than it is at enabling them. I remember walking out from having a drink with a friend once after she spent the time texting, she later apologised but when I had too much respect for myself to be second bested by someone who wasn’t even in the room.
The other reason for my excitement yesterday was that for the first time in what seems to be years, I, was chatted up by someone. Not just anyone but a boy who I’m pretty sure I could have realistically given birth to in biblical times. I took it as coolly as possible; as the incident occurred whilst i was in the middle of reviewing a band at Ruby Lounge where I was very conscious I was having to take photos whilst getting a feel for the music, making notes and making sure I didn’t show too much leg due to the dress I was wearing; but inside I was all giddy and couldn’t wait to tell the boy. It may have been something to do with the way I applied my make up yesterday. I came across a whole set of MAC brushes on the internet, ebay, for £20 and snapped them up quickly. 
One is a foundation brush which I previously thought was just another money-making venture but it really does work and I think the young man had no idea I have lived in four decades and haven’t even lived them in a particularly health conscious way.
The last cherry on the icing last night was the moment I realised that generally, most people in Manchester are actually quite nice after all. As I started bopping around trying to take photographs and get little snippet quotes I reached for my phone to txt the boy to see if he fancied coming out. After foraging in my bag, my coat and even my bra (well you never know) I started to get the horrible feeling which only comes when you know you have lost something irreplaceable. In spite of my reluctance to become too attached to my phone, it has all my best friends numbers, fantastic photos and sentimental texts. I scoured the venue and just as I was about to start crying and go home I came across two boys sitting on a sofa who had found it and were looking to find out who it belonged to. Admittedly I may have scared them slightly with my gratitude and considering that they may well have been underage I probably shouldn’t have offered to buy them a drink but the two of them restored my faith in humankind after the meanies from yesterday and I left the gig with a spring in my step which even the scallys smoking dope smiled at.
Sound Control Launch Party
Emerging out of the recession with more false starts than Great Britain is the grand opening of Sound Control Manchester. You may have heard it had launched a couple of times back last year, but as these openings either didn’t go to plan or were not quite as spectacular as hoped, much like a bride on her wedding night telling her husband he is her first, Sound Control have decided these other nights didn’t really count. I imagine they are hoping anyone who attended the other launches was too tanked to remember it or have now convinced themselves that even though the music was better than normal, they had been at 42s after all.
Entering the club the first thing I feel aware of is the nerves of the staff and owners. They have embarked on an impressive publicity campaign and delaying the grand opening does seem a wise step. The venue looks superb; with a bar lined with pretty red lights and bathroom facilities far lovelier than anything you’ll find at Manchester’s longer running indie nights. There is paper and soap provided for a start.
Though they have expressed a desire to keep the building in its “raw industrial state” the end look is in places more rushed than raw and as I sit down on the wonderfully springy wooden chairs to take in the place I realise the smell I first noticed when I came in is sawdust which litters the lush tables.
There is some disappointment from people who have come here on a promise of stomping ska and garage in the basement club when it is closed only an hour after it opens as there are not enough people to fill the floor. Most people however, myself included, are quite content with the other floors; a bar area where one can listen to music whilst chatting with friends and a fantastic upstairs room which has a fantastic pa and music pit which when combined with its wonderful mini podiums for chilling out and acting up on could well rival The Academy as a live music venue.
The night is everything a music lover and a dance floor mover would want. The playlist is fantastic; whilst unafraid of old Indie classics for the sentimental, these songs do not define the night. There are plenty of new tunes and an impressive line up is advertised of live music to come, including a visit from The Drums a popular post-punk group from New York early in February.
Sound Control is besides Oxford Road station and as a result the launch attracts some interesting traffic. As well as indie boys and girls, some of whom tell me they were heading to 5th Avenue but thought they would give it a go and were pleased they had, there are middle aged men and even a couple of cowgirls. They all seem united by their appreciation of having found a good music night with decent beer on tap as well as drinks offers. At £3 entry with a flyer and £1.50 for Carlsberg, Alco pops and spirit and mixers you can leave feeling quite tipsy with change from a ten-pound-note.
Formerly a music shop where legendary artists brought the tools of their trade; Sound Control will soon be known as a venue where musicians inspired by such acts will come to play. This is, The Launch Night of Sound Control Manchester, and for the sake of indie-music lovers everywhere I hope it will be the launch of many a great night to come.
For more info and line-ups go to Sound Control
