Oh Manchester, so much to answer for. The past month has been pretty dreary, and the freshers have been welcomed by virtually constant heavy downpour. Despite the stereotypical weather we welcomed the legendary Patti Smith to town, I witnessed a life-changing gig from some Danish men wielding rabbit masks in …
After a hellish journey, numerous trains cancelled, I arrive at Sacred Trinity Church in Salford. Tonight is the debut headline show for No Ceremony, an elusive electronic band causing quite a stir at the moment. With only one live show under their belts, as part of the line-up for …
Pop and Kingsley talk about the implications of sporadic line-up changes, tell us why they hate Britain, and generally give astounding amounts of paragraphical evidence for being possibly the most politically frustrated musicians we’ve ever interviewed. ANGRY! REFRESHING! CONTROVERSIAL! INSPIRING!
Hey dudes. You’ve had a pretty crazy ride since way …
The Northern British Summertime has begun in earnest, initiated by black skies split by lightning, lashing rain and a thunderstorm of biblical proportions. Our gardens were flooded, the roads were gridlocked, and the horizon remains oppressively ominous. Though the Wimbledon tennis rages against the dying golden light and the white …
The pull of your hometown is magnetic and inescapable. Your memories and beliefs and thoughts are inexorably related to where you came from, and you can’t help but feel a certain partisan pride for the place and its people. As a northern boy, my pride extends to a true passion …
Alice Simkins is a delightful, knowledgeable keen bean and all-round super fan of new music. Her radar, though, hones in on Manchester. In the first of her monthly columns on what’s going on in the north west, she fills us in on its bunker gigs, festivals and her encounters with bands touring …
The consensus amongst us, the sardine-slotted voyeurs in attendance for Grimes’ Islington ‘bleep-boop’ rally was of some dazed inferiority. Her set was definitely too short. But it was also definitely really hip. So it twisted my investigative noodle to hear people openly mix the breathy declaratives “it really was a …
In Notion 50 we wrote about the wonderful new coming-of-age film Submarine, what was done by Richard Adoaye, known most notably for his role as Maurice in The IT Crowd. Adoaye is a director, as well as being a comedien, actor and writer. His direction of three Arctic Monkeys videos (‘Fluorescent Adolescent’, ‘Crying …
Record Store Day is on 16th April- that’s just a month away, so start saving your pennies. To set the ambience for this annual occasion, we think you should listen to the incredibly moreish ‘The Record Shop’ by The Daydream Club. It’s a really pretty song which they happen …
Hello again from the Capital of Counter-Culture! It’s been a busy few weeks in the ‘Pool. The return of the student population, the Liberal Democrat conference and an influx of artists and their appreciators with the launch of the Biennial has meant that the walk down into town from Hope …