Friday 10 August 2007

So it goes


De La Salle and not MGS (Mostly Going South), that's what made the difference. Have you read Stuart Maconie's Pies and Prejudice? .....Manchester is big-headed, good-hearted, full of itself, opinionated, even-handed, arrogant, musical, over-confident, but comes up with the goods, even if they're not the exact goods you really want.

The Free Trade Hall, the Halle Orchestra, GMEX, Deansgate, Afflecks Palace, Placemate 7, Piccadilly Radio, Manchester United, UMIST, Joy Division, the Hacienda, Friday's, Saturday's, the Underground Market, I'm in love, I'm in love with the girl on the Manchester Virgin Megastore checkout desk, the Buzzcocks, The Smiths, Gordon is a Moron, Anthony H Wilson, The Communist Manifesto, the Trades Union Movement, the Royal Exchange, Caroline Ahern, Fat Bob, Pauline Calf, Queer as Folk, Shameless, Oxford Road, Eighth Day Vegetarian Cafe, Canal Street, the 41, the 112, the 263 and 264, Peterloo, Suffragette Movement, Trams, RNCM, both Old Traffords, the Stone Roses, What do you call 12 Mancunians in a filing cabinet? Sorted., The Hollies, 10cc, Mark E Smith, Anthony Burgess (Xaverian), MCFC (I suppose, if you like that sort of thing), The Apollo, Marc Riley, Mark Radcliffe, Piccadilly Gardens, Frank Sidebottom, John Cooper Clarke, Alistair Cooke, Manchester Town Hall, St Peter's Square, Albert Square, MRI, Ringway, Christie's, the Palace Theatre, the Refuge Assurance building.


That's what I think of when I think of Manchester.

(Apologies for the blatant Salford thefts, but what the heart wants)

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Can't comment on your amazing list as I don't know Manchester at all. But clearly it's one of those places completely distorted by the media. To them it's Gunchester, with marauding gangs slugging it out day and night, while to the locals it's a great place full of brilliant things to see and do. Bit like Belfast....

Tim F said...

Paul Morley just called St Anthony H "a sort of metaphysical mayor of Manchester", which is sweet.

bye bye bellulah said...

When I was growing up I sincerely believed Manchester was the centre of the universe, though London and New York were important too.

Sweet.

Betty said...

When I was young, and living in a non descript pimple of a town in the West Midlands (not even a Birmingham satellite town ... maybe a satellite of a satellite!) Manchester seemed impossibly exotic. A visit to Manchester was like a day on holiday!

bye bye bellulah said...

I like Paul Morley I meant to say.

Betty, that reminds me of Nightfly by Donald Fagen.

Steerforth said...

Yes, Manchester has it, much more than London, which is really a collection of villages.

I like the fact the Mancunians haven't succumbed to the cloying sentimentality that is prevalent in Scousers.

Pants said...

Hi BBB

Lovely tribute. Tony Wilson was an amazing and important person in British music and will be missed. There was a lovely homage on BBC2 on Friday night. Did you see it?

xxx

Pants

Manuel said...

If I may add...

...Saying "no", FCUM, The Koffee Pot, Piccadilly Records, Oldham Street, Rusholme, the best night I ever had, the best girl I ever met, chip barms, dirty old town...

bye bye bellulah said...

Steerforth, you could be a Southerner who might actually enjoy Pies and Prejudice....

Hi that's so pants, yes that's how I heard the news. I do like Richard Madelely, he's such an Everyman.

Hi manuel, oh my god, I haven't thought about The Koffee Pot for years and years. I heard it's a bit upmarket now?

Fat Roland said...

Richard and Judy.

Gone and ruined it now, haven't I?