Manchester Media gossip: The Mix RIP

The magazine business is notoriously nut-like, so it may not come as an enormous shock that The Mix Manchester, the fledgling listings mag, has folded like an umbrella after only two issues. The publisher had "financial difficulties." This means the Bloggerel column is homeless, so you Manchester bloggers will just have to find another way of achieving fame/notoriety/mild embarassment with a single post. Special apologies to Dan Flynn of Mad Dan's Blog, whose bit about the genie in the pop bottle was to be featured in the doomed third issue.

It's not all doom and gloom on the media front: We're getting a new newspaper. The North West Enquirer will launch on April 28. It is to be a weekly paper covering the whole ginormous region from North Wales and Cheshire up through the Lakes, with a focus on the cosmopoliitan urbs of Liverpool and Manchester (where it is based.) It'll be interesting to see if this can help fill some of the arts and entertainment coverage gap left by City Life's closure. The website is at http://www.nw-enquirer.co.uk/ but there's nothing up yet.

What's more, I've heard another magazine, the Leicester-based 69-247, is launching a Northwest edition in September (yes, that's really what it's called ... The name just says class, doesn't it?) My links are not working now, but if you want to see the kind of thing you can expect from them, paste this into your browser: http://www.69-247.com/

musical monkey

Island Monkey got creative in honour of Condi's visit. I'm sure John would approve.

Monday curiosities

Bench, our friend on t'other side of the pennines, has provided us with a link to a fascinating online exhibition titled "The Unbearable Sadness of Vegetables" which is just one offering from a great kitsch archive run by an American newspaper columnist called James Lileks. It's called the Insititute of Official Cheer, "where old pop-culture is subjected to our patented re-ironization process." Neat-o.

Dave Maass of Maassive has posted to Manchester is Shit about a local comic artist, Robin Scott, whose mini-comic Every Life I've Ever Lived follows his day-to-day life. I hadn't heard of this guy before.

If you're into art of the digital flavor, hustle your bustle down to the eerily splendid Victoria Baths for Meme Pool, the first show from new Manchester artist collective Interval - it's worth checking out and it's only up this week.

Condi Nasty

Roll out the red carpet! Condi's comin'. I was delighted to hear that my secretary of state will be visting Liverpool and Blackburn this week. When she's in Blackburn, I hope Jack Straw takes her to see the carpark on top of the council building, which has got to be one of the most inexplicably surreal places in Britain. But I imagine they'll tread the well-worn gladhanding trail from school to mosque to successful small business, in between dodging protesters. Yep, seems some people aren't as delighted as I am with Condi's visit. It's not every day we get one of the key players in the Bush administration up here and Northwest protesters are busy dreaming up witty Condi-specific placard slogans.

The highlight of Condi's trip will almost certainly be a Liverpool Philharmonic concert in her honour hosted by Scouser celebs Roger McGough and Cathy Tyson. Except that - oops - McGough, Tyson and some of the musicians have decided to boycott the gig for political reasons. This was a marvelous piece of planning, because considering how well the capital of culture preparations are going, Liverpool could really use some more scandal and bad press. If the musicians won't behave, maybe they could get Condi to play - she is a concert pianist, though I imagine she doesn't get much time for tickling the ivories anymore.

One blog has really gone above and beyond in keeping us up to date on all things Condi. Hats off to our own A Logical Voice, which remains the best place to go for updates about the story as they occur - here is their latest. You can also visit Condiwatch for details of protests Friday and Saturday. Anyone going?

Off the wall

This article in G2 yesterday by UK graffiti art's elder statesman, Banksy, issued a warning to the stencil hounds and spray can wizards of London: The Olympic Games are coming, and a massive rub-out is in your future. This got me thinking about the illicit art decorating Manchester's streets and doorways.

The first time I remember noticing graffiti here was when a walk to my friend's house in Hulme brought me unexpectedly under the Mancunian Way (back in the rookie days before I knew the shortcut to the Redbricks.) The tunnels sport a colourful profusion of stencils and tags, probably because the authorities don't often go there. In fact, no one seems to go there much, except graffiti artists. I snapped a few mobile phone pics before I got too sketched out by the isolation and general dodginess of the place and scurried away. If I was more technologically gifted, I'd post them here. But why bother, when you can see all the local graffiti pics you could ever possibly hope for over at Manchester Marks. The pic above is from this blog, and was taken at Hotspur House off Oxford Road. Manchester is Shit has also been known to post graffiti photgraphs, and is a good place to go for details of upcoming exhibitions, underground parties, and the like. Also the messageboard United Art City is a great way to keep up with street art in Manc and beyond.

Graffiti art gets a bad rap these days - we're right in the middle of the hipster backlash. Self-appointed trendspotters may sneer, "Oh, that's so, like, three years ago." But the medium's higher profile means that, in addition to being co-opted by companies flogging anything from trainers to insurance, it's also a lot easier to actually look at, and galleries are suddenly falling all over themselves to show it.

Grafficionados might want to check out a couple of exhibitions in town now: The C.A.L.M.A. Show over at Contact Theatre until early May features installations from the Brazilian graffiti artist whose work combines allusions to paganism, alchemy, folklore and corporate culture.

Also, the Richard Goodall gallery is busting out of it's rock n'roll pigeonhole for a show by NY street artist and illustrator Dalek, to April 29. And you know Magma practically always has some graffiti art going on at the storefront, which often seems to feature giraffes.

And one more

One new blog got left off the last post. It's Urban Trawling, written by Si. He says: I didn't invent urban trawling, I am just a victim of the trend. Exiled from the "real world" of trendy city-centre bars and coffee shops, we have nowhere to go but the streets.

So what is urban trawling, exactly? Don't know, but I will certainly keep reading to find out more. The most recent post is a passionate rant at the soulessness of the glass n' chrome buildings that seem to be replicating themselves across Manchester at an alarming rate. Si is no fan of Urbis. Si also has the mumps - sheesh, do people actually still get that? Get well soon, Si.

Blog bonanza

Hey, look at that. I moan about having no new blogs to add and you all deliver. As a result we have a bumper crop of fresh, locally grown blogs to enjoy... mmmmm.

Why did I go wrong? is written by Wodge, who says it's "mostly about living in Manchester." There are so many pictures on it, it kinda looks like a photo blog, but maybe not. And one of the pictures is of a bus. What's with the sudden bus fixation, you guys?

Miss Fluff is the author of Trolley Park. She likes roast dinners and cosy nights in and she's quite a talented artist, judging by the sketches. I like this influx of arty bloggers. You can see one of the pictures from her blog above.

Lingua Franca is a brilliant, now-defunct magazine about ideas, and it's also the name of a language-oriented blog written by Heather Pollitt (cheers to Roy at Mantex for the tip - I see Heather's also guest blogger there this week)

She writes: My blog's about anything to do with language use, seen from an analytical, iconoclastic, historical angle. I'll be commenting on idiosyncracies, shooting down blind prejudice and celebrating the recent developments in technology that have resulted in the democratising of communication. Everyone's passionate about language and that's because it's part of us. Let's explore it's workings and stop being so precious about it. Amen, sister. Recent posts explore road signs and the language of politics.

Lastly, we have The Misapplied Criminal Mind, a personal blog about, among other things, the evilness of cats and how custard is the most disappointing dessert choice ever (isn't it?)

Thanks to Lord Rich, one of the web wizards behind the Manchester Bloggers aggregator, for keeping me up to date on new additions. Sign up, folks. The aggregator is your friend, even though it has a scary name. Really.

Blogger picture problems

Has anyone else been having problems posting pictures on blogger over the last couple of days? I can't do it, and the lack of colourful illustration on here is really starting to pinch my aesthetic sensibilities. Anyone have a clue????

UPDATE: of course, now it's working. Isn't that always the way?

More bus blogging

You wait and wait for one and then two come at the same time. Groaningly trite yet highly appropriate seeing as not one but two bus blogs have arrived in our city within a couple of weeks. Hot on the heels of I Wanna Ride The Bus! comes 43, a record of travels on the 43 bus (goes between Piccadilly and the Airport), which is the means of blogger Geoff's commute. He writes:

I suppose it would be fantastic to travel around the world to amazing places and write about it, like a travel writer, but I can’t do that. What I can do is get the 43 bus to town (and back again), and, you know, waste not want not and all that. Moreover, I think getting the 43 bus can be pretty good.

Geoff has some pretty cool drawings on the blog (one of a folding bike is above)and some of them even move. And the soundtrack has got to be a recording of the background sound on board the 43. In his latest post he waxes lyrical about bus graffiti.

XFM cometh

XFManchester finally started broadcasting last week at 97.7 fm, and already it's hard to imagine how we got along for so long without it. The first thing I noticed was all the Mancunian - or at least Northern - accents on there, which is quite refreshing. I heard a tiny bit of Tony Wilson's first broadcast (I undertand there was some publicity stunt involving Bez and a bunch of folks breaking the world record for largest ensemble shaking maracas ...) and a bit of Clint Boon's "Music Response" last night. He played some good local bands who have probably never been on the radio before but seemed to be plugging his night at South with dismaying frequency. I like the music they're playing so far - a decent mix of new and old, though some of the new veers a little toward the more anodyne side of indie. Ah well, it is commercial radio.

But old Tony must be a busy man these days. Saw this post reporting that the BBC are revamping GMR now that XFM is in town and have secured the services of one Anthony H. Wilson (Dude, have you ever noticed that he has the same middle initial as Jesus Christ? Do you think that's a coincidence?) Rockontop actually says:

Predictably, the BBC are bringing in Tony Wilson and Terry Christian as new presenters. Because there are no other broadcasters in Manchester. Indeed.

No new bloggers?

You know you haven't been blogging frequently enough when people call you and say "I noticed you haven't blogged for a long time, and I just want to make sure everything's okay." A well-deserved kick in the behind. And no, I haven't gotten lost in the mists on the West Pennine Moors or fallen down an old mine shaft, I've just been (sigh ...) kinda busy.

That being said, I would have done my traditional Friday welcome new Manc bloggers post, but there weren't any. Can it be that the flood of new Manchester-area blogs is slowing to a trickle? Surely not. So I'm putting out the call for fresh blood: send 'em in. Those urls. To me at themanchizzle at gmail dot com.

The Mancunian Agreement

The Manchester Council is working on a plan to have all city residents sign a citizenship contract. This reminds me of something a hardboiled old newspaperman I know would say when the local government did anything especially stupid: "You just can't make this shit up." He would love this. I read about it in the MEN on Friday:

The agreements would start as voluntary but over time would become part of formal contracts, covering things like tenancies and truancy - with penalties for those who break the terms. ... The draft version refers to the contracts as "The Mancunian Agreement", claiming the idea is to "support individual and collective self-esteem and mutual respect." ... People could be asked to pledge everything from being a good parent to avoiding dropping litter in the street to trying to live a healthy lifestyle.

Apparently the whole thing originated with a dubious sounding "consultation project". No word yet as to how much this pettifogging malarkey is going to cost us.

Spinneyhead has taken note. And Blood and Treasure definitely isn't having any part of it. Even Shuggy weighed in from up North. Stay tuned.

Inblognito

A couple of things have happened lately that have gotten me thinking about the murky relationship between our online personas and our real-life ones.

When I started out writing my blog, I went to great lengths to keep my blog anonymous, picking a codename and setting up a separate email address. I thought that writing under a nom de plume would free me to be completely honest without fear of personal or professional consequences. It'd protect me from internet nutters. And as a journalist, at least in the states, I could potentially find myself assigned to "objectively" write about a politician, controversial issue or organization. Having an online paper trail of my personal opinions could potentially make things difficult for myself and my paper if someone wanted to be a jerk.

But as time went on and I started meeting some of the people who read my blog, I gradually started using my real name. Introducing myself as Yankunian at a blog meet seemed, I don't know, kind of retarded and precious. Especially when I already knew some of the people there from other things. When I got professionally involved with a blogging project at the MLF, it was essential that my real name be linked to my blog - it was, effectively, my credential. And of course by linking to Norm's profile of me last week I kinda put the final nail in the anonymity coffin.

Some people really don't want to be unmasked. Even more than that, they don't want their anonymous blog pointed out to people even though it doesn't have their real name on it because they think people might be able to figure out it's them from what they're writing about. (whew!) Of course I respect a blogger's personal preferences, but a tiny part of me wonders why they don't get one of those old-fashioned diaries with a lock on it, hide it under their mattress and wear the key around their neck? Why write a blog on the internets, where it's out there for all to see, if you don't want people you know reading your stuff? Because if you're putting it out there, you should assume that someone you know is reading it.

I went by Southern Bird's anonymous blog today and I see that she stopped writing late last month. This is sad, because I liked her blog - it was engaging and she genuinely seemed to enjoy writing it. She explained in her last post that she was giving it up because an ex-boyfriend was, from what I gather, stalking her through her blog. SB alluded to problems she's had in the past with other ex-boyfriends and her blog, and in her comments several others write in with similar tales of woe. Her name isn't on her blog anywhere, but she presumably told her ex about it in happier days. Having an anonymous blog didn't protect her from this situation, because she made it non-anonymous herself, just by telling someone she completely trusted at the time.

What do people think about this? I'd be interested to hear how some of you came up with your own approach - full separation of online/offline identities, some overlap or completely straight-up, firstname lastname blogging? I suspect the Manchester blogroll includes all of the above.

Get on the bus

This week's lone addition to the Manchester blogroll is I Wanna Ride The Bus! by GM Traveller, a shadowy figure who started the blog that(s)he describes as "dedicated to my goings to and from work in Manchester, and maybe the usual something else in between."

As you'd expect, there's lots about particular bus journeys, and discussion of routes, including a lengthy exploration of why the new Shudehill bus station is so woefully underused. But there's also a nice post about the comparative merits of the different markets in the towns around Manchester. GM Traveller's inspirations include The Station Log Book, the musings of a stationmaster on the London Underground.

(Lovely bus image courtesy of the Manc Lomo godlings at Just Shoot)

Hey, I'm famous

I feel sort of embarassed tooting my own horn like this (blushing, looking uncomfortably at feet) but the Friday profile on Normblog this week is me. If you want to read it, go to The Normblog Profile 129: Kate Feld

Genie-us

We all know Manchester is a magical place in the springtime. Dan Flynn has had a fascinating encounter with a foul-mouthed genie in a pop bottle.

You can read all about it here


And Crinklybee has embarked on an exhaustive survey of our city's public telephone boxes to bring you The Crinklybee Award for Manchester's Most Splendid Public Telephone Box. It's a sort of swan song for him, as he just got his first mobile phone a couple of weeks ago. Jonathan, welcome to the wonderful world of being always - irritatingly - reachable. You'll never be on time again.

Blook who's talking

When is a book not a book? When it's a blook, apparently - to the uninitiated (which is, like, everyone, since someone just made this up), that's a blog that started life as a book, like Belle de Jour or Julie and Julia. Okay, I get the concept, but the cutesy name is kind of annoying. But apparently it's there because announcing "The Blooker Prize" was just too tempting a proposition for Lulu founder Bob Young.

Alert reader Conscious & Verbal pointed out this article in the Telegraph (via Bookseller):
The founders of the Booker Prize maintained a cautious silence yesterday after a rival organisation unveiled plans for an award with a startlingly similar name, the Blooker Prize, to reward books born on the world wide web...

Interesting stuff.... but I have to wonder whether the Booker's silence was actually a "cautious" one. It might have been a "completely disinterested" one or even, an "I'm sorry, were you saying something just then?" kind of silence.

51 with a bullet ...

Congratulations to our very own Mark Thwaite of the excellent Ready Steady Book. According to the Observer, he's the 51st most important person in British publishing. It's nice to see a literary blogger get some recognition in the mainstream lit media, even if he didn't make the top 50. Mark's name is first among "the ones who nearly made the list:"

Mark Thwaite, founder and editor of www.readysteadybook.com, the UK's largest independent literary website. A librarian by trade, Thwaite writes a regular blog attracting up to 3,000 visitors per day.

Now if we can just take out Mary-Kay Wilmers and David Godwin, he'll have it all wrapped up next time.

Open Music Archive

On Friday I met Eileen Simpson and Ben White, who are running the Open Music Archive project at one of my favourite vintage shops, My Goodniss on Thomas Street, run by the lovely Leyla Nazim. (It was a good day - I also got a delightful dress for a mere £14). Eileen just sent me some more info about their upcoming event at the shop:

On Saturday March 18 at My Goodniss there's going to be an evening of free music and films from the Open Music Archive, which collects and distributes content that has fallen out of copyright, and are thus free for anyone to use. From 6-8pm Eileen and Ben will perform a live DJ & laptop set and digitally project re-mixed 16mm film footage. You can expect to hear long-forgotten blues, folk and jazz tracks transferred from scratchy 78 shellac records - but the OMA folks also strip samples, beats, words and melodies from these tracks to produce brand new music that they license with Creative Commons ShareAlike licences. If you're coming, bring a memory stick or other device to take away the music or download after the event from www.openmusicarchive.org/mygoodniss

Blue period

Just want to point out the pioneering work being done by Mr. Pretzels and friends - since I last checked in they've pushed blue-tack art to even greater heights of innovation. Go here and watch their animated short films.

Last orders

When 24-hour licensing passed, I envisioned happy nights drinking leisurely cocktails, exiting bars and clubs at an hour more compatible with the cosmopolitan vibe one might expect from "the original modern city." I imagined, oh, I don't know, setting off home after a night out without having to fight my way through a drunken herd of yawping, half-naked souls all simultaneously trying to snag a taxi, eat a kebab, be sick, pick a fight and get off with some luckless stranger. Not that there's anything wrong with any of the above - it'd just be nice if everyone didn't get let out at the same (unreasonably early) time.

But official-type people fear change, and my 24-7 dreams have come to diddly-squat. So it was with great interest that I read in Manchester Online this morning that the first 24-hour drinking license has been granted to ... Cornerhouse. Apparently, the police have been opposing every application, no matter where, on the grounds that late opening will disturb residents, increase crime and generally bring about the eve of destruction. But the council approved Cornerhouse, of all places. Why?

A council spokesman said: "The Cornerhouse is one of Manchester's key cultural hubs and its 24-hour license is clearly linked to its function as a cinema and the many other events that are held there.
It is a well-run establishment which recognises that public safety is essential and is very clear about how crime and disorder and public nuisance will be
prevented."

Hmmm.... want me to translate that for ya?: "The Cornerhouse is frequented by a well-educated, affluent older clientele who like to watch movies with subtitles. These people know when to stop drinking and who are unlikely to do anything untoward in the wee hours that might make us regret this decision."

I like the Cornerhouse and go there lots, but something about this seems kind of classist and unfair to me. I can think of many other bars and clubs who would actually benefit a lot more from a 24-hour license. And what's the point of having 24-hour licensing if you're not going to use it? It'll be kinda funny though if word gets around about the late license and the C-house starts getting invaded by likkered-up riot boys looking for a late-night snootful.

Bebo? ...wasn't that a new wave band?

Since I know many of you here at The Manchizzle are big fans of MySpace and other social networking sites, you might want to read this story in The Guardian technology section today. I'm so un-cool I'd never even heard of the SN site they've focused on, Bebo, which is apparently all the rage with those young people. Sheesh, who can keep up?

Show and Tell Online

New blog fiesta. Ole!

We have a few additions to the jelly roll this week -- and two of them are American. I know, but really, it's not that we're secretly taking over, it's just that the few yanks who are here all seem to be blogging. Given the fact that blogging is much more widely established in the states, this makes perfect sense. (Or that's what we want you to think....)

The first is Plain Simple English, written by Buffy Holt, a resident of Cheshire, I believe, who is writing a novel. She's from West Virginia but doesn't intend to move back to the states anytime soon since she loves it here. You can read more about her and the book she's working on at her blog but be warned - absolutely no Buffy The Vampire Slayer jokes will be tolerated.

Dave Maass came over here from hot and dusty Phoenix to study visual anthropology, and is also a writer who's involved in Verberate (nice new site by the way) and other literary/film events around Manc. He also has the best surname-linked blog I've heard in a long time: His blog is called Maassive. Sweet, huh?

But if you don't have a name that can be cleverly worked into the title of your blog, you can always take a different tack and opt for a bold statement like the folks behind the group blog Manchester is Shit. While this blog won't be getting linkage from the Northwest Development Agency anytime soon, it does have some top pictures of and posts about graffiti and sundry other things.

Dave Maass also told me about another couple of Manchester blogs I'd missed:

The first, BrandosHat, is written by Steven Waling, a poet who teaches creative writing. The blog is a place for for discussion of all things related to poetry, religion, and life in general. His latest post considers the different influences that determine how a poet evolves -- interesting stuff.

And Changing Cycles is the work of Salfordian (?) Ben Mellor, a cyclist and performer who recently returned from a three-month bicycle trip around the country, an experience he will be turning into a live act on environmental themes during his current residency at Contact. Three months on a bike around Britain in the winter - damn! Bet there are some stories there ...

The Manolo he love the shoes

Normblog's Friday profiles are consistently interesting reads, but this week's choice is especially super fantastic. The Normblog Profile: Manolo the Shoeblogger

New blogs: Mr. Pretzels, Yer Mam

Blue-tack: It languishes in obscurity, balled into a sad lump collecting dust and odd bits of fluff in the desk drawer among stubby pencils and paperclips. But who knew that inside the heart of the blue-tack lurked the potential for a second life, a more artistic one? Mr. Pretzels, that's who. Please follow the link to see blue-tack -- and timewasting on the job -- elevated to heights of magnificence never before achieved. I think the works completed during the Victorian Easter Island period show special promise. And to think it all happened somewhere in South Manchester ...


James, author of Yer Mam, kindly wrote in to let me know that I had failed to list him on the roll. And, damn, but haven't we all been missing out on a whole heap of tasty music blogging, complete with mp3s, cover art and humorous pirate references. Anyone who's working their way through a personal top 300 singles 2000-2005 has my deepest respect. Please note that he blogs on MSN Spaces, not to be confused with the much-maligned myspace. (Not that anyone would be daft enough to mix them up just because they sounded similar, ho ho ho.)

UPDATED New Manchester blog column

I’ve mentioned the possibility that we might get a new Manchester listings magazine in this blog before, and, lo and behold, it has actually come to pass. I had inside knowledge, though: I’m now the literature editor of The Mix, a fortnightly mag that’s available from today in newsagents around the city centre for a mere £1.50.

The literature section in every issue will feature a column called Bloggerel, which will shine a spotlight on the sadly-overlooked work of Manchester bloggers. Each Bloggerel will feature an excerpt from a recent blog post, drawn from the sites on the Manc blogroll at right. This isn’t an original idea: I stole it from The Vermont alt-weekly Seven Days and The Guardian does it as well, though their column features blog posts related to big news stories. My hope is that it will make more people want to read blogs.

The inaugural bloggerel is Bar Fiction from Bournemouth Runner’s blog The Art of Fiction.

I was also taken with this funny post from Kitchentable, about a serendipitous experience at Fopp.

If you think you’ve written something that could be in the column, or want to point out a great post on someone else’s blog, feel free to email your bloggerel nominations to themanchizzle at gmail dot com. I’m looking for excerpts or whole posts that are 500 words or less (SEE UPDATE BELOW), are well written, can stand alone in the magazine and will be of interest to pretty much any reader. Because it’s the literature section there may be a slight bias towards literary or “writerly” posts, but it’s open to any topic.

I’ll get in touch with people if I’m putting their post forward (though, unless you have creative commons or explicit copyright protection on your blog, I don’t think I’m required to.) If you want to remain an anonymous blogger, that’s fine – I’m really just going to use blog names/urls, not author names. And please note that there’s no pay involved, except the glow of pleasure that comes with a surge of extra traffic.

UPDATED: Because of space limitations the Bloggerel column will now be limited to excerpts of 200 words. Eeek. Keep 'em short n' sweet, then.

Result: myspace CAN be a blog... but isn't always

Wow, look at all those comments ... while there was a fair amount of humorous slagging off in there, I think the result of the collective musings is this: If you're genuinely blogging, then who cares what platform you're using? You should be on the blogroll.

So that will be The Manchizzle's totally democratic policy henceforth. If you know of anyone in the general vicinity of Manc who's blogging on MSN Spaces, livejournal etc. or social networking thingies like myspace, or Friendster (can you blog on Friendster? Does anyone still use that?) send 'em my way.

myspace: a blog or not a blog? discuss

Most of my "creative" friends are scared of blogs. That might seem weird, but I think it's because they wrongly assume that they're too technologically challenging to run. But somehow, like, in the last five minutes, they've all acquired myspace sites.

Last week I was accosted by a woman I know in the hallway of my Nathan Barley-esque sometime offices on Lever Street. She said breezily, "Hey, what's your myspace, I'll send you an invite to the club night next month." My face fell. "I, um, I don't have one," I told her. She looked so disappointed. I felt, oddly, embarassed. Hoping to recover some sort of cred, I wrote the url for my blog on a scrap of paper. She looked at it as if it were a dirty word in a foreign language.

Then I went and looked at my friends' myspace sites. The template is terrible. It's ugly and it doesn't work right, but there they all were, getting hourly updates on their favourite bands' bowel movements and frantically messaging each other to say nothing much in particular. I don't feel so bad about not being on myspace, because I like blogger a whole lot better, but I think it's cool that the music industry seems to have adopted myspace as THE way to set up a band website on the cheap. And while a lot of the blogs on these sites are feeble, vestigial things, some of them are actually really cool.

So I ask you, Manchester bloggers: should myspace sites be considered blogs and listed in the Manc blogroll? What do you think? My comments box awaits your collective widsom.

Click here to download a video clip of Demetri Martin's very funny piss-take of the whole myspace thing on The Daily Show (courtesy EdTechUk. (The totally appropriate illustration comes from The Chalkboard Manifesto.)

The turn and glare

When did going to the movies stop being a hushed, magical experience where everyone gathered around the miracle of flickering images and become a free-for-all? In the last couple of years, I've noticed a staggering decline in decorum at the cinema. Perhaps I'm just noticing this now because I'm getting older and more curmudgeonly. So curmudgeonly, in fact, that I use phrases like 'a staggering decline of decorum', which makes me sound like my dentures are pinching. But I digress. The last few times I've gone to see a movie (on both sides of the Atlantic) I've encountered some appalling behavior.

There were the two pre-teen girls at 'The Producers' who shared a large tub of popcorn and whispered and giggled so loudly that we had to ask them to be quiet three times. There were the people behind us in '13' at Cornerhouse last night who talked at normal conversation pitch through the ads, trailers, credits and the first bit of the film. I like to watch the trailers, dammit. And don't get me started on the mobile-phone related disturbances. At some movie recently a phone rang loudly, and instead of shutting it off, the person answered it. I almost had a heart attack. Then there was the whole family texting happily away during 'King Kong.' Father and two are-they-really-old-enough-for-mobiles sons, faces bathed in the blue glow of their handsets, seemingly oblivious to the big ape. Why do these people go to movies?

Here's my strategy for dealing with bad behavior at movies:

1. The turn and glare

2. A second turn and a longer, more malevolent glare, perhaps with a raised eyebrow

3. Turn, glare and 'shhhh' meaningfully

4. The same again, but this time with hands raised in the international sign of "what gives?"

5. Getting verbal. This may actually require getting up and walking to another section of seats. "Excuse me, would you mind being more quiet/turning that off/doing that outside? We're trying to watch the film." This makes you feel like a prim librarian from central casting, but it usually works.

6. Another verbal entreaty, with the addition of either a. sarcastic comment or b. threats to fetch management and have them bodily removed. In cases of extreme annoyance, both.

7. Go to manager and demand free tickets (it's never actually come to this, but I would.)

You can never be too rich, too thin, or have too many pageloads

Just wanted to pass on the link to this enormously interesting piece about bloggers in New York magazine (It's not from "New York Metro," that's just the way part of their online operation is branded - sorry, I know that's really pedantic, but it's confusing when NY Metro is cited as a news source by clueless bloggers. Who's a journalism geek?) Anyway, people who are interested in the social dynamics of blogging will want to read this. Blogs to Riches: The Haves and Have-Nots of the Blogging Boom.

Hey, look ... new blogs!

You may notice that I've sneakily added some new blogs to the Manchester blogroll:

Kate works in the arts and blogs a lot about film and such on If You're Sad and Like Beer... I believe the title is a reference to that whacked-out, perplexing and gorgeous Guy Maddin movie The Saddest Music in the World, pictured above. Kate hasn't been blogging very much lately but maybe if we all pester her, she will. Pester. Pester pester.

The Airport Diaries is a workblog apparently written by someone who works at Manchester International Airport. The author is listed only as "the airport exile." Interesting stuff.

Half Lived by Truman is a personal sort of blog written by a man who is living between the USA and the UK - A man I can definitely relate to. In his case, he divides his time between Texas and Manchester, which is an interesting combination of places (and one hell of a trip). Haven't I heard of a band around here with some members who lived in Manc and others based in Texas? Was it the Earlies? And then there was another musician from Texas who now lives in Manchester - I forget who. So what's the big Manchester-Texas connection?

The latter two blogs came courtesy of the links on Easy Update, the photoblog of Ms_Understud. Formerly of Manchester, now of Newcastle. Our loss.

What's on extra: Gig-a-licious

Truly the gig gods are smiling on Manchester this week. Isobel Campbell(photo above), the sweet-voiced singer late of Belle and Sebastian, has been getting a lot of press recently, mostly for Ballad of the Broken Seas, her unlikely collab with Queens of the Stone Age frontman Mark Lanegan. But she's going to be performing solo Tuesday at Night and Day, with Jenniferever and Superkings warming up. Her album, according to the Guardian, is chock full of “...warm, atmospheric songs... honey-coated whispers...lost in the slow-motion melodies...windswept lullabies....” (That's lot of ellipses, no? I just pulled that blurb off the N+D website, but it makes you wonder why they had to chop the quote up so much.) Anyway, it's gotta be better than sitting through a mediocre, overpriced meal in some joint that's decked out with pink doilies.

On Wednesday, Gothenburg, Sweden's homegrown hero, Jens Lekman plays the King's Arms in Salford, a beautiful old pub with good beer and a smallish performance space upstairs. Jens doesn't seem to have much of a profile around here, but he's getting a lot of rave reviews over in the states; here's the one that turned me onto him. I really dig his music - it's quirky, heartfelt pop - and you've got to respect a man who plays the ukelele. Bill Wells and Vinny Peculiar open. Details here.

If Lekman doesn't appeal, Brad Meldhau is playing the same night over at the Royal Northern College of Music (details here). He's an insanely gifted jazz pianist who delights in obliterating genre boundaries - his versions of some Radiohead songs will make your brain melt. And acoustics-wise, the RNCM is my favourite venue in town - the Magnetic Fields concert I saw here last year had perfect sound.



Friday brings the African Soul Rebels concert to Bridgewater Hall, with Amadou et Mariam, Souad Massi and Emmanuel Jal. I don't know much about the latter two acts - Jal is a rapper, and Massi is an Algerian singer - but Amadou et Mariam should be worth the price of admission alone. They're a blind Malian singing couple who make music that's haunting and funky at the same time. Their album Dimanche a Bamako was produced by the loopy musical genius Manu Chao, and was a massive hit in France.

Am I going to all these gigs? Hell no. But someone should.

Blog meet

The Manchester blog meet was a big hit - about 30 people were there, and everyone seemed to enjoy meeting the faces behind the blogs they read. Chern Jie, a very friendly Engineering student from Malaysia who I met there (and whose eponymous blog I have just added to the manc blogroll) has put up some pictures and a nice long description of the multi-stage event here. That's where the above pic comes from. Chris, Tom, Norm, Spinneyhead and Clare have posted about it as well. Hopefully this will be the first of a series of once-in-a-while blogger social outings. Kro was so busy and, often, loud - maybe next time we can do it in the quiet side room of some old fashioned pub. But I suppose that wouldn't have the wireless.

Weekend: green, zines

There is some pretty cool stuff going on this weekend, and seeing as I got such a positive response to my "what's on" post of last week, I thought I'd make it a regular weekly feature.

If you're coming to the blog meet and have an interest in homemade magazines, while you're in the 'hood you may also want to check out the Manchester Zine Fest, which is going on from high noon into the evening at The Basement, a collectively-run cafe/art/event space at 24 Lever Street. They're going to have workshops, speakers, a zine gallery and all sorts of treats for zine-lovers. (The picture above comes courtesy of Barnard College, home to many fine zines.)

I've been curious about Green Bohemia for a long time. It's a live music night at Greenroom with an appealingly eclectic list of performers. I see that tomorrow night is their second birthday party - the ideal time to check it out; Isobel Heyworth, Gideon Conn and The Shmatte Kid will be playing, with a whole bunch of other folks. Plus, it's free.

The bluest blog in town

Ladies and gentlemen, may I direct your attention to Bitter and Blue? If you're a Man City supporter you'll want to bookmark this blog, because it's all about the boys in baby blue. It's the work of Danny Pugsley, who says: while I do include a bit of news and match reports, I try to keep it more of an opinion based blog as there are many forum and fan sites for news stories etc.

This strategy seems to be paying off, since we see that an excerpt from Bitter and Blue was featured in Sunday's Observer. Well done!

I've actually had Bn'B on the blogroll for a long time, but have been holding off on introducing it until I could also find a Man United blog that was written by a fan based in Manchester. Curiously enough, I couldn't find one ...

Love rides again

Just noticed in Metro today that the Deansgate branch of Love Saves The Day, which has been shuttered since late 2005 due to financial problems, is to reopen on February 14. Yep ... Valentine's Day. The Oldham Street branch has been permanently closed, from what I've heard. Rats.

Flick: King Kong

I may be the last person in the country to have seen King Kong, but it was on its last week in the cinema and the consensus seemed to be that this was one you really had to see on the big screen. I was in the mood for a blockbuster that didn't require strenuous use of the brain, and that's just what we got. KK is perfectly good entertainment - light on character and plot, heavy on gobsmacking special effects.

My favourite parts of the movie were the beginning and the end, which were set in a gorgeous Depression-era New York. As soon as the boat approached Skull Island, the movie basically turned into a Jurassic Park/Indiana Jones style adventure with a triple helping of scary beasties and violent dismemberings: Dinosaurs, check. Big evil fanged bats, check. Tentacles-with-teeth, check. The one creature missing from this movie was the most important (and potentially fearsome) of all - the editor. Just because you can construct seventy-nine distinct species of disgusting overgrown insect-thing doesn't mean you should. I kept imagining Peter Jackson saying, "aww mate, let's just throw this one in, too. Go on."

blogs, meetings, blog meetings

The plotting continues ... Friday I met with Chris Gribble from the Manchester Literature Festival, Lord Rich (who kindly came all the way from Bradford) and Duncan of Stripy T-Shirt to talk about the Manchester bloggers project (Rich and Duncan set up Manchester blogbound - sign up if you haven't already) and we had a good chinwag about what the site might be like.

So far everyone seems to agree that a group Manchester blog linked to an aggregator is a good idea, as well as hooking up blogger posts about the same topic (i.e. linking up blogger reviews of the same movie or gig.) And, of course, a directory of Manchester bloggers grouped by category and locality. We'll be at the blog meet this Saturday, and will be interested to hear about what features/functionalities people would like to see on the site.

On Friday I also met up with Norman Geras of Normblog for tea and a nice chat about blogging, movies, New York and all sorts of things. Mancophiles will want to read the list of great quotations about our city that Norm recently posted about. It's oddly comforting to see that Manchester has been the butt of jokes for at least a couple of centuries.

Updated weekend: art galore, smithsco

What to do this weekend? For starters, the British Art Show 6 is in town, so seize the opportunity to gorge on contemporary art, it only comes around every five years. In particular, I thought the Whitworth Gallery and the Chinese Arts Centre both had a pretty impressive selection of works. Above image courtesy of The Telegraph, where you can see a gallery of images from the exhibition before it arrived in Manc.

And Friday is the monthly Smiths Disco at the Star and Garter, if howling lyrics to little-known Moz tunes in the company of sweaty former teenage misfits is your thing. Get there early...

In totally unrelated other news, it appears that XFM has finally announced a launch date for the Manchester station: March 15. Indie-heads rejoice.

Update: have removed refs to blog meet and zine fest because, erm, that's next weekend. Talk about getting ahead of oneself.

Manchester media gossip, part two

News comes of another contestant in the rush to fill the yawning cultural void left by City Life. We hear that The Mix, a fortnightly culture and listings magazine, is being planned for Manchester. The editor comes from Wideshut Magazine, which has been running some interesting collaborations with local arts organizations, most recently Castlefield Gallery. The publication is to be based in that cultural hub of Salford, Islington Mill. And see what I did there? ... I mentioned a mill without referencing trouble at t'mill, rubble at t'mill or even stubble at t'mill (though admittedly there is a lot of stubble at that particular mill - not exactly a clean-shaven bunch, those creative types.) Oversubscribed puns are the bane of a writer's existence.

Music to blog by

Music bloggers do us all a great service - they go to all the gigs we can't and listen to all the new bands, helping us pre-sort out the wheat from the chaff with a minimum of music journalist badditude. And in most cases, they're not getting anything out of it - no money, no "reputation", just the knowledge that they are harnessing their obsessive enthusiasm about music for the power of good.

As you'd expect, the Manchester area's home to several excellent music bloggers. Phil Thompson created Bloodshot Dawn out of a desire to spread the word about good music overlooked by most DJs. Artists featured lately in BD's album reviews, gig reviews and concert news include Sufjan Stevens, Belle and Sebastian and the Arctic Monkeys.

Formerly known as the Ledge on the Edge, The Indie Crediential is written by Rick (The Ledge) and Mindy (justHipper), a Salford couple who go to 40-50 gigs a year, plus the odd festival. That's a lot of live music. The most recent is a review of the Secret Machines gig last week. Rick writes: The site is due a redesign as soon as I've finished reading my Eric Meyer books, and the content will be beefed up with extra cd reviews and commentary as well as regular mp3s. Cool.

Others don't blog exclusively about music, but feature it prominently in their blog posts. Girl on a Train posts lists of songs she listened to that day. Crinklybee is doing a series of posts about his old 45s, and 3 degrees of noise often posts about bands. Check them out.

Blogs: Dangerous Man, Gooseania, Crinklybee

Today's crop of new-to-you blogs have been lurking around on the blogroll for a while, but I haven't formally introduced them yet. First off is The Dangerous Man, aka Jay, who writes of himself and his blog:
I am a 20 year old gay guy. I live in Manchester, UK ... In August of 2004 I moved into an apartment in the city centre (on Deansgate) with my partner Paul who is originally from Liverpool. My blog is a daily snapshot of my life. With honest accounts of sex, drugs (or lack of), music, work and play. Warning, this blog contains thoughts of an open mind and is not suitable for right wingers, religious people, and the 'sexless' You have been duly warned!

Maths graduate student Craig Laughton writes Gooseania, which he describes thusly: My blog is about what it's like to do a PhD, I thought it would be useful to document the three years because when I started, I didn't have much idea what I was in for! I tend to write a lot about my subject (maths) and general PhD stuff and unfortunately not too much about Manchester per se, but I guess I'm forever talking about the university so that must count for something. Craig just had his first article published, and it was about blogging - congratulations, Craig.

Another is Crinklybee, a blog I've long been a fan of for its quirky tone. Check out this post title: A short post about Twiglets which suddenly turns alarmingy into a long one about the Dogme film 'Italian For Beginners', before getting a grip of itself and ending up back with the Twiglets again. Brilliant.

The man behind Crinklybee is Johnathan, a 30-something Geordie living in Levenshulme, who writes: I suppose like most bloggers I just write about the stuff Iget up to- I try to make it engaging and humorous and build up a picture of my world ...

Nine Black Alps dis Manc, define "scally"

I was delighted to see that Manc's own Nine Black Alps made the "A Night Out With..." column in the Sunday Styles section of the New York Times yesterday. In the past this has featured now-huge-in-the-states bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, so this must mean NBA are on their way to getting that elusive American acclaim.

It's maybe not so cool that they use this press space to slag off their hometown clubs. Guess we won't be seeing them at Fifth Avenue next Friday, then. Note, also, the clarification of "scally" for American readers.

The four members were working odd jobs before they hooked up through Manchester's underground music scene, "at one of the few clubs where they don't play Stone Roses and Oasis for a bunch of scallies," the band's guitarist and bassist, David Jones, noted.

Scallies? "English rednecks," he explained.

(Image from the NYT)

Manchester Blog Meet: : The Details

Clare, the intrepid organiser of our first ever (I believe?) Manchester Blog Meet has passed on the relevant times and locations for the multi-part event on Saturday, Feb. 11. You can find the post on her blog here.

Folks are free to come to just one part, or the whole shebang. Here's the schedule for Saturday:

3pm: tea/coffee and cakes at the new Kro in Piccadilly Gardens
7:30 pm: dinner at Efes Turkish restaurant (let Clare know if you're coming to this)
9:30 pm: libations at Mother Mac's Pub, back Piccadilly

Our hostess has also offered to put folks up at her place if they're coming in from far afield. Many thanks, Clare, for putting so much time and thought into this. I'll see you all at Kro, but won't be able to come to the later bits.

New Blogs: Free Man, Feeling Listless and Keris

Okay, so I’ve stretched the boundaries of the Manchester area all the way up to Preston, but I think A Free Man in Preston is well worth the long commute. As featured on Radio Five Live (and, apparently, recommended by the Guardian), it’s written by a disorientated Lancashire man, who says: “What do I write about? The office where I work, mainly, and stuff about outside work sometimes too. I think that about sums it up really.” Check out the geekariffic soundtrack feature, powered by Castpost. Is it legal? Who knows. But it sure is cool.

Another new addition, Feeling Listless is penned by Stuart Ian Burns, a student at Man U who splits his time between here and Liverpool. His blog is the place to go for cultural review from the clueless (Stu’s description, not mine. I’m sure he’s just being modest.)

And finally, Keris Stainton is a writer and dedicated reader who maintains a blog here. She says it’s generally “a combination of popular culture/celebs, my own journey to becoming a professional writer and some personal stuff too.” You can access her novels in progress there, too.

Manchester media gossip

With the demise of City Life last year, lots of us have been forced to resort to the quaint practice of scanning posters and flyers to find out what's going on in the way of gigs and events -- or actually buying the MEN on a Friday for the GO! section. At 10p, it's quite a bargain. But fear not; If the rumors are to be believed, there's already more than one group waiting in the wings to pick up where CL left off.

The former editor of City Life, along with a couple of the mag's erstwhile columnists, is said to be drawing up plans for a regional mag. What's more, The Leeds Guide, an established player in the listings mag game, is said to be looking at moving into our tantalizingly untapped market, and has already enlisted some local talent - namely, a few City Life writers - to help set things up. Should be interesting to see what happens.

Gregorian Rants

Greagoir Ó Dálaigh writes the cleverly named, wide-ranging blog Gregorian Rants. I asked him to describe what he wrote about. He replied: “a better question might be 'what don't I write about?'

On any given day I'm likely to be talking about adventures on location with the BBC in Italy, being Irish in England, serving beer to Dublin crimelords, meeting Mikhail Gorbachev, excavating a human skeleton in Greece, how badly Everton football club is performing, how G.K. Chesterton is the most magnificently underrated English writer of the twentieth century, or any of a host of topics to do with travel, politics, history, sport, religion, art, cinema or music. Sorry. I talk a lot.

And he very kindly put me onto a number of studenty Manchester blogs which will be added to the blogroll shortly:

There's nmr boy, who lives in my hall, for starters. Steph at kaleidoscope eyes used to live here and probably will again; in any case she studies Egyptology here. Maria at gingerbeast is a trainee teacher, and Eleanor at Ramble On studies something to do with French. Stuart's Kitchen Table is a venerable Mancunian blogging institution, but it looks as though Stu's just gone on hiatus, which is a huge shame.

In closing, I want to direct everyone’s attention to a hilarious, though sadly defunct blog posted about recently on Gregorian Rants: Ash-Burned Foods, which detailed the culinary delights on offer at a Manchester university dining hall (source of above photo.) I quote: "'Burger In A Bin' reads the menu for this Friday's meal. A self fulfilling prophesy i fear." Come back Ash-Burned!

Planning a Manc blogs website

Oy vey! In the last week I’ve been contacted by so many people wanting to be added to the blogroll that things have gotten more than a little backed up. If you’re one of those people waiting patiently for your blog to be introduced to its Manchester brethren, my apologies. I don’t have much on for the next couple of days, so I should be able to catch up in a mad fit of posting.

So by this point, you’re probably saying something like: sheesh, who knew there were so many great blogs in Manchester? Someone should probably collect them all together on a proper site with bells and whistles, rather than just being lumped unceremoniously on some poor girl’s blogroll? Island Monkey posted about this recently, and I've been thinking along these lines for some time now. So I’ve started getting the ball rolling on a new Manc bloggers website. This would serve as a portal to the city's blogs, a way to organise bloggers and get more Mancunians blogging, with occasional get-togethers. The lovely new Manchester Literature Festival (rising from the ashes of the poetry fest this autumn) are keen to provide support to this fledgling project.

I think it’s important that this be a blogger-driven endeavour that serves everyone, so please let me know if you’re interested in being involved, or even if you just want to offer your two cents’ (two pence?) worth about what it should and shouldn’t be like. You can email me at themanchizzle at gmail.com, or leave a comment.

Wireless in Manchester?

Due to technical difficulties in the home office, I just spent the day schlepping my laptop all over the city centre looking for a place where I could plug in, power up and log on for the price of a coffee. But no dice. I remember doing this in New York, before, once or twice. I cherish fond memories of the NYC cafe society, teeming with coffee shops that offer free wireless to customers, and power outlets too. That's why New Yorkers have the thriving mobile office culture that enables self-employed folks like me to get out of the house and work/meet/procrastinate in public, right?

Wrong. My friend Marisa, a freelance writer who lives on the disgustingly leafy West Village block used for exterior shots of Carrie's apartment on Sex and The City (in a hatbox-sized apartment)is here to set me straight:

Ok. Pause the America-is-better rant, b/c it ain't as cute as it looks. While, yes, there are cafes on every corner, it's really tough to find one that has access to free-flowing electricity and free wireless. There are two by my apt, but one blocked off all of the outlets so you can only have juicy internet and long-term electric flow if you get there at like 7 am. The other has 4 tables and is unbearably hot. It's not a win win.

Okay, rant paused. But surely there must be some sweet underpublicised wireless hotspots in Manchester that don't cost an arm and a leg? I've just enabled comments, and am asking readers to comment/email with any wireless spots that they know of around Greater Manchester. I'll sum them all up in a post later.

Bookish blogs

Here I am, jetlagged and happy, back in the UK with a big red suitcase stuffed full of blogs to add to the Manchester blogroll. I'll begin with a few blogs of the literary persuasion. First up is the excellent literary blog the Art of Fiction. The man behind the blog is Adrian Slatcher, who also edits the Manchester-based literary review Lamport Court. It offers "comments on the literary scene, and thoughts on the creative process."

While not outwardly identified as a Mancunian blog, Ready Steady Book, a big, beautifully produced group blog concerned with all things literary, makes the blogroll because both blog founder Mark Thwaite and blog designer Kelle Link (nice job, Kelle) live in Manchester.

I also class as literary those blogs which exist mainly as an outlet for creative writing. People have just begun to explore the possiblities of using blogs as a vehicle for a narrative or as a way to experiment with characters or voices. In the sprit of ambiguity I direct you to Community Fair, which landed in my inbox a couple of weeks ago. It's a narrative that appears to emanate from within a government programme in Manchester. Read it from the bottom up, and decide for yourself whether it's real or not.

Correction (26/1):

Mark from Ready Steady Book has set me straight: RSB is not a group blog, and, in fact, it's a whole lot more than just a blog ... it's a literary website. Whoops. Mark writes:

"Not a group blog - only I blog here on RSB - but we do have many contributors adding reviews to the site. On the local front, watch out for some minisites dedicated to local writers and poets coming soon ... "

Cheers Mark, we'll be looking forward to that.

Additions from feedmap

Thanks to alert reader Roy of Mantex... I have discovered feedmap, "where blogs meet maps"... and found a cache of Manchester blogs I didn't know about. So, welcome to the blogroll
Ramage, James' Blog, Port 7, Kookosity, vanillasky, and Towards a Free World. I'm not going to attempt to summarize each of them today, but I urge you to go by and check them all out. Some thoughtful writing and beautiful pictures in this lot.

Will be heading back to Manchester Saturday after a few days in my old town, New York, and I can't wait to get back to the UK. I'm in a sad state after three months without a decent curry or pint of bitter, the morning papers, the carefully modulated tones of Radio 4, and, of course, the daily proximity of my nearest and dearest. Plus the whole snow thing is getting kind of old.

Manchester Blogger Meetup

Doing her part to prove that bloggers are not all malajusted misanthropes who shun social interaction, blogger/novelist Clare Sudbery, of Boob Pencil , is organising a multi-part Manchester blogger meet-up on Saturday, Feb 11. Locations have not yet been determined but the meet will probably kick off at a coffee shop in the city centre somewhere. I'll post the details here as they become available, or check Clare's blog as the date approaches.

I'll be there (at least definitely for the afternoon bit), and look forward to meeting a few of the folks I've been trading emails with in the past couple of weeks. And picking the brains of the tech-savvy about new ways I can pimp up my blog. You have been warned!

Clare also passed on a new addition to the blogroll, Mad Dan's Blog, which lately has been extolling the restorative powers of Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood.

Had also forgotten to add this Manchester blog that I came upon a month or so ago when I caught a post about the demise of City Life: Island Monkey, who writes about popular culture, politics, moustaches and, of course, Manchester.

Two more ...

Here are two more Manchester blogs for you, and then I'm taking a break until next week.

Mantex is blogger Roy Johnson's writings on design, typography, reference books, music, literary studies and language. Recent posts include a thoughtful rant on the idea of "genius" prompted by Radio 3's recent broadcast of the complete Bach, and a rundown of Oxford's revamped writer's style guides.

There's also Skipper, Bill Jones' blog about UK politics, the parliament and the press, coming to you from Stockport. Yesterday's post considers Bob Geldof's new role as poverty advisor to David Cameron.

More Manchester blogs

There's been a nice response to my earlier post, and I've already received some new additions to the Manchester blogroll, which are listed briefly below. Just so you know, I'm not being too strict about it -- blogs from anywhere in Greater Manchester count, and I'll even take blogs from the surrounding areas of Lancs. and Cheshire.

So, on to the blogs. Phil Edwards writes Actually Existing, another Manchester blog with the enviable tagline “ruthless criticism of all that exists, except for the good bits.”

Blood and Treasure’s recent posts have covered subjects ranging from Iraqi politics and the torture memos to psychogeography – interesting stuff.

Norman Geras, who writes the excellent Normblog, has been a big help to this nascent project, posting about it on his blog and sending me links to the above blogs as well as Topsyturvydom , Rob Spence’s writings on literature, academia and life.

The group blog Counago & Spaves has two members in Timperley, and others with previous Salford and Altrincham connections.

Whew. That's it for now. Thanks for all your emails.

Manchester Blogroll

So you (yes, I mean you, the one person who is reading this blog) may have noticed that the list of Manchester blogs down the side of the screen has quadrupled in the last week or so. This is part of my new effort to provide a really complete Manchester blogroll on the site. I've been pretty amazed and impressed at the variety of Mancunian blogs out there, but in order to find some of them I had to do some very annoying and time-consuming searchin' on the web. So here it is. If you've arrived here because you're curious about who could possibly be linking to your blog, welcome. If you know of any Manchester blogs I've missed (and I'm sure there are many), email them to me at themanchizzle at gmail.com and I'll be happy to add them to the blogroll.

The Great Outdoors

The Live Journal community Manchester's Journal has long proven to be an excellent - and very entertaining - source of information about life in Manc. People write in looking for recommendations on where to go for a night out (somehow, the answer is invariably Jilly's Rockworld), help getting a job/place to live, and suggestions about where to buy certain hard-to-find items (bonsai trees, magic mushrooms, swtichblades, etc.) Now someone has written in soliciting reccs on the best locations for an al fresco shag in the city centre. Marvelous.

Refill

It was a sad day a couple of months ago when the two Manchester locations of Love Saves the Day closed seemingly overnight, in a cappuccino-scented cloud of mystery. Surely everyone must know the real story by now – and we understand that greedy git of a business manager is safely in the hands of justice.

That’s why we were so surprised when the LSTD logo was spotted on a stall in Piccadilly’s food market the other day (yes, we’re nowhere near Manc but our informants are everywhere.) A little research on t’internet reveals that the Deansgate location is going to reopen sometime in early 2006. Good news for all those Castlefield coffee hounds, but not so great for those of us up on the Northern end of town. Guess there’s always Oklahoma?

In a funny little twist of circumstance, Newyorkology reports that the Manchester cafés’ namesake, a funky NYC vintage shop that was featured in Desperately Seeking Susan, is set to close in January after 20 years on the spot.



The landlord has apparently jacked up the rent, and they can’t afford to stay. Leslie Herson, the store’s owner and founder, told local rag The Villager, "New York is losing its individuality because little stores like mine can’t compete.”

Hmmm. That’s something to ponder over your morning lattes, Northern Quarterites.

Dec. 7 issue City Life's last

From the NUJ...

Guardian Media have announced that City Life - Manchester’s entertainment and listing magazine - will publish for the last time on December 7. Thirteen journalists’ and designers’ jobs will go.

The magazine started as a workers’ co-operative in 1983 and was bought by Guardian Media in 1989. The company says that over the last four years it has lost around £1,000 per week. Last year Guardian Media regional made more than £30 million.

"We have to face up to the fact that we are in the advertising business, not the newspaper publishing business, and we have been for the past 20 year."
- Mark Dodson, new chief executive of Guardian Media Regional, at the meeting where he announced 48 job cuts and the closure of City Life.

Wow. One minute you have a magazine, the next you don't. Life's a bitch, eh?

It’s Manchester. Read it. Live it .... Sod it.

I was first tipped off to City Life’s troubles with this email from the NUJ about a week ago (see below post.) I asked around and got the full story. Apparently the suits down at GMG HQ in London had been labouring away, blissfully ignorant of the fact that they owned a magazine in Manchester. But some astute employee finally followed the trail of haemorrhaging cash north to Deansgate. They acted fast – we hear that this next week’s issue may be the last.

Now, The Manchizzle knows some perfectly lovely people who work at Shitty Life, and the thought that these dear folks may soon be out of work is sad indeed. But one has to marvel at the kind of incompetence that could cause a relatively healthy listings magazine to lose readers, advertisers and money, dwindling to a shallow shadow of it’s former self, in a town where it had no competition. That’s right, a virtual monopoly on the listings mag game. Mancunians want a listings magazine. For fuck’s sake, we need to know what’s going on. But most of us had stopped buying City Life, confused or infuriated by the twice-monthly design changes, the schizophrenic editorial direction, the flabby, disengaged writing and rampant advertorials.

The only people left reading city life these days are a flock of 40-something women in Cheshire, the sort who talk too loud and drink too much, buy their pointy stilettos at the Trafford Centre and think true happiness is being on the list at Panacea. A few sad older blokes who think that Manchester’s music scene has been pure rubbish since the heyday of ________( insert choice here, e.g. The Hacienda, Simply Red, The Manic Street Preachers….) And the self-styled “cultural insiders” of Manc, those ego ridden men-in-the-arts, who will now no longer have a willing shill for all of their pet projects.

The magazine is going down because it fell out of touch with the people who made it possible in the first place – Mancs young and old who are creative, funny, self-deprecating, honest, independent, skint, innovative and up for it. Who are hungry for real life, and aren’t interested in reading thinly disguised ad-copy about facial treatments at luxury spas, or the life story of some idiotic quasi-celeb.

It’s sad every time a magazine dies in this day of media conglomeration. But we can console ourselves with the happy realization that we will never have to read another column by Tony Wilson.

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From: NUJManchester Mailed-By: nuj.org.uk

Date: Nov 22, 2005 8:26 AM
Subject: Please save Manchester magazine from closure

City Life - a Manchester entertainment magazine that started life as a workers' co-operative - is in danger of being closed by Guardian Media.

A two-week review of the title's future is underway and the newspaper's staff - many of whom are members of the Nationaul Union of Journalists - are under threat of redundancy.

Please email protests to the chief executive of Guardian Media Regional on mark.dodson@men-news.co.uk - ask this apparantly liberal company to make every effort to save the magazine and the jobs of its workers.

Point out that as much of Manchester's economy is based on the leisure industry it takes particularly bad management to ruin the city's premier listings and entertainment magazine. It is unfair if the journalists - who only earn around £16,000pa - take the blame for this failure.

City Life is such a part of Manchester culture that it was mentioned on last night's Coronation Street!
If you read the Guardian or any of GMG's other products please point out that you expect this company, in particular, to treat its staff and readers with respect.

Please act quickly.
Please copy any protests and send messages of support to to nujmanchester@nuj.org.uk
Please pass this message on to anyone else who will be interested.
Many thanks
Miles Barter
NUJ regional organiser

Manchester: It's not as bad as you think

I was reading the New York Times travel magazine this week, and was happy to see Manchester listed in a little featurette about great gay destinations. But it turned out to be something of a backhanded compliment. The sentence began: "England's northern metropolis isn't as ugly as some may think ..." Good lord.

Moving out

In light of my changed address I've decided to move blogs for a while too.

So while I'm in Vermont, I'm going to be posting to a new sister blog, The Vermizzle

(Yeah, I'm going to work this Snoop Dogg thing way, way past the point where it stops being au courant and just starts to sound lame and dated. But maybe he'll sue me anyway!)

Bye for now.

The Vermizzle?

Due to a completely unforseen chain of events, I find myself here in the land of my birth. It's going to be an extended stay. Seeing as this relocation will definitely limit my ability to provide witty commentary on life in Manchester, my focus will probably shift to providing witty commentary on life in the Green Mountain State. Okay. They're not that different. One's the second city of Britain with a population of two and a half million ... and growing rapidly. It's known for bands, football and textile mills. The other is a mountainous northeastern state with a population of little more than half a million people. It's known for trees, cows and shouty liberals. What could be easier?

It's also home to some fine bloggers and fascinating folks, I discovered today at an event at Johnson State College Vermont's blogosphere is just picking up momentum. The talk focused on bloggers as citizen journalists, but some of the most interesting discussions were about the potential for blogs to provide coverage of local issues and encourage public involvement and debate. This is an angle that generally gets lost in all of the media hype about blogs but it's not lost on the community-minded souls of Vermont, where everyone still votes on school and town budgets once a year at Town Meeting Day.

For a sampling of some of these experiments in community-led blogging, check out the excellent VT blogroll up on Cathy Resmer's 802 blog (affiliated with the Burlington Alt-weekly Seven Days, where she's a staff writer.) Links at the bottom to iPutney,iBurlington and a few others.

Northernquarterland

The Northern Quarter: formerly a down-and-dirty few blocks of Manc blight studded with sex shops, rough pubs and good curries. Now an acceptably edgy playground for creative types with silly haircuts.

About six months ago, the Northern Quarter's growth seemed unstoppable. In the last year or so, new bars have sprung up like psychedelic toadstools after rain ... first the big fat boring lounge Bluu, followed in short order by the more interesting Common, Bay Horse, Rodeo and Odd. On the food front, we got the Northern Quarter Restaurant and Bar, Dr. Livvy's and Soup Kitchen. Plus an anarchist bookstore/cafe, a health food store, not one but two annoyingly expensive fetish trainer shops, a florist, a roots record shop, a trendy hairdresser's and two new vintage clothing stores. I'm sure I'm leaving something out, but, um, sheesh, that's a lot.

But all is not well in Manchester's Greenwich Village. Two of the three-in-a-row clothes stores favoured by trust-fund hipsters on Oldham Street, Arc and Boxfresh, have shut down. However, they're both located in the Smithfield buildings, where Urban Splash's rent hikes have prompted quite a few departures over the last year or two. Perhaps they're only interested in supporting small businesses nearer their massive new chips development in "New Islington" (formerly known to us as Ancoats. Didn't have that aspirational ring to it, so they had to change the name of the neighbourhood. A small detail.)

It'll be interesting to see whether these empty storefronts fill up, and if they do, what kinds of businesses come in. Gentrification anyone?

In the meantime, I'd like to go on record saying that anyone who refers to the Northern Quarter as "The NQ", "The N/4", "The Quarter" or any variation thereof should be taken out behind Afflecks' and pelted with Arcade Fire and Goldfrapp CDs until they whimper.

The honeymoon's over

Have just returned from a week here, where I managed to get far, far away from computer screens and seriousness. Ravello is a heart-stoppingly beautiful place, slightly less touristed out than the rest of the Amalfi coast, which is made up of tiny colorful towns clinging limpet-like to rocky cliffs along the Bay of Naples. I spent a large portion of the trip clinging limpet-like to the Oh Jesus handles on the passenger side of our tiny rented smart car as completely insane Italian drivers bore down on us, refusing to give way, slow down or drive in anything approaching a reasonable manner. And all this on a single-lane cliffside road that was essentially one 30-mile-long hairpin turn. Oy vey.

Before leaving, I consulted the international message boards at Chowhound to ensure that we’d eat well in Italia, and the hounds did not disappoint. We had amazing meals at Lido Azurro on the docks in Amalfi and Acqua Pazza in the appealingly chilled out fishing town of Cetara. We also embarked on a hair-raising drive over the Lattari mountains in search of extra virgin olive oil. We found someone who spoke english in Agarola and followed his directions to the outskirts of Pimonte, where we managed to identify an olive oil producer and blundered our way through a charades-like transaction. And now a massive five liter unlabelled plastic jug of musty green oil squats on our kitchen counter, tasting dark and spicy and about as far from our tesco’s extra virgin as it could be. I see many great salad dressings ahead. For, like, the next three years.

I have been following the news from New Orleans with much sadness and anger. Two of my favorite American columnists, Molly Ivins and Maureen Dowd, have risen to the occasion, writing op-eds infused with righteous wrath and packed with frightening information. Michael Moore has also nailed it with his letter to Bush. There are encouraging signs that the American public is waking up at last. But it’s horribly sad that this had to happen to bring that about.