Louder Than Words 2023

INNSiDE

This years Louder Than Words festival comes - as usual - at a busy time of year, November being peak touring season for a lot of bands. I should have been reviewing a gig on the Thursday night prior to the festival, only an horrific RTA that closed a section of the A6 for 8 hours knocked it on the head for me, which is perhaps just as well given how tired I was by the end of Sunday...

I missed day one (Friday) because by the time I'd calculated that I could afford a weekend pass this year, they had all sold out. Rather than pay extra for three separate day passes, I paid for a Saturday pass and a Sunday pass, which worked out as being more or less the same amount of money as I'd been planning to spend on the weekend pass. I don't know if I'd have gone on Friday anyway (especially if I'd been out doing the gig on Thursday) as I wouldn't have been able to get the day off work.

I got up early on Saturday morning to attend Simon Morrisson's annual music journalism panel, which I always find very energising and inspiring. It tends to act as a soothing balm across the previous twelve months (or, given I last went to the full festival in 2019, four years...) of indifference and rejection. 

Simon was joined this year by a third year music journalism student from the BA Music Journalism course at the University of Chester, plus journalist Lisa Torem, Andrew from Silent Radio, and Simon's photographer Rachel. I found it particularly interesting this year because when they talked about the health of music journalism they felt it was in a good place at the moment, mainly because of the upsurge in small web based and print start ups, and a fanzine revival and re-emergence. I suspect that the fanzine revival is happening for similar reasons to the vinyl revival: People miss having something they can hold in their hands. Somebody asked a very perceptive question about how to deal with writers block or lack of confidence in writing. There was another good question about writing and mental health, which shone a light on the limits placed on journalism during lockdowns but also the freeing and helpful nature of writing during the same period: Training students in how to review a gig was hard when there were no new gigs on, but lockdown also gave people time and space to write about music, just not live music.

I left INNSiDE after the music journalism panel in order to head back home and do the remainder of the weekly food shop at the greengrocers. Which was one of those things that seemed like a good idea at the time, but which felt less great when I was striding back down Whitworth Street for the second time that day. I'd optimistically hoped to be able to get back in time for the Black Female Voices in Music panel at 2:15pm, but it didn't work out. I did get to sample my first ever Spanish Pink Kiwi Fruit, but I also missed the Moss Side legend that is Cleopatra Higgins, and the former does not adequately compensate for the latter.

I got back into Louder Than Words just as the Black Female Voices in Music panel were emerging from their meeting room. It looked like it had been very well attended and, judging from all the excited and animated faces, very well received by an almost entirely female crowd. There was one woman who a lot of people were speaking to after, and she was being very generous with her time, and very articulate and gracious with all of them. She had a very tangible aura of charisma about her and I suspected that this was Cleopatra Higgins. A quick google has confirmed that I was right. 

I got in relatively early for Paul Hanley's chat with John Robb about his new book, Sixteen Again: How Pete Shelley and Buzzcocks Changed Manchester Music, which is due to be published very soon by Route. I wanted to see this one because I can remember going to see his earlier Louder Than War appearance when his Fall book, The Big Midweek, was out, and finding him a particularly fine and funny raconteur in the dry Mancunian sense. He was on fine form on Saturday and the room was absolutely rammed. They talked about the Pistols and the Lesser Free Trade Hall gigs, Magazine, and other Buzzcocks related side topics and I was pleased that Hanley talked about Pete Shelley's sexuality, and his matter of fact what-you-see-is-what-you-get approach to it. They also talked about a question that seemed very pertinent, given the massive slew of punk books there are out there, namely: Why, when there are so many books about The Clash and the Sex Pistols, have there only been "Two and a half" books about Buzzcocks? The point was made that Buzzcocks perhaps were not a band given to self-mythologising, that they weren't steering the narrative as they went along (unlike some of their contemporaries...) and were actually quite self-depreciating, which I think is true. I think it's also part of why so many female punks were written out of musical and cultural history, although there's other reasons in both cases.

Ahead of my next event, I spent a sizeable chunk of time lurking in an alcove, essentially penned in by the long queue of people waiting to get into the Will Sergeant event next door in the big room. I think I spent about 50% of the time vaguely wondering who Will Sergeant was* and the other 50% with the Louder Than Words volunteers who were valiantly trying to keep the door in the alcove propped open so that it didn't lock them out by closing. We talked a lot about the value of a good, sturdy wooden doorstop.

The event I was waiting for was this years dance music panel, chaired by Simon Morrison. There was a difference this year though: The first half hour was a whistle stop tour of the history of nightclubs in the UK, courtesy of Simon and an historian from MMU, Dr Katie Milestone. They have collaborated on the book Transatlantic Drift: The Ebb and Flow of Global Dance Culture, which begins with WWII and goes up to the Millennium. There were also contributions from a very maverick former DJ turned artist, Trafford Lovething, who was wearing a magnificent hat and stripy jumper. Then there was Simon's photographer Rachel and Kirk Field, who was responsible for Side B of the event. 

Side B was a truncated version of the live show he's doing to promote his memoir, Rave New World: Confessions of a Raving Reporter, about his own involvement with acid house and rave culture, though it does include other stuff too. He first got involved with acid house and illegal raves via helping out with a friend's mobile bar business while sofa surfing in the mid 80s. They ended up taking a booking for an illegal rave, and the rest is history. The show included a great interactive missing words round, using the Have I Got News For You format, but with outrageous lies from some of The Sun's most breathless acid house moral panic reporting. There was also a very on the nose, very funny, and bloody catchy song called "Sardines in Pasha" about going to Ibiza and finding it's not all it's cracked up to be now it's become a brand rather than an idyll.

The final event of the night was the one that swung it for me when deciding to book tickets this year: Pauline Murray in conversation with Russ Bestley about her memoir Life's A Gamble.

I have a lot of time for Pauline Murray, and not just because she is one of the interviewees for my women and punk book. I always knew when I interviewed her that her story was both largely untold and also, vitally, needed to be told. And I'm very pleased that she's written it herself. 

She was immaculately dressed, as always, in black and shocking pink and while I could tell that she was very nervous, I think she became less nervous as she went along, and she and Russ were able to cover the span and themes of the book. I queued up with the people wanting their books signed at the end so that I could tell her how much I'd enjoyed reading it.

Afterwards it was time to head for home and I had to navigate the Saturday night bacchanalia's outside the Ritz and Gorilla and assorted bars and clubs further down Whitworth Street. The 192 was quiet, despite it being rammed, and seemed to be mainly full of twentysomethings heading for home. Later I became aware of someone playing some ululating diva on what sounded like a loop. Which wasn't unpleasant, but did feel a bit surreal. 

Current bedtime reading

While I was outside the launderette with my headphones in on Sunday morning, waiting for my wash to finish, I heard what sounded like a siren going off and saw a man pushing a double buggy hove into view. The siren sound was coming from a baby in one side of the buggy, and the other side of the buggy was occupied by a toddler with its hands clamped firmly over its ears, wearing an expression that could only be described as resignation on its face. 

As usual, I got caught up in the Remembrance Day ceremony at the war memorial on the way home, but I don't think it would have made much difference if I hadn't stopped for it. I knew I was going to be late for the John Robb event, The Art of Darkness, because I only left the flat (post launderette and war memorial) just under half an hour before it was due to start. Still, it seemed worth trying to get in for at least some of it. 

I made it to INNSiDE in time to catch about half of John Robb's talk, and what I heard sounded interesting. I came in (to a very full room - I had to stand in the corner at the back) to him talking about the long influence of The Doors on what would become the goth bands. It hadn't occurred to me that 'The End' being used at the end of Apocalypse Now would be so crucial, what with it being released in 1979 and everything.

Unfortunately for me, I came into the event more or less straight from the rain outside, stopping only to get my wristband for the day and to have a chat with the LTW volunteer about Penetration. This meant I walked into what turned out to be a very warm as well as very full room, meaning I spent the remainder of the talk sweltering like an arctic explorer in a sauna as whenever I tried to take my waterproof off it sounded like I was shaking out a tarpaulin. I managed to get my arms out during the talk, then used the brief lull in-between the end of the talk and the first question of the Q&A to pull off my waterproof at speed, then get my coat, scarf and cardigan off, by which point I was absolutely dripping. And not from the rain.

I also made the mistake of particpating in the Q&A by asking if John Robb was aware of there being a Yorkshire version of 'Bela Lugosi's Dead'** or was it an urban myth? Which I think slightly poleaxed him. At the end, a couple came over to me as I was trying to pack my waterproof away and told me that, while they weren't aware of the Yorkshire version, Bill Bailey has covered the song, and I have decided that I must hear this. We talked a bit about humour in the goth scene after that, and then I elected to go and have a look at the chapter list in the John Robb goth book to see who/what was in it. I essentially gave in at this point when it came to Not Buying Any Books This Weekend, and purchased it, setting in progress a train of events that would see me return home with a big bag of five books. 

After getting John Robb to sign it, I went back to the Sonicbond Publishing stall and purchased a track by track guide to Laura Nyro, as I could do with an album by album breakdown of her work, plus they're actively seeking new writers to write books for the series. I don't know if it would work for me as a style of writing, but it might be worth exploring.

I elected to skip the 2pm/2:15pm events as I wasn't 100% sure which one I wanted to go to, plus I was hungry and wanted to get some food. It was still leathering it down outside so I went to the bar downstairs at INNSiDE and ordered a mozzarella, heritage tomato and basil pesto pannini with chips and a bottle of water. While I was waiting, I had a look at my books and tried not to think about how I was going to get them down Whitworth Street and Fairfield Street and onto the 192 and home without a bag.

Booksbooksbooksbooks...

I was a bit carb coma'd after that, so I took my time going back upstairs as the next lot of events weren't until 4pm. I spent my time milling about the book stalls, waiting for the bloke on the Blackwell's store to come back (he was on his own and was perfectly entitled to take a break and go and see some of the events, and it's not even like I was in a rush) so I could buy Brave New Rave and the Scottish post punk book. I also got talking to the people who run Route publishing, and we talked about punk and punk books a lot, also women and punk books. They encouraged me to pitch my punk women book to them in the moment, but I think I did it really badly. Route were actually one of the publishers I wanted to pitch it to when I first started looking at publishers, only I wasn't sure in the end if they'd be interested as it looked as though they were more focused on memoir rather than what, I suppose, would be considered extended music journalism or cultural criticism.

Not too long after that it was time for So It Started There, which was Nick Banks from Pulp in conversation with Gareth Bird. This was a very fun event as both men turned out to be natural raconteurs, at ease with themselves and each other. There was, of course, discussion of the infamous Brit Awards/Michael Jackson incident, including the previously unknown role of David Bowie in getting Jarvis off the hook with the police.

I was sat next to two really nice women for this one who, while appalled that I didn't know who Will Sergeant was, were friendly. They asked me who else I'd seen as they'd been hoping to get tickets for the Will Sergeant event but had been disappointed and were going to try for Glen Matlock later on the off chance that tickets would still be available. 

They were two of a number of people over the weekend that I had conversations with about Penetration, as a number of people came up to me on Saturday and Sunday after hearing me ask Pauline Murray a question about Penetration's use of E.M Forster's The Machine Stops at the beginning of 2015's Resolution album, and about dystopian themes in their work more generally: I wasn't trying to be be clever in asking it, I just remembered that we had talked about it when I interviewed her in early 2016 and we'd had a really nice, interesting conversation about it. I thought she might enjoy talking about it again, which she did, and people seemed to have picked up on it, causing me to get noticed and for people to start conversations with me as a result. Which was nice.

I also had a really great conversation with someone about goth as well, just prior to this event.

The final event of the night, by which time I was definitely flagging, was Glen Matlock, talking to John Robb about his book Triggers. He'd originally been down to do Saturday night, but had a gig in Sicely, so they moved it to Sunday and he flew back especially to do Louder Than Words. 

Triggers is themed around pivotal songs in his life, as he did his first memoir - I Was A Teenage Sex Pistol - 25 years ago. He and John Robb talked about formative songs, including by the Kinks, Alex Harvey, Ian Dury, and Abba ('SOS' helped to inspire a riff in a Sex Pistols song, I think it was 'Pretty Vacant') and Matlock talked about what those songs had meant to him at particular times. I think the whole talk gave a good overview of his musical trajectory, from the Pistols to the Rich Kids and beyond. He still does his own stuff, but he's in demand as a bassist and sometimes guitarist, often at short notice. 

Because he was slightly late (by about 10 minutes - which isn't at all bad, all things considered) he was pre-ceded by a 15 year old neo soul singer, Lily Blossom, who performed at one of the smaller events on Saturday and was so good they decided to offer her the chance to perform to a larger audience, ie a room full of people waiting for Glen Matlock. She performed a piano led track that may have been one of her own or just a song I didn't know, and a cover of the Amy Winehouse version of 'Valerie'. I liked the first song better of the two, as I think she got to show off her voice more with it, but she did a good job. As Jill Adam said, it's not everyone who can say that they opened for the Sex Pistols. Or a Sex Pistol as it was in this case.

It had stopped raining by the time I left, and I got a bus quite quickly. The journey was uneventful save for some loud periodic bursts of what might have been desi trap from the back seats, which in turn may have been a desperate attempt to drown out an excruciatingly boring mobile phone conversation that was going on in the seat in front of mine about computer game specs. 

My last thoughts as I switched off the light on Sunday were "Oh God I have to invigilate the third GCSE Maths paper in the morning" followed by "It could be worse - at least I'm not the one taking it."

* I now realise that he was in Echo & The Bunnymen, and that my ignorance in this area (I also didn't appreciate until the bloke from OMD was at Louder Than Words a few years ago just how big that band had actually been..) basically means I have an early 80s Liverpool bands blind spot which I could probably do with sorting out. 

** Sample lyrics: The flat cap's on, the whippet's fed.