Latest news with #musicvenue
BBC News
a day ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Plans for Burslem venue in memory of Motorhead's Lemmy Kilmister
A planned concert venue in heavy metal legend Lemmy Kilmister's hometown would help to boost the area's music scene, a local artist has proposal would see the vacant Queen's Theatre in Burslem, Stoke-on-Trent, transformed into an 800-seat venue with a cafe, museum and music those behind the idea is sculptor Andy Edwards, from Newcastle-under-Lyme, who created the statue of the Burslem-born Motorhead Edwards told BBC Radio Stoke the venue, which would be called Kilmister Hall, could help to attract more bands and artists to the city. "We've got a big musical heritage in this city and we used to attract the best bands," he said."That's drifted away and this [new venue] would make a huge difference in getting that back again." The Grade II-listed Queen's Theatre originally closed in 1998 but reopened for occasional events in 2003 before shutting again in neighbours the Lemmy statue on Market Place, which was unveiled on 9 May to mark 10 years since the singer's death from cancer and the 50-year anniversary of Motorhead's to IFK Legacy CIC, which is working on the proposal, plans for the venue were at an early stage and organisers were looking at procuring the building and raising have been held with Stoke-on-Trent City Council, which owns the theatre, and Mr Edwards said they had been "really positive". He said it was important the project was financially viable, adding: "It's not just about wild dreams, it's about making things pay for themselves and not run out of steam."A spokesperson for the city council said there had been "lots of discussions" with interested parties over the future of the Queen's Theatre."While these discussions are in still in the early stages and all options are being explored, it is clear that all interested parties are keen to progress with a project to restore the building, particularly one which will combine a performance space with wider community and educational uses," they added. Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Man runs from Leeds to London to see Sam Fender
There are a number of methods of travelling to a concert, but the chances are, the average music fan hasn't considered an ultra-marathon. That's how Andy Hobson, 34, is planning to reach the London Stadium next Friday. He is running from his hometown of Leeds to London to see Sam Fender in concert. His journey will start outside the Brudenell Social Club on Saturday, and will end on the 6 June in the Olympic Park in east London, where Fender is performing. The 252 mile (407km) journey will be in support of the Music Venue Trust, a charity which acts to protect UK grassroots music venues, and which Andy believes he "owes his life to" during struggles with his mental health. Andy, who works in the emergency services, was not originally planning the marathon fundraiser when he bought tickets to see Fender play in London, as part of his People Watching tour. He said: "I bought the ticket and instantly I thought, I wonder if I can run from Leeds to London?". Andy is using the challenge to raise money for grassroot music venues "to help make a difference to that sector". "I loved going to music venues, especially small independent ones, when I was struggling with my mental health," he said. "On a particular day, when I wasn't feeling too great, I would book a tickets for the most random gig. "I knew I would go into those places and feel a sense of community, so I wanted to create a fundraiser to help make a difference to that sector - which I felt like, at the time I was struggling, I owe my life to it" he said. In addition, Fender is donating £1 from every ticket sale sold for the UK dates to the charity, something which "reinforced" Andy's decision. During the week-long journey, Andy will start and end each leg at a different music venue, including the Leadmill in Sheffield which recently announced it is leaving its current venue. Friends, music and podcasts will power Andy through the challenge, which he plans to break into 10-hour running shifts. He said the financial outlay he has spent on equipment will be another incentive to complete the challenge. "Once I get stuff like the clothing and branding - being a Yorkshire man - it gets me thinking, I have paid for it now - so I have to do the job now. I have got to see it through. "Even in the difficult bits, I will think, I have paid for this top - I have to do it now!" So which Sam Fender songs will provide Andy with inspiration on his journey? "Seventeen Going Under will feel like such a big song. But recently, off his latest album, Nostalgia's Lie has been quite a good song for me. "It feels very relevant to this journey. I'm sort of looking towards my future self, if that makes sense?" Listen to highlights from West Yorkshire on BBC Sounds, catch up with the latest episode of Look North. Why Leeds' independent venues are struggling Indie bar announces closure after 16 years 'I like to think that me running is saving someone's life'
Irish Times
25-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Workman's Club heyday: Where we rubbed shoulders with Paul Mescal, Fontaines DC and Morrissey
For a generation of Dubliners , The Workman's Club on Wellington Quay, which has gone into examinership , was a habitat at some stage. Of course nobody who made it their community hub would have dared say they were doing it purposefully. They weren't 'creating culture'. That would have been too earnest, too self-important. The regulars preferred to feign apathy ironically. But in their Doc Martens and thrifted faux furs, over Zaconey and Cokes and under tarps sagging with Dublin rain, passing bags of Amber Leaf around, they were constructing the DNA of a city's creative generation. It was a space that could be anything. 'I've had sober nights, drunken nights, great gigs, sh**e gigs, kissed princesses, kissed toads, and had a panic attack when my girlfriend dumped me in the smoking area. The Workman's Club was the start of everything,' says Andrew McGurk of the band A Lethal Black Ooze. 'It was home for us. We went, over and over.' Opened in 2010 in the shell of a down-at-heel Liffeyside building, Workman's arrived at a time when other venues had become, in the minds of some, greatest-hits bars masquerading as an alternative stronghold. Gavan O Huanachain, a DJ at the time, recalls, 'The idea behind it was to take on Whelan's.' The founders were people who felt let down by what they saw as other venues' restrictions. So a vagabond team assembled and attempted to fill the perceived vacuum with rough edges and sticky floors. The risk paid off quickly because Workman's won Hot Press's Best Venue award within its first year. READ MORE By 2011, it was flooded nightly by artists, musicians, theatre kids and anyone cosplaying as same. It wasn't designed as a queer space, but it was one in practice. It wasn't marketed as a creative incubator, but it was that too. The smoking area acted like Dublin's creative CERN where people crossed social divides. Here NCAD students flirted with IADT designers, Dramsoc kids argued with Players playwrights. Shamim de Brún Dublin winemaker Killian Horan recalls having great nights with the Trinitones . Theatre house techs met sound engineers. The cultural collisions reverberated far beyond its walls. The Cellar became a refuge for creative experiments. 'It felt like the only place you could try something without having to be polished,' remembers Aiesha Wong, who waitressed there during college. 'The upstairs bar was where I accidentally landed my first modelling gig after chatting to a photographer about his camera. Things like that just … happened.' You could turn a corner and see trained ballerinas doing the worm on a Wednesday night. Plays were conceived in that smoking area. You could see the same people ad nauseam and still find the place unavoidably compelling. Relationships started and ended. Bands were formed. Friendships were forged. It was where actors met musicians, comedians met poets, and everyone knew the bartenders (Christina, Daragh, Karl, Ciarean) and the bouncers (Ivan was one) by name. Blood Red Shoes on stage at The Workman's Club in 2023. Photograph: Kieran Frost/Redferns Everyone was 'a creative'. Everyone was discovering 1980s synth pop for the first time because they were born in the 1990s. Entire Facebook groups were devoted to regulars, like Saul Philbin-Bowman, whose popularity led to the creation of the Facebook group 'Ohmygod you know Saul too'. It became a surprise hit with celebrities of a certain ilk. You would be unlikely to catch Beyoncé, Britney Spears or other mainstream pop stars. But Grace Jones appeared. Jake Gyllenhaal allegedly sipped a Guinness there in 2012, triggering an early viral Twitter storm as punters hurtled down the Liffey quays hoping to spot him. There were sightings of Foals, Franz Ferdinand, Michael Cera, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Alt-J, Miles Kane, Simon Harris, Robert Plant, Happy Mondays and the most millennial star of all time, Harry Potter himself, Daniel Radcliffe. DJ Claire Beck recalled in an interview a few years ago playing an Interpol track one night and being interrupted by drummer Sam Fogarino himself standing in front of her. There was even a bloke from the US version of The Office, and Hank from Breaking Bad. Morrissey created the biggest stir. Everyone had a story to tell about being there when he was, but they were all on different days, and at different times. McGurk recalls, 'Morrissey … who was staying in The Clarence one night, even came to see my band Spies. That was surreal.' [ Morrissey in Dublin review: There's a surprise towards the end of this cathartically cranky gig Opens in new window ] Claiming to have seen Morrissey in the venue back before Workman's was ubiquitous became such a trope it ended up in listicles and spawned memes. Trevor Dietz, formerly The Workman's clubnights manager and its Somewhere? Wednesdays originator told Golden Plec in 2015 that The Smiths frontman had been in on 'four of five occasions', which may explain the confusion. Of course the celebrity sightings added an air of legitimacy to the place but it also built a reputation for being the place to see bands before they were famous. Bastille performed their Dublin debut in Workman's to just 25 people. Aiesha Wong says: 'At the time, it felt like a magnet for Dublin's artsy, alt, 'let's-start-a-band' crowd.' Breakout bands Fontaines DC and The Murder Capital were regulars at Workman's in their early days; both on stage and as fans. In fact, Murder Capital frontman James McGovern reminisced in a Far Out Magazine piece , that 'Workman's is where it all started for us,' describing how in the years before their 2019 debut album the band hung out at Workman's with all their mates in other young bands, 'cutting our teeth'. Journalist Callum MacHattie called it 'the university of indie music for Dublin bands'. [ Grian Chatten of Fontaines DC: 'We were speeding off the edge of a cliff' Opens in new window ] Though Workman's was predominantly a music venue, it didn't limit itself to just one form of art. The vintage room hosted, and hosts still, a wide variety of stand-up comedy, theatre, fundraisers and the occasional open mic night. It hosted a release party for Emilie Pine's seminal book Notes to Self , published by Tramp Press. Poet Emmet O'Brien performed many of his poems now recommended for the Junior Cert syllabus there. Breakout star of comedy Small Town, Big Story, Peter McGann , recalls: 'My big thing with Workman's is when I would do the Pulp Injection radio plays. They'd always be put on on a Monday or a Tuesday, and each one would dissolve into a massive school night session … the whole cast would have pints … bought for us by people who came to the show. We'd be dancing away to the DJ till all hours and then we'd have to crawl out of bed the next day to get to work.' The fashion was a big part of it too. Fedoras were everywhere. As were moustaches and moustache tattoos. There were multiple ironic takes on the 'fur coat, no knickers' look. Former regular, Carly Murphy, says: 'I have a recollection of some fabulous emo-esque ride in a huge brown bear coat at the top of the stairs coming down when I was going up.' It was also messy. Every scene worth mythologising has its narcotic haze. One was either into Zaconey and Coke or Cute Hoor pale ale. Peter McGann had many a night slide into Cute Hoor-fuelled carnage. 'Cute Hoor was like rocket fuel. It was like a pint of Buckfast and cocaine in how it made you carry on.' For nights like that, what mattered wasn't who might be there. It was who was there. Regulars here would go on to write books, star in Love/Hate, the Meteor ad, prestige TV, or become Paul Mescal . Others would also go on to be teachers, nurses, gardaí, journalists, doctors, engineers. Many, however, forged careers in the creative industry, in part thanks to connections made at Workman's. Now, as it slips into examinership in an attempt to save itself, will the generation that built it up let it go? Will they return in their droves to indulge the nostalgia of their misbegotten youth? Or will other upstarts come along and create a new space for the next generation of creatives to call home?
Washington Post
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Washington Post
After Biden's diagnosis, Jake Tapper's book tour is business as usual
'You guys want me to sing, right?' quipped CNN's Jake Tapper, as he and his co-author Alex Thompson, of Axios, settled into their seats onstage. It was an unusually rock-and-roll setting for a book talk: 9:30 Club is one of Washington's most storied music halls, with a capacity of 1,200 standing. (This event was seated; as of that morning, Politics and Prose Bookstore had sold a little over 300 tickets, priced at $45.30 each — hardcover not included.) The previous night, the club had hosted a singer-songwriter lab-engineered for Spotify's coffeehouse playlists; the next night, the rows of folding chairs would make way for a sapphic dance party, benefiting a reproductive access fund. All three of the venue's bars were open on this Thursday evening, requiring the P&P crowd — silvering, affluent, graciously suppressing irritation — to be carded at the door.
BBC News
19-05-2025
- BBC News
Three arrested after Shrewsbury town centre stabbing
Three people, a woman and two men, have been arrested in connection with a stabbing outside a music Mercia Police also said the 34-year-old victim of the attack had been discharged from hospital and his injuries were not as serious as initially attack took place as he left Albert Shed in Shrewsbury at about 04:20 on Sunday and the woman, who is 20, and the men, aged 20 and 25, were all arrested later that day on suspicion of causing grievous bodily three are currently on police bail as inquiries continue. Follow BBC Shropshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
