Being a point of gathering, for the diverse and cunning folk of the city of Manchester, with particular attention paid to art, music, culture and the esoteric. Often associates of that place of exceeding divilry, THE PEER HAT.
The time between entries has increased. I've made sure to be out everyday, to feel the wind on my face and to explore this weird region of ours in as much detail as I can, peeling back something satisfying and forbidden, committing it to my memory for reasons as yet uncertain. Still, everything is delicious, by which, I mean the experience of the common place. Wandering the back ways of our city feels positively Joycean: it is an urban labyrinth, abundant, alive, filth encrusted, beautiful. That many are now even more woefully disconnected from the wormy, dead bird and pebble sod, is a side effect of the death grip this virus, or rather the idea of this virus (far more powerful) has had on the West. Out there, on the abstract, broken planes, where briefly bird song roared louder than the voice of human industry, there lies the key towards a fuller, more satisfying, more urgently alive reality.
Above is Debdale Park, which I find myself passing through most days. I have met a wonderful man who plays the saxophone and another fellow who hangs books upon lines, for people to buy for any sum they choose. They huddle close, creating a kind of forlorn, yet enchanted fairground overlooking Gorton Lower Reservoir. I purchased a book about the Lake District. Either way, both men have an ebullience that is hard to ignore...these are connections formed out of the atmosphere of alienation and the whiplash response by many, myself included, to make new and sudden friendships at any cost. Find the others, find the others.
I don't want to waste too much of your time with this entry. I was going to post a few more photos of my journeys, but honestly, the above will do, the grey skies of July swollen with sorrows yet to be unleashed. But we will find a way, as a community (our mantra). There's no other choice.
As they say in Hookland, Re-Enchantment Is Resistance.
So When Is The Peer Hat Opening, You Wandering Fool?
The success of the crowdfunder, meant that we didn't have to take the frankly appalling risk of opening through the grimness of July. We considered the possibility, but we chose to wait for a variety of reasons, rational and instinctual. You can ask us all about them when we re-open, which will be, at the latest SEPTEMBER 4TH. August looks pretty empty gig wise, and since the live music ban is lifting at the beginning of the month and our raison d'etre starts and ends with that, AND Abatoir Blues are running a gig on the 4th, it seemed like a good fit. We might yet open earlier, but September 4th seems realistic. We can't help but notice the virus spikes and such taking place around Europe, but, with our eyes fixed firmly on a terrain view of health, we will set our sails to weather the storm. The space weather suggests a peak around December for viral troubles, so buckle in. We may be relying on the baldly abstract ways, in which the upper elites of Britain seem to be given, when it comes to regarding the welfare, of the greater section of the population. EDIT 03/08/2020 (Yep, I was right about that...where do we go from here? It's an endurance race my friends.)
Our prepared and measured response, would not have been possible without your help.
Oh yes, there was this also: a little interview we did with the Manchester Evening News:
It was interesting to pour out my thoughts and I have to say, I think our concerns were fairly well represented here. So that was a relief.
What About Our Damn T-Shirts?
Bear with us, or email me and I'll arrange a grab session. We've had so many things to do to get the place compliant with guidelines..they're all there and will come your way soon. So yeah, if you want, email me on nick@thepeerhat.com and I'll sort you out personally (if you need that shirt now motherfucker....and you have every right).
(MORE TIME PASSES)
And Now It Is Lamas And We Don't Know Again
Following the commencement of this post, it was revealed to the people, that we would no longer be permitted to see one another indoors...except it seems, in places like the Peer Hat, so long as we prevent the members of different households from meeting. How this is accomplished, is of course, left to the imagination of the proprietor. It's something that is essentially unenforceable and I personally believe, will lead to a more fulsome lockdown scenario. How to contain despair. How to give a voice to the gasping, dry choke of plans dashed and unheard? We at The Peer Hat, can say to you: "Yes, we will open on September 4th" but of course that is now within the lap of the stars. And the Stars Are Not Yet Right. We can only wait and see. Still, the words churn and boil forth and the hot taste of anger and hurt at those closest and dearest to us, continues to rise and do it's damage, to wound and slow. We must reconcile between ourselves, recognise that we are legitimate human beings with legitimate fears, reasoning and intuition, that can only serve us as we allow. We must forgive. We must be compassionate. If our communities fail because we cannot show contrition, and show mercy in return...if we gloat at the failings and weakness of others...
What would be the point of The Peer Hat? Who would wish to go there, but enemies from a fallen reality?
Lamas
Lugh's face is as bright as the sun. He is mostly forgotten now, only whispered of during The Wakes...but deep within the mythosphere, he strides still, a hero beyond measure, forever the plaything of the Goddess. But a hero he remains and if we look deep within and catch a glimpse of that shining countenance, we might recognise it as our own and move forth---towards and through--- the invincible shadow.
The Second Peer Hat Album
We've been a little delayed with this as you might imagine, but we have all the tracks now and think it will be a real treat for the ears. It's a little longer in running time than the previous offering, but no less enticing, representing those that camp within our walls for a little time and then moving on. We are at a pivotal point in history. Dead Machine versus the awe and horror of a reality that is whole. Do we want musicians and artists passing through our lives and sharing of themselves? If so, we must ask what we are prepared to sacrifice. If not, then we must make peace with a new world, one where the only musicians are in your bedroom and in the history books.
We have no way of making that choice for you.
Streaming & Such
It's funding season and we need grants to remain viable. This means that we have to invest in streaming as a priority. Whatever your opinion of streamed gigs as a viable way of experiencing the magnificent, awe inspiring power of live music....that is the reality of our situation. Prepare for that and think about how we can make it more palatable. Please feel free to mail on nick@thepeerhat.com with any ideas you might have.
Not many people read this blog. A lot less than enjoy The Peer Hat. But you do and we care about your opinions.
Let's See What's Happening, As A Friend Of Mine Used To Say...
Ian is back...I want to thank him for being such a warm and caring person. His perspective has been invaluable. In the meantime, check out these.two linked episodes of Ian's digital memoir...
Johnny Dreamguns is also back...the mercurial one has a track entitled Washed Up At The Shore for you to drown in and upon. The lo-fi nature of these tracks, allied to a wicked sense of humour, belies a certain (and somewhat surprising) streak of pain and darkness. Still completely standing on it's own (on the shore, amidst the flotsam and jetsam).
We expect to receive more exciting tidbits as time progresses. I think that the early outpourings of music and art, came from a sense of novelty and from the opening of a weird fleeting portal. Magic came forth and we bathed in it for those few frozen weeks, before the caustic light of our current reality reasserted itself (with added awfulness). Confusion and chaos rule. But we were always that.
Enough time has passed since our last blog, to bury an entire cemetery of unrecorded events. I can wander around, lost in the mists of this graveyard, stumbling at each mound in turn, furrowing my brow in an effort to decipher the scratchings upon the headstones. Sometimes there are words and names that I can almost elucidate, but those triggered thoughts remain suspended amidst the dust of memory, ultimately pristine, never to be disturbed.
Since the last paragraph, I've spent about 35 minutes hunting for an email somebody sent me about something, which I felt would be absolutely ideal for a blog post. Naturally and in the theme of this entry, I AM COMPLETELY UNABLE TO REMEMBER ANYTHING ABOUT IT. I clumsily hit caps there, but as Bob Ross said "there are no mistakes here, only happy accidents".
Yes, the space between the headstones really is at a premium.
What a labyrinth life has become, negotiating a very real if non-physical maze. I'd go into that analogy more, but I used it several blog entries prior. It seems as if being uncertain about things that happen, has become a luxury. Critical thinking? WE DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THAT. No, we have instead a digital chorus and an increasing demand for a kind of theological orthodoxy. The Peer Hat is a place where we can express ourselves and be whomever we desire, without fear of our best intentions being weaponised and utilised for nefarious purposes. This is the great issue of our holographic moment and why it's difficult to voice opinions on corporate platforms that are explicitly being used against us, in open, with apathetic consent. Here's what we will say, quoting the great Argentinean writer, Jorge Luis Borges:
"In Paradise [he discovered] that in the eyes of the unfathomable deity...the orthodox and the heretic, the abominator and the abominated, the accuser and the victim...were a single person"'
Enough for thee? Quite enough. We feel that it's important to say this much also: if you actually have the power to make a difference in this indescribably cruel and unfair world--- and intend to do so, shut the fuck up and get on with it. These are heavy, dangerous times. Or at least it feels that way. Let's make certain that our actions speak for themselves.
Yes a heavy time.We at The Peer Hat have been devoting man hours to the survival of our temple to inclusion, proposing ideas, rejecting ideas....some seeing the light, others regrettably banished to the cutting room floor. At times it feels futile...are we battling the shift towards a new social order? One in which people don't go out, don't go to music venues? Are we representatives of an old order that spells death for the immuno-compromised? These are questions we will be forced to ask over and over, as will you, our dear friends, family, fans, customers and artists. We gain nothing by nailing our colours to the mast, as I hope I have already demonstrated. But whatever the motive, an attack has been made on every single bulwark of life---friendship, family, sex, mourning and celebration. We here hope to offer a taste of honey. We built ourselves on a foundation of community. Thus we wait. And our survival depends upon that community valuing the idea of itself and of freedom, more than it values the safety offered in isolation.
We cannot make that decision for you, but we will be waiting. Our decision in that respect is made.
On the side of the less dramatic, there are some potential avenues of light which may yet make the notion of spending time with us, something less than a game of psychic Russian Roulette.
In the first place, the recent spate of government relaxations, has made opening up on July 4th, a legal possibility. The light here, is that this represents something akin to a swift step towards the usual menu of social pleasures. The downsides are, unfortunately, considerable. Table service, no live music, no dancing---apart from loyalty to the idea of The Peer Hat, what joy would there be to glean from such a scenario? It's close to the equivalent of sneaking a can of Special Brew into the doctor's waiting room. Staggered closing (imagine calling a competing bar and asking them to shut 15 minutes before yourself), slot booking (table B , come in, your time is up) and potential data collection exercises, further write home that this current Wetherspoon's friendly, great re-opening, is a smoke screen behind which venues like ours, cannot function and cannot be seen.
Secondly, plans are afoot to pedestrianise Stevenson Square and surrounding streets. Hurray for the Save Our Summer Six (sorry, who?)! We can envisage a fairly interesting scenario that sees people enjoying the famous Mancunian outdoors, mingling (at a distance!!!!!!)....perhaps even a near festival vibe. The downsides, are threefold. Firstly, this looks set to happen in perhaps 3 months time..making this something of an Autumn of Love. Secondly, the large numbers might give cause for the authorities to blanch and shut the whole thing down in a welter of panic. Thirdly, the Great British Weather might have it's own ideas.
Indeed, it is raining as I write. Having just endured four days of increasingly Mediterranean heat, I must say I'm quite glad of the thunder---right here and now, within this instance. Such squalls might spell disaster for any outdoor schemes, but here, this second, I am at peace. It is becoming increasingly useful to locate ourselves in moments--- the greater the fear and uncertainty becomes. Though there is a sense of cessation elsewhere (if not perhaps a firm conviction that the barbarians are not at the gate), for those within the music industry, times are reaching a bleak nadir. Quietly, we face a great vanishing, independent venues and independent artists alike...
What will culture look like a year from now?
How many venues will be standing?
Could we take the pressure of change?
What will our mental health look like?
What about those left behind? Those in the grip of fear? Those that are ill?
Can we come to terms with our mortality?
Can we come to terms with our immortality?
What form does rebellion take when oppression is consensus?
On each of the fronts mentioned previous (friendship, family, sex, mourning, celebration), we are forced to find ways of creative expression that circumvent the presented difficulties. Art is our ally. As is the landscape, if we inhabit it fully. As Conner Habib wrote, it's both possible to be highly suspicious of the authoritarian measures which have shut down our lives AND conscientious regarding the health risks. The two are not mutually exclusive and sadly, this is a failing we see over and again---and not just regarding the virus, but repeatedly in life. Nuance is everything---without it, there would be no life worth living and to ignore it, is to negate life itself.
I've spoken before about the artist approaching the moment when they transcend the music industry, the silly parade of radio voices and radio heads, the pennies for streaming, embarrassing PR photographs, pay to play, shovel-ware and the culture wars of youth, relevance and fashion. I thought it would happen slowly, a transition to localism happening a step at a time. But it seems the change has been forced upon us. The artist, the poet and the musician, have been placed in a state of, paradoxically, hyper relevance. Denied the usual means of expression, we look anew, find them wanting and arrive at a fresh vision of the future..
What does a music venue look like when it's community has been forced to split, when it's raison d'etre seems to have evaporated? Separated, flashing signals at one another, dare I say, "touching from a distance"? Might it starts to resemble a model of the human brain? Or the universe itself? Connections firing between it's members in ways that might even be considered on the quantum scale? Our thoughts, feelings, ideas and actions entangled? You think perhaps love is not a force as strong as gravity? Only one that works within the blinding glare of consciousness , equivalent maybe to the beginning of all creation? Forced ever smaller, we can say (to roughly quote Pete Carroll) , that whilst miracles are very rare on the macro scale, on the Planck scale, they're surprisingly common...
In scaling down and discovering why we're doing this at all, we find the hidden connections and indeed, the hidden miracles.
With that said let's talk about the crowd-funder...
HOW DOES 102% SOUND? LIKE SOMETHING ALAN SHEARER WOULD SAY? WELL LOOK BENEATH!
YOU DID THIS AND YES, IT IS ACCOMPLISHED...WHATEVER HAPPENS NEXT, THIS WAS DONE AND REPEATEDLY I FIND MYSELF WRITING IN CAPS AND SAYING "WE DON'T KNOW WHAT TO SAY, EXCEPT THANK YOU".
To write yet another weeping note of gratitude, would be doing you all a disservice. If there is anything of our musical culture remaining after all this, the results of your charity and fondness for The Peer Hat, means it has a far better chance of being a part of what is to come. Either way, you will figure out a way through this. I've said this repeatedly...whatever one calls it...and right now it's called The Peer Hat, Manchester needs a place like this. We won't be kept down.
THERE'S MORE TO BE SAID...LET'S TALK ABOUT BLACK STAGE, THE PEER HAT COMPILATION ALBUM!
As the crowd-funder has drawn to it's triumphant conclusion, we've searched for another means of bringing home much needed revenue. Finally, we've settled upon a musical release. There will be two Peer Hat compilation albums called Black Stage, one featuring largely local artists and the other, featuring the work of touring musicians who have stopped by to perform with us. The first album will be released on....the 3rd of July. We're thinking £12 is an adequate sum, since we don't want to devalue the amazing contributions of the artists involved. The second album will be released hopefully in mid to late July... we're still collecting a few remaining submissions.
ALL OF THE ARTISTS INVOLVED, DONATED A SONG OR PIECE OF MUSIC, FOR FREE, FROM THE FONT OF THEIR OWN GENEROSITY. WHENEVER YOU SEE THEIR NAMES IN THE FUTURE, SUPPORT THEM, SEE THEIR GIGS, HELP THEM KEEP GOING!
I'll post the track list before Friday to whip up some vibrations.
To finish we want to cast your minds back to November.
Wandering Mexican spirit music duo, Ritual Maya, took residence in our venue for a couple of weeks. I'm sure many of you recall their presence, there was a palpable sense of magic that trailed in their wake, seeming refugees from another time and place, caught adrift on the flow, to find themselves within our most humble venue.
The mystic vibrations were soon to intensify. Who else but Akin could somehow raise the magic to even greater levels? This video is absolutely mesmerising, capturing the act of creation happening in two forms simultaneously. Although the art produced is of course beautiful, the value in this film, is in seeing how there is very little difference between the medium and the message. Something to bear in mind as we plough on through these darkest of days.
A couple of weeks back now, Julie Campbell AKA Lonelady, sent me a request to delve once again beneath the trembling surface skin of Mancunian unconscious memory. Scrub Transmissions, essentially amounts to a treasure hunt: in this case, the treasure to be found, is a Lonelady poem & song, playing on a permanent loop (or for at least as long as the battery on the MP3 player endures). Embedded into concrete, only a discreet input jack showing itself, this is a what I might describe as a camouflaged dissidence, a paradoxical means of promotion, since all onus is upon the listener to seek and find the sound thus hidden. I wrote about her last ScrubTransmission here. Allow me to quote myself:
"....The re-assertion of magic came with [Manchester's] death as an industrial force. Suddenly...not a factory any longer..[but] a graveyard...a peculiarly angular Pere La Chaise. And more (or less)...it became a ruin....the importance of the ruin on the British psyche cannot be under-estimated...the Romantics clashed against the arrival of the modern, by venerating the ruin. A ruin invites the Wild Adversary back to the table...negotiation is now taking place between the urban and the rural..and consequently, the human and the non-human (in terms on consciousness, in terms of agency). Here we can venture and linger. Here, the danger is older and purer...but it is a place of communion. Lonelady expressed this comunion by cementing her art into the landscape. This, the very definition of intrinsic meaning...where there is nothing, one creates. And yet, as I re-traced Julie's footsteps, I became yet more convinced, that there was an extrinsic meaning here...and that solitary, now dead transmission, represented the terms of dialogue with an environment, that was at once newly born, and threatened with inevitable extinction."
If you've been following this blog, some of this will already be striking notes of familiarity. My feelings on the matter remain unchanged. Julie is not fond of the term 'psycho-geography', used as a lazy shorthand by journalists attempting to grab and tame her muse. Yet, the impact upon my own consciousness, ushered by this hyper weird plague walk, cannot be over-emphasised. I feel perhaps even more radically inclined to place my cards upon the table and say that----yes, there is an entire ecology of information happening between our perceptions and apparently non living objects, things, places and ideas. Like as to the wind that sways the grasses on the wasteland, the throb between the bodies upon the dance floor or the courage of the poet to mythologise their place, bearing out a love that, quite frankly, might be described by those from fairer climes, as positively deluded.
At any rate, I'm waxing right up my own arse. The Peer Hat asked for people to send us whatever they were doing during their period of isolation. So of course, I leapt at the chance to get some words down for the blog. And sure enough they came, or at least I assume they are about to come...(EDITORS NOTE: they came)
Here were my instructions. Reasonably simple, but since I began my journey in Audenshaw (which, in a synchronistic aside, is from whence Julie hails), I had at least 4 good miles to cover. I resolved to make those miles as revealing as possible and representative, not just of my experience, or even of Julie's intent as an artist, but of the shades that have passed, akin to holograms through and over this land. Furthermore, to capture a sense of belonging that would not feel out of place within the walls of The Peer Hat as it is now, a dream. Hopefully there is something of the universal in this transcript.
Delta Hill
Steps to the top of Delta Hill. You can see a remarkable amount of Pennine beauty from up here
As a child, Delta Hill was something like notorious. Nearby, what was known as the Paddy Walk, passing by a coal yard and some allotments. Those allotments are the source of a hazy summer memory, spent with my friend Ben, somebody whom I have since lost touch with. But that coal yard was thought to be the haunt of an evil killer, Jimmy Greenteeth. I have memories of something like a nightmare, (or was it the tale told to me by another childhood friend?)...being pursued by the malevolent Greenteeth, frenzied, door to door. Interestingly, I later became aware of a Tameside faerie by the name of Nan Greenteeth, a kind of bog or pond spirit, naturally fond of the taste of child flesh. Could there have been a connection? Delta Hill itself, I convinced myself was sometimes in alignment with Delta Cephei and that the vague, almost certainly artificial mound, was in fact an ancient hillock, sacred to the early Britons. Regardless, beyond the mirage of childhood convictions, I have never been able to find a satisfactory reason for it's existence.
The Paddy Walk. I didn't name it.
A den of sorts.
Door to childhood.
Red Hall Chapel
A little further along the route and I'm forced to trade the intriguing back-ways of Audenshaw for the dull, vaguely pleasing sameness of Audenshaw road. There's still a long way to tread.
Orange Country Encounter
What grieving there must have been when the Chapel was drowned beneath the reservoir, lamentations for an age in passing. Were there graves beneath the calm, cold surface? Were there places that people loved? Places once thought of as valuable, something to be fought over? When the chapel, built in 1783 was demolished, Audenshaw was thought of as a pleasant rural hamlet... but it would soon be changed forever by sweeping industrialisation. Pseudo-Tectonic transformations, saw the place rise a little, before stumbling into the decrepitude of British ignominy. More history, a little further below now:
"Red Hall and the Red Hall Methodist Chapel were among those buildings drowned by the reservoirs. Red Hall was built in 1672. The estate, which included a large part of the hamlet of Audenshaw, had been given to Captain Ralph Stopford, a captain in Cromwell's army, by Cromwell himself. The Hall passed into the Hobson family. Edward Hobson started a day school in 1740 and, until recently, his charities were used for educational purposes. After his death in 1764, Red Hall passed into the possession of Robert Thornley who built a small factory on the side for furriers and skin dressers. The Thornley brothers were strongly interested in the Methodist revival, and were involved in the building of Red Hall Chapel which was opened on April 21, 1783, near the Hall. It was part of the Stockport Weslyan Circuit, and on April 6, 1786, John Wesley took services at Red Hall when he was 83."
So this place had born witness to Wesley's preaching, now calmly drowned. Lest it be forgotten, Wesley made a journey to the Americas in an effort to convert the 'poor savages' that were native to the place. However:
'It was on the voyage to the colonies that the Wesleys first came into contact with Moravian settlers. Wesley was influenced by their deep faith and spirituality rooted in pietism. At one point in the voyage a storm came up and broke the mast off the ship. While the English panicked, the Moravians calmly sang hymns and prayed. This experience led Wesley to believe that the Moravians possessed an inner strength which he lacked. The deeply personal religion that the Moravian pietists practised heavily influenced Wesley's theology of Methodism'
Curiously, there exists a Moravian settlement not 10 minutes walk from the Red Hall Stone. It seems that something of Wesley had brushed off on the place...now a vague memory long since banished by the waters I sometimes swam in as a child. I cast myself back to then, imagining the vertiginous years beneath my kicking feet, watched by ghosts that see the sun forever from a distance, a rippling white host.
The Blue Pig, also built in the 1700s. Abandoned since 2013, put to death by the motorway.
Fairfield Train Station
Here comes the train.
I stopped here for a piss and also to mark the boundary, where Audenshaw would give over to a different kind of wasteland. We sat for a while, my partner and I, watching the empty trains rumble past. When I was a child, I imagined there was a mythical Fairfield, that was exactly what it said on the tin. A Summerland of sorts, or a Happy Hunting Ground. Like Flowery Fields two stations away, it was a case of false advertising. Later, I would become aware of Fairfield Girls School, which as an adolescent, provided the fuel for further fantasies. Such is youth.
Carrying bio-matter. Time to move on.
Fallowfield Loop
The Passage To Mancunia.
Glorious artery connecting me to the promised land, a superb highway filed with sights, experience and horror. I cherish the thought of the Loop, how it runs without prejudice between Audenshaw and Chorlton. It feels arbitrary and I like it that way...I am honoured that my home sits close to it's humble beginning. In fact, so humble as to be almost invisible. A housing estate attempts to nullify the entrance and very nearly succeeds...I suppose it must come as a surprise to all that discover it for the first time. Follow the passage way and one emerges into another world, Manchester's shirt ripped from it's back , or a car bonnet flung open and the workings of the engine made apparent.
It's easy to think of the Loop as a holdover from an earlier epoch. And yet...until 1990, it was merely a freight line, certainly not the strange pathway we've come to know today. It's birth, remains a testament to the fact, that we're still very much capable of creating magic and fully capable of rolling out 'ruins to order'. In some senses, the Loop recalls the Project for the Rational Improvement of Paris (1955), the section in question:
"The rooftops of Paris should be opened to pedestrian traffic by means of modifications to fire escape ladders and construction of catwalks where necessary."
Realities are there to be created, repurposed and rethought. There is the flash of Solar Punk to this programme and latterly, of the clandestine, the secret and furtive....something all too rare in our society, but exponentially occurring at this radical plague instance. What measures of rebellion can we fathom within apparently consensual authoritarianism? When conspiracy with peers in refuge bars and music venues is deemed a crime, to whom or what must we look for guidance? The answer relies upon rejecting the perceptual prejudice of a materialist, rationalist society: for it is to the landscape that we must turn and whisper and listen.
We at The Peer Hat are enthused by the Loop, it acts as a means of fast, non road travel and communication between variously connected individuals. I admit that we had this in mind when considering The Peer Hat Post, certainly as one arm of it's potentially psycho-geographical (sorry Julie) meanderings. To me, it feels like a secret passage. There are crossroads a plenty along the way and in this sense, it is fair to say that it belongs to the Devil. Traversing it at night, is not something I can recommend: there are stories I can tell which would have you hurriedly agreeing.
There is much more to be said about the Loop, it deserves mythologising, it's place has not yet set (to my knowledge), by the bards of Manchester. My route this day meant that I would stay on it (Her? Him? Them?) not for very long, but I will say this: sometimes we need to take the Devil's road.
Irritatingly, there's a diversion; something is being hidden. Also, this sign was pointing the wrong way.
Abbey Hey & Gorton
A bullethole, blood and memory.
After leaving behind The Fallowfield Loop, we emerge blinking into Abbey Hey, residential Gorton and another town pulsating with a kind of low key strangeness that belies initial impressions. There are many poppies around, perhaps leftovers from the recently passed and supra-spectral 75th VE Day. They watch, bloody eyes, windows to infinite battlefields and symbols that have over time, gathered more meaning than perhaps was intended. There is an obstinance to their arrangement that is not easily shaken. They are exit wounds on a landscape that can at times, appear cadaverous.
A ruin, the fence is the greater eyesore.
Gorton, some say it gained it's name from a battle fought long ago between the Saxons and the Danes. I imagine the night before the conflict, there would have been fires burning that one could have seen from Delta Hill, where soothsayers and poets picked out the victors from the array of celestial bodies. That the battle was bloody, there can be no doubt, the fields drenched red with the life blood of the fallen, the ground now a mountain range in miniature, though these slopes are viscera and bone, plucked at finally by crows that had waited patient for the ring of iron to cease it's echo. Naturally, historians, in their closeted manner, declared that such a battle was mere fancy. In fact Gorton meant 'dirty farmstead' and that the brook that courses through it, was perhaps the source, discoloured as it was. And yet the signs are here...the blood still marked on walls and in windows.
This is a battle fought at this very moment within the dream chambers of sleeping Gorton. Woe to the historian that dismisses myth as the distorted message of a surmounted past, or even as mere religious instruction. Be surprised instead to learn, that myths are yet another super-imposition upon what we consider reality... they never happened. They are happening.
Silence here, was total.
Plague screeds, unseen, untended, the post office a sepulchre.
There are a great many cages in Gorton, as there are a great many ruins. To keep the good folk from an untimely end, must surely be their stated purpose, and their instalment, surely seen as temporary. Instead, they remain a fixture, and have the effect of inducing an unpleasant sensation of imprisonment. Or rather we are in a zoo, but in the place of animals, we observe shards of condemned structures, a broken past that we are forbidden to touch.
Caged angel, adjacent to The Angel Pub.
All windows sealed
The picture is the same, it repeats.
The Buzz was an exclusion unit, a place for permanently expelled children. It was located in the Peacock Centre, which, despite the grandiose sign, exists no longer, The sign seems like a vain testament to a fallen Utopia..and yet, in an amusing turn of aesthetic, seems to now indicate a place where the brilliant hued bird might be seen by passing pilgrims such as myself. My partner, comments, that it seems as though something is waiting to happen. This is her childhood turf and to her, it is as if somebody pressed PAUSE. I can see it as I'm sure you will be able to also.
The white sign is brilliantly scrubbed.
The steel works and associated tavern presents itself soon enough. Another childhood friend's father worked here for many years. I remember him returning home wearing an eyepatch after a shard of metal nearly took his sight. He recovered fully. The memory for me, however, remains fresh. My friend's father wad called Tom and, once upon a time, there was a bakery on my street (unimaginable now). He worked there and I thought it the most glamorous job a man could turn his hand to...I was always delighted whenever I saw him leave work, head to toe, covered in flour. When I thought of the black machines and the molten metal screeching through voids of invaded space...it always seemed a terrible shame that the old bakery had shut and that he was forced to endure labour within the bowels of hell. At any rate, it was not hell, it was Gorton. And he was not my father.
I sometimes wonder what the tavern is like just after the factory closes.
The Monastery, is the undoubted jewel of Gorton, the Franciscan's efforts tunnelling through history to the present. The red brick monk's gate, is the segment that attracts my attentions on this particular day. You might accuse me of churlishness, ignoring the beautiful building to which it provides egress. But as we pass by, I can see trails of cassocked friars, enduring the drizzle of a Monday morning, to enter via this modest aperture. To me, it seems like the holiest place of all and, unabashedly Mancunian. I feel a little sorry for the monks; what a hard life it must have been..and consider that they built the place with their own hands!.And yet, unlike Red Hall Chapel, this place endures and it's ghosts are free to continue in their obediences.
Monk's Entrance
Once past the Monastery, I knew that we were on the final stretch. Considering how close we were to the city and the ever present roar of Ashton-Old-Road, the atmosphere was quite still. There were people around to be sure, but they seemed to move within bubbles. We would pass and occasionally smile or whisper "hello", just like they did in the countryside. As we pass by a very DIY home stead, I experience a vision of this place as it once was, not so very long ago. I can hear the river.
Rural Gorton Shack
The Approach
Soon were are the only people we could see. Gorton Road calcifies into still humming machinery. This might be the only place left in Manchester, where the Industrial Revolution is still happening, my a partner remarked. But these aren't cotton mills, or churning engines that power the Empire. Everything, is in fact, re-purposed, smaller, making less noise, employing less people. A sense of emptiness settled over me, as if I'd stumbled through gossamer. I walk and I feel as if I am at meditation.
A Church 2020
Beneath a tunnel, lichen crawls up the benighted walls, forming brilliant patterns. It's an incongruity. I find it difficult to believe that unsentimental council directives, would allow for life like this to flourish in such abundance. That is unless, it has forgotten. Yes, there is a sense that this long stretch of industrial development, has fallen from the consciousness of the city.
Spread over the walls of the tunnel, the lichen strives to feed itself.
I know we are quite close now. I feel a vibration of deja vu, recalling my first appointment with Lonelady's Scrub Transmission. We pass by a section of fenced off waste ground. Though there is the possibility for egress, the stalwart explorer would be forced to navigate a small hillock of rubbish, For a moment, I consider wading through the filth and nastiness to access the tantalisingly grassy area beyond, but something holds me back. Perhaps it is superstition, but there is something decidedly unnerving about the geography of this moment, as it struggles to fit into place within my mind. We pass on, choosing not to linger. Nevertheless, I find myself silently thrilled by this brush with the irrational.
Here Be Monsters
The sun has made no decisions today, but Helios shows it's face long enough for me to commemorate our imminent arrival. It's strange how the the line of history flattens out, throughout the rest of my journey, there had been a gaggle of voices, shapes... depth. But here, it is as if the waveform has stilled. It occurs to me that we are the ghosts now and in some odd sense, we are carrying the weight of all history, a hidden yet significant action taking place upon a backdrop of heat-death.
Stainforth Street
DEMON
There's a certain sadness in the air as I arrive but only in the sense that my adventure is coming to it's conclusion. I wonder who wrote this word and why. Was the artist a seer, an oracle? Did they forsee Julie's secretive mission and, if you'll indulge me a moment longer, a true act of free masonry? I don't remember seeing it before. Briefly I consider whether or not Lonelady herself carefully drew the letters, defining her territory. I decide not, and settle finally on this: DEMON is a honeytrap, it draws the eye of those that know and of those that want to know. Just a little way from Ashton Old Road, yet still hidden by that strange sense of obscure nothingness I mentioned on the approach. I spend a little time searching for the input jack and, sure enough, I find it. However, before I plug in, I peer into the space beyond, a fracture above my discovery. All I see, is the bare stone of a building that has seen no material purpose for years. A ruin then. A haunted place. Meticulously chosen.
Finally I turn my attention to the input. My partner plugs in headphones, listens and then finally hands them over to me. I place them over my ears and hear Julie's voice. And I close my eyes.
Other Things We Know, We Haven't Forogtten
So turning our eye back upon the worthy works of the weary warriors, this week we have:
Elyssa Iona, my good friend and bridge between The Peer Hat and the mighty Islington Mill, has been extremely hard at work during this almost interminable period of teeth grinding. A dabbler in all things analogue, her vapourised aesthetic, it's worn magnificence and crumbling splendour can be seen on many a Peer Hat design, from posters, to fonts to artworks and photographs. Did I mention she does drone also (I think one does drone, don't quote me on the verb)? This however, is something else again. From the website...
"DIYD is an artist-led darkroom with a real emphasis on community and experimentation.
The facilities are available for hire to the general public, with rates including an on-call supervisor and discounts for Islington Mill studio holders, students and the unwaged.
In addition to this there will also be tutored sessions available for beginners or users in need of additional guidance & a range of affordable process/scan/capture services available if you would rather have a technician do it for you!"
Islington Mill keeps surprising, maintaining it's commitment to DIY culture. And that's down to the hard work of people like Elyssa, who keep finding ways to make things happen. Website link is above beneath the picture and if you fancy checking out Elyssa's other work, I suggest you go HERE.
What is Ian doing now?
Come June 5, Four Candles will be releasing their song, Doughnuts. All proceeds will go to The Peer Hat, which is a truly kind gesture from one of our scene's most active members. Naturally, the new EP, called Alternative Golf will be available on bandcamp and on German Shepherd Records. Check out the video below! We think it's a really slick sounding record from the band...there's really nobody else like them around.
Aaaaaaand Hannah!
Six days late, but not a moment too soon, comes our coverage of Not Bad For A Girl Collective's first birthday! Hannah from Psychopomp provides the tunes for you all to get with, and in case you're unfamiliar with NBFAG, here's what they have to say about themselves:
Not Bad For A Girl is a home-grown ethically-sourced collective of women who just want to have fun. Born from a shared love of music/events and hatred of gender inequality, we’re all about equal opportunity, equal pay and equal parts spirit and mixer.
With 8 different DJ’s playing everything from jungle to northern soul we’ve covered alllll the bases. Look out for the signature pink balaclava + catch us on lineups across the UK.
Get your tracks out love x
WHO WE ARE TO US:
Bookings email marthamarthalc@gmail.com. We do CLUB NIGHTS/FREE PARTIES/RAVES/HOUSE PARTIES/HEN DOS/NORMAL TUESDAY EVENINGS. House party package: £100 for speakers, lights, decorations, lineup, bouncers + damage control for the council (boo).
ThtGrl - ThtGrl has a solid collection of genres mastered under her belt when it comes to DJing. From DnB to Disco and Acid to House, she’s played in venues such as Ministry Of Sound and around the country in most major cities. She’s supported the likes of My Nu Leng and Darkzy and has been booked all over Europe. Whatever vibe you’re after, you can have no doubt you’ll be hit with a style of mixing that’ll have you hooked. https://soundcloud.com/tht_grl
Kiana - Iranian-born Manchester-based DJ with a wide taste in music ranging from techno,breaks and bass to ambient and experimental. She has performed at venues such as Soup Kitchen, Partisan collective, Cotton, and Stage and Radio as well as festivals such as Westival and The Folk Forest. A familiar name on airwaves, Kiana has her own show on NTS Radio, Tehran Amplified, where she showcases contemporary sounds from underground Iran. She co-hosts a weekly vinyl only show on Fuse FM and appears regulary on Limbo Radio. Her other radio appearanes include Reform Radio, Melodic Distraction and MCR Live. As well as DJing, Kiana is currently combining her passion for electronic sounds and engineering by exploring the psycho-acoustic effects of audio signal processing academically at University of Manchester's Electrical and Electronic Engineering department. https://www.mixcloud.com/SoodxKiana/
DaiSu - New to the scene but still a queen, DaiSu specialises in house, disco and a lil bit of tech. Catch her sipping VKs behind the decks. https://soundcloud.com/dai-su
Maracuya - Currently smashing the scene, Maracuya wows crowds at events all the way from B.L.O.O.M. residents parties to illegal raves. Her free party-influenced frenetic sets always get the crowd pumping, with anything from breaksy electro to 170bpm old school Jungle. https://www.mixcloud.com/maracuyasoundsystem/
Velmz - Fresh off sets from brands like Hit&Run and Fuse Presents, Warrington born DJ Velmz is killing the Manchester DnB scene. Velmz serves selections from minimal to liquid that prove there's nothing wrong with a bit of 'girly' DnB. https://soundcloud.com/velmz
Moll - You can count on Moll to bring the bouncy bassline to get the room hyper. Expect wubs and wobbles and everything inbetween, including garage stompers even your nan would get down to. She’s a resident on Vandelay Radio and has made her way from bonny Burnley into Manchester for events like Fuse Presents and MisogynyIsHate. Old school bangers every time. https://soundcloud.com/mollycronshaw
Egg On Toast - Fresh off the Tokyo track, Egg On Toast brings mind scrambling tunes. Expect disco, house, afro, techno, electro, poached, fried, over easy - all that nasty jazz. https://soundcloud.com/eggontoast1
(Applications closed for now x)
FEMALE CREATIVES HIT US UP WE LOVE AND NEED YOU
Yep, sounds pretty cool. Here's Psychopomp to see you out. Hope you enjoyed reading this one.
This blog entry was set to go out last Thursday, but with the emergence of our Crowd-Funder, it seemed like a good idea to avoid clogging the airwaves with yet more Peer Hat related stuff (especially when so many places are in dire need of immediate aid). This time last week, I think we started to digest the reality of our situation and the reality that people may simply not want to come and spend time in a place whose main currency is intimacy...at least in the short term.
My mind veers in every direction when I consider what actions must be taken to preserve The Peer Hat. Maybe, like anything that breathes, it's time to die has come and that we should all lay down our trowels for a while to await a better tomorrow. Or perhaps...perhaps there is no better tomorrow, without fighting to preserve something good that already exists. We've chosen to go down the route of preservation for the time being; obviously our levels of engagement with the idea have been high, and I have the strongest sense that we've barely even started in our journey. But also, there is an air of obligation, even profoundly so.
Here are some ideas that we have had.
Ambient Beer Delivery Service
Fairly simply put, we put some folk on bikes and send them wherever the beer drinkers wish them to be sent. We can't really see any reason not to do this at the minute, almost a no brainer, in fact. We think this represents the safest option in terms of us establishing some kind of extra income for the place. Psycho-geographic prospects are sweet also. I'd wax more about that, but I'm saving myself (see below).
The Peer Hat Album: EYE (?)
Bands and artists donate a song or two and we keep pumping out Bandcamp albums as fundraisers. Relies heavily on the goodwill of the artists, but then, did I mention that Her nest is lined with the jawbones of poets? In all seriousness, I think there's been something of a surge in people paying attention to each other's shit and that might have decent results for local bands (eg. the future is local, the dream is your contribution to the now).
The Peer Hat Online Festival... u/MIFFF'd
We're going to do this for sure...essentially a day long streaming thing with chat. Big issue with streaming, is that it tends to sound a bit on the shit side. Thus, we think it's going to be really important to emphasise the social dimension of things.
CYBERPUNK DYSTOPIC PEER HAT
Steve Roe
This may not be a something that we get over quickly. Taking the position, that change could be permanent, we're going to need to develop the online side of The Peer Hat, on a business level. We desperately need another income stream to help us cope with the barren months.
Essentially, we've visualised a website which does the following things:
1) Acts as a kind of repository for Peer Hat related stuff...not as a boring archive or some such, but as an asset dump of sounds, video and art, that can be used by any member for their own projects. Imagine it all being customisable. Imagine that artists in the city have an easy place to share things. I find msyelf getting hot and bothered by this idea, a localised and unique audio/video trove. Like creating treasure.
2) Contains audio and video that's exclusive to The Peer Hat. Mostly gigs or whatever, but initially, private performances donated by artists. We envisage something like a digital vault, with featured performers, maybe with arhcive, maybe not. It'd be cool to have everybody participating, with everything filed appropriately and words to similarly combust affairs.
3) Charges a subscription fee. How long we do this for, we're not certain...definitely for the foreseeable future. We need to make it as if there's a virtual doorway, with a virtual ticket teller. In this case, more like a secret handshake.
We'd like to think that we could do away with any fees eventually.. Likewise, if we did consider carrying this thing on beyond these indefinite virus years, then we could maybe pay artists who appear, in the same way as we'd pay them for organic gigs.
T-Shirts
Open the floodgates! Let the great sell off begin! Yep, these are definitely coming your way.
Reflections
We want to look at the ways we can create a community digital hub. The money aspect, is just something we need to address....I've no idea if people would use it or not and how much it would ultimately contribute. The point is, we're forced to be thinking in this fashion. Any money we make from this is going to be hoovered by rent.
It does not come easily. I can think of lots of reasons to keep associations as analogue as humanly possible...that said, we need to consider other outcomes. The short and medium term forecasts, offer no real relenting of the current circumstances. Whether people will even want to socialise like they did in the past, remains unknown. Currently, many seem to be desperate to stay indoors. Regardless of the right and wrongs of it, as a current situation, that would be the death of us.
So we need to think with this apocalypse, not against it; indeed this weird, virtual Peer Hat, may turn out, to be a necessary crank in the machine. The potential is there, to make this something quite interesting and possibly even revolutionary--- if interest is sufficiently sparked. And of course, any activity would contribute to the place outlasting the moratorium on intimacy.
Let us know what you think of it all, should you get the chance to breathe.
Thank You
The Crowd Funder has thus far been a great success...at the time of writing, we're 70% of the way towards our target of £10,000, so obviously, fantastic. Again, a testament to the power of an idea over a place. I've nothing really remarkable to add beyond our infinite gratitude...
So where's the poetry?
That was as utilitarian a post as they come, but we felt it necessary for you to be in on our thought processes. Again, as occurs so often, our thinking changes on a daily basis. We've felt so much love for The Peer Hat this past few days, that it's been hard to think objectively. My soul is being played like a harp. Your collective will, has me thinking of you all as some kind of uni-mind Orpheus...I feel better about nearly everything. This is obviously a good thing (I can safely inform you that the others here in The Peer Hat mind dungeon, feel the same).
These Things Are Happening, You Just Know There's Something Going Down
I embarked upon a wee journey this week, during my allotted exercise period (never thought I'd write that sentence). However, I'm going to make this journey the subject of my next blog, which will come out very soon (eg. next couple of days). I thought about adding my thoughts on my trek to this section, but it really deserves it's own treatment, since the instigator of my wanderings involved me directly; created an experience for me, allowed me to participate fully in something beyond baseline consciousness.
So hold fire on that.
The Doll Bride Mask
My man Tom Wise, who some of you may know from his bands Spillage and A Better Reality and also, invoker of punk band trouble as Lovely Hen Promotions, just sent me a banging tune from whatever nightmare isolation cell he's found himself holed up in. Tom is an unsung force at The Peer Hat, his presence tells me that the ship is steady as she goes, plus the gigs he puts on and performs at are always good. Looking forward to seeing him again, probably (definitely) on the Blood Bowl pitch.
Ian Moss doesn't stop
Two entries from our man Ian during today's blog entry. Let's start with a bit of Four Candles action
And of course, let's Flow Backwards....our man is locating us squarely in the lovable dystopia we like to think of as the early 80s
