Tour Diary – Manchester (January 24th, 2013)

A late night last night and an early morning drive today. We all piled into the Sprinter and headed south to England. It was a beautiful drive through the north country, especially with the hills and valleys covered in snow. Jeff, Marg and I were dropped off at the BBC complex in the old Manchester docklands area, which is fittingly overseen by an enormous picture of Dr Who. The whole area has a distinct “futureworld” vibe about it: I kept expecting to see workers scurrying about in identical colour-coded jumpsuits. The radio show, The Verve, was hosted by a famous BBC personality, Ian McMillan (sp?), and was a refreshing twist on the usual radio performance/interview format. We were joined in the studio by a playwright, a poet and an author and a conversation about words ensued. Unfortunately, our brains were still back in Glasgow, in the bottom of a John Smith’s pint glass, so we just followed along, played our song and did a lot of staring in to space.

The gig tonight was just outside of Manchester in the suburb of Sale. We had no time to look around, but we did pass by the Manchester United stadium on the way to the venue, which is sort of like catching a glimpse of Yankee Stadium or Cowboy Stadium or the Duomo in Milan. It wasn’t exactly a beautiful looking room tonight, but it sure sounded great. We had a very good and very fun night of music….another sold out show and another great audience…all is good in our world.