Jason Lytle Manchester Academy 26/05/09
Posted under: Now being a longtime Grandaddy fan, this was something I was really looking forward to and I was in no way let down or disappointed.
I was also excited at the prospect of meeting up with friends, some old and some new who share the same love of Grandaddy/Jason Lytle as myself, plus it was fun to catch up with them over a few beers.
The day started very early for me as I had to travel to Manchester from Cardiff, so that meant a train journey from my home town of Aberdare to the Welsh capitol in order to catch the 9:50 train to Manchester Picaddilly Station. I arrived on time at around 1:10pm and whilst waiting for Matt to arrive from Keighley, I decided to grab a coffee and sat there watching the jubilant Burnley football fans returning north fresh from their Wembley triumph over Sheffield United the previous day. I chatted with a few and wished them luck for the following season when they will play in English football’s top flight – The Premier League.
My phone lit up, it was a text from Matt. His train was near Manchester but was travelling at a snails pace, he informed me he would be getting off in about 10 minutes, so I grabbed another coffee.
It was 1:30 and Matt and I walked out of Manchester Picaddilly and grabbed a cab to the hotel which was on the other side of the city. We could not check in until three, so as you do, we went to the bar and got some beers in and waited for another of our friends – Ian who was travelling down from Middlesbrough. Ian would meet us at around three, so plenty of time to relax and get some lovely cold beer down us as we chatted and watched sky sports news in the bar.
Ian was bang on time and arrived in time for check in. We put our stuff in our rooms and went back to the bar to quaff some more and wait for Eean to arrive from Sheffield (this is a story in itself).
To cut a long story short, Eean was on the worlds slowest train from Sheffield and when he got off at Ashbury’s station near the hotel, he phoned me for directions. I used google maps on my iPhone to give him what I thought were the correct directions. “Just head towards the houses not the factories” I told him. “No problem see you soon.” he answered.
10 maybe 20 minutes passed and my iphone sprang into life, it was a quite flustered Eean “John, I’m outside the City of Manchester Stadium, am I near the hotel?” Cue guffaws and laughter from Matt, Ian and myself, “Eean” I replied, “ummm I think you have headed north rather than south so you will have to come back the way you just walked.” I gave him further directions and instructed him to meet me by the Bingo hall close to the hotel. Sure enough Eean turns up 10 minutes later and with little time to spare, he checks into the room and we are all off in a taxi to Oxford Road and in search of food and drink before the show.
The weather was looking a little ropey when Eean had arrived (blustery and spots of rain), but when we got out of the taxi, the sun had come out and the temperature had etched up a few notches, so in good spirits we headed off to meet a friend of Eean’s and a new friend of ours (Phil) who travelled the short distance from Liverpool.
Over a rather nice pub lunch and more beers, we all chatted together and the mix of accents – Scouse (Liverpool), West Yorkshire, Teesside and Welsh was really funny as even though our accents are so different, we all understood each other clearly.
Next up was a trip to Big Hands bar which is situated right near the Manchester Academy. There we would be meeting up with yet another friend, Bik. It was the first time Bik and I had met despite knowing each other a few years and it was great to finally meet up with him at long last.
The previous week, Bik had organized rehearsal space, digs and a one off show for Jason and co at a local venue in Preston called The Mad Ferret. Here Jason did a secret show as a pre-tour rehearsal before heading out all over Europe and the US. It sold out very very quickly. I was unable to attend, but Eean, Matt and Ian did and by all accounts had an amazing time. At one point it ended up with Eean and Ian manning the merch stand!
Another of my friends (Mikkel Elbech) who is another longtime fan, got to do something he always wanted to do and that is interview Jason prior to the Preston show. In fact, he spent about 2 and half hours with Jason in Bik’s kitchen and you can read the results of this on Drowned in Sound (see links at the end of this post – it’s a lengthy interview in four parts.) He also got to take some great pictures as well which you can see accompanying the interview.
Anyway back to the main event……
We made the short walk up to the Academy venue and up the metal staircase where we had just missed the support act (The Voluntary Butler Scheme) play their set. The place was packed out and it was very hot and sweaty. The bar was crammed and with showtime upon us, I decided to pick my spot early and stood with my friends not too far from the front.
The lights dimmed a little and the PA crackled into life with Jason’s intro tape. The only way I can describe what we were listening to was that it was hilarious and I don’t want to spoil it for anyone who has yet to see the show yet, so I will leave it at that!
We could make out the shapes of the guys coming on to the stage, first up was Dave Burtch who was filling in on the sticks for his big brother and former Grandaddy member Aaron. Then came bassist Rob and guitarist Rusty Miller. Finally Jason, who walked on and took his place behind his little keyboard to rapturous applause.
A few gentle acoustic guitar strums and a slow building keyboard swell signalled the start of proceedings. What sounded like a relaxed acoustic version of “For The Dishwasher” gave way into the familiar opening sounds of “Chartsengrafs” from Grandaddy’s Sophtware Slump album. It was kind of strange to hear such a gentle version of this as it was originally recorded as a very up tempo song.
A brief pause and then first of the new material to get an airing – The Ghost Of My Old Dog. This is a personal favourite of mine off the new record and it sounded fantastic live with Rusty providing some great vocal harmonies to Jason’s deeply personal lyrics. It must have been a tough one to rehearse prior to the tour, but they pulled this off with aplomb!
I thought about getting something from the bar as it was getting really hot in there now, but there was nowhere to move and I didn’t want to lose my place. I was edging closer and closer to the stage song by song and during ‘What Can’t Be Erased’ I spotted another friend and fellow Talkscaper Graham Brand. I went over and spent the rest of the show with Graham, right between Jason and Rusty playing right in front of us.
A show highlight on this tour has to be “Beautiful Ground” which was performed to near perfection tonight. It’s been doing the rounds on Jason’s set list for a while now, ever since the break-up of of Grandaddy and the transition to solo performance. It’s great to hear it still as part of the set.
Another Grandaddy classic was reeled out “AM 180″ with Rusty forgetting the signature keyboard melody to much amusement from the rest of the band and the audience! Jason didn’t say a whole lot to everyone during the show apart from the usual ‘thanks’ and seemed to really want to remain focused on everything he had to do in front of him as he juggled with guitars, keyboards, sequencers and whatnot.
After closing with (If my memory serves me right) ‘Our Dying Brains’ – another real fan favourite, the band left the stage for a brief pause then returning for Jason to address the crowd and show his thanks for everyone coming. Someone shouted something (a request maybe) in a very broad Manchester accent only for Jason to retort “I can’t really understand what you are saying, but whatever it was thank you!”.
It was getting late now and we got treated to a short but sweet stripped down version of “He’s simple he’s dumb he’s the pilot” (re-named 2000 man for this tour). Everyone lapped it up and it was all over far too quickly it seemed. What seemed like 30 minutes was in fact about an hour and twenty minutes and 12 songs.
With the crowd making their way out over the sticky, plastic glass filled floor to the merch stand and the exit, I re-joined my friends and we debated what to do next. We headed over to the merch stand and had a brief chat with Dave Burtch who quickly spotted Eean’s ‘Built Like Alaska’ T-shirt exclaiming that he had designed ‘that one’. We asked what everyone after the show and everyone was a bit unsure as they were still breaking down equipment but Dave was up for hanging out and a few beers maybe at the hotel which he said was about 10 minutes away.
Arrangements were made instead to maybe meet up in Big Hands bar down the road. We went downstairs to grab a beer and talked with Rusty Miller for a while before heading out into the cool air and to Big Hands.
Phil and Bik had to leave us at this point as Bik was DJ’ing back in Preston and Phil had to get back to Liverpool ready for another working day the next day. We said our farewells and walked into the bar where we met some Scottish friends Alistair and Laura to see off the rest of a very very good night with yet more German beer!
And so to the next ‘Gathering’ let’s hope it’s not too far away!
Related Links and further reading:
Mikkel Elbech’s Interview with Jason Lytle Part 1
Mikkel Elbech’s Interview with Jason Lytle Part 2
Mikkel Elbech’s Interview with Jason Lytle Part 3
Mikkel Elbech’s Interview with Jason Lytle Part 4
