Flyer
The Passage, Stockholm Monsters, The Spurtz
Manchester Polytechnic Mandela Building
19th February 1983

Ooh, ‘ello computer, had to pop out ‘n do some graft, but as Archie Bell and his Drells used to doowop up the back of our class “ Here I go Again....” P.S. what the f#*k is a Drell ...??
Last upload was aaaall about The Poly (Ye Olde One). From thence it moved over the way to Oxford St., and became the new Poly (later The Mandela Building, as many buildings of that time were called/ re-named...).It was a brand newbie, state of the art building with a lift ,shops , plumbing without equal, etc,. It was fortified somewhat against the peril of the non- student type, (proper bouncers on the door), but as usual, with the help of an “acquired” student card, you could still get in. It definitely wasn’t the same craic as the Old Poly but it was cheap and it was cheerful. Again, it had a good music policy and some top shelf entertainment as well.
I’m presuming this flyer is from the new Poly ; at least two local bands that I know of, Stockholm Monsters and The Passage. Y’know in the old music papers they used to have these uber-group family trees, tracing the lineage and pedigree of certain bands , well I think both these bands could trace their genesis (oh no, Phil Collins!....hope you're not eating your dinner....), to another band , The Spurtz, by at least a whopping one degree of separation. Stockholm Monsters were part of The Factory stable of stars and The Passage, as far as memory serves, were a three piece, live and direct from Charles Barry Crescent , Hulme. Actually the elder statesman of the band was one Dick Witts ,who’d once played the spoons in The Halle Orchestra , so I’m reliably informed. He was a well known entity on The Tony Wilson “What’s On” family half hour, infamous for not being able to sit still while he delivered his weekly monologue on the Arts and Craft movement in the North West of England. “Margox.”, better known as Margie Clarke, (later of " Letter To Breshnev" fame) , completed that particular tri-umvirate).One feature I particularly recall was Michael Clark, the newest enfant terrible’ of the dancing fraternity , tutu-ed up and demi- plie’-ing his way down the aisles at Woolworths or some such , amongst the purple-rinsed brigade, before he went on to become the precursor of Bez with The Fall. The rest, as they say, is ‘istory...I think they recorded on the Cherry Red label and were on the the”Pillows and Prayers” album, a rather impressive compilation, circa ’82 (?). They made a noise and woz good ‘n that...