Hilariously misspelt ticket for Tubthumping anarchos. The sublime Shudder to Think in support.

Flyer for Queer Academy - a multi-floored LGBT rave promoted by A Bit Ginger (Lucy Scher & Paul Cons), the team behind the hugely successful gay night Flesh at the Hacienda.

A write up from City Life (see previous artefact) suggests that the plan was to make Queer Academy a regular bi-monthly club night. This didn't happen. My guess is that Paul & Lucy wanted to do a weekend event in Manchester (Flesh was on a Wednesday), and so experimented at the Academy, but for whatever reason it didn't work out.

Regular Flesh DJs Tim Lennox and Kath McDermott (with occasional DJ partner Lin) played at Queer Academy.

Text: Abigail

Flyer for Queer Academy - a multi-floored LGBT rave promoted by A Bit Ginger (Lucy Scher & Paul Cons), the team behind the hugely successful gay night Flesh at the Hacienda.

This review from City Life magazine suggests that the plan was to make Queer Academy a regular bi-monthly club night. It didn't happen. My guess is that Paul & Lucy wanted to do a weekend event in Manchester (Flesh was on a Wednesday), and so experimented at the Academy, but for whatever reason it didn't work out.

Regular Flesh DJs Tim Lennox and Kath McDermott (with occasional DJ partner Lin) played at Queer Academy.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives
Special thanks to David Govier.

Story by Abigail:

I really fell in love with Gallon Drunk after hearing them on Out on Blue Six in the classic 'under the duvet' style. I was into Nick Cave and PJ Harvey as well, from quite a young age, so 'the Drunk' were a good fit for me.

I didn't see them until much later after some line-up changes and the thrill was gone.

At this point they would have been touring 'You , The Night..and the Music' and sounding pretty wild, I'm sure.

Head honcho James Johnston ended up joining the Bad Seeds for a bit.

Sonic Youth played Manchester Academy at the peak of their commercial success in 1992 as part of the Pretty F**king Dirty world tour.

The show was bit of a disappointment, it was my first time watching them live and I barely recognised some of the songs due to the bands penchant for adding art wankery jams to what were great pop songs.

What made this gig stick out for me was the hippy looking guy handing out pieces of carrot as we entered the foyer, naively I thought the carrot was laced with acid and literally pulled a piece out of a friends mouth in anxiety. Anyway... we were watching the support act, Pavement, and look who is playing the drums... only the flippin' hippy carrot man, Gary Young. He was kicked out of the band a few months later. Pavement were great, I should have saved the carrot to throw at Sonic Youth.

Sonic Youth played:

Shoot
100%
The Burning Spear
Kool Thing
Swimsuit Issue
Genetic
Sugar Kane
Tom Violence
Theresa's Sound-World
Youth Against Fascism
Drunken Butterfly
Schizophrenia
JC
Purr
I Love Her All the Time

Setlist source: setlist.fm

Story by Rod:

I'm led to say 92 for this but would have thought 90 - see below. Interesting times these with dance and baggy really kicking in whilst the Pixies and Sugar were ushering in the grunge scene. It's to Manchester's credit of course that these sounds were mashed-up on many dancefloors before things became more polarised.

Sugar, of course, was Bob Mould (ex Husker Du) touring his classic Copper Blue album - released 92 hence the guessed date. I recall his storming gig earlier at the Boardwalk.

Interesting to see these booked together. New Fads, like James (wasn't there a crossover?) were always at the more esoteric end of the scene. Justin Unabomber played bass.

The last time the Ramones played in Manchester.

Excerpt from Wiki:

After more than a decade and a half at Sire Records, the Ramones moved to a new label, Radioactive Records. Their first album for the label was 1992's Mondo Bizarro, which reunited them with producer Ed Stasium. Acid Eaters, consisting entirely of cover songs, came out the following year. In 1993 the Ramones were featured in the animated television series The Simpsons, providing music and voices for animated versions of themselves in the episode "Rosebud". Executive producer David Mirkin described the Ramones as "gigantic, obsessive Simpsons fans."

Great line-up for early '93.

Suede during their pomp, St Etienne and Radiohead - one of those rare bands that made the journey through all the Academy venues and beyond. They played 150 gigs this year.

Radiohead's second visit to the Hop & Grape. The first was in September 1992.

At this gig Thom announced that 'Creep' had not made the top 40 and said it should have been number 1. It was later re-released and went Top 5.

Taken from City Life magazine, 1993.

Fresh from grossing out the Lollapolooza crowds, The Jim Rose Sideshow Circus rolled into town on a wave of red top media hoo-hah due to the 'sick' nature of the show. This article states that sick bags were included in the £8 admission!

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives

Here's a rare glimpse of the bookings calendar used by the Academy to log all their shows in 1993.

It's great to see huge names like Radiohead playing Hop and Grape (now Academy 3) for £4 a ticket and a crossed out booking for grunge heavyweights Alice in Chains who eventually played at the Academy on 1 March.

With thanks to Sean Fintan Morgan

Taken from City Life.

A fashion do at the Academy in aid of the Terrence Higgins Trust with DJs Jon Da Silva and Greg Fenton.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives. You can make an appointment to see this the City Life collection by emailing: archiveslocalstudies@manchester.gov.uk

Taken from City Life. More fashion vibes, this time in the University.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives. You can make an appointment to see this the City Life collection by emailing: archiveslocalstudies@manchester.gov.uk

Editorial taken from City Life magazine 1993.

Uncle Tupelo achieved cult status in the UK, going against the grunge grain with a unique guitar sound that saw them as early purveyors of the Americana music scene, eventually splitting in 1994 and evolving into the much loved Wilco.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives

Taken from City Life.

Story: Abigail

Nice little editorial by Chris Sharratt in which he mentions Brett Anderson's arse slapping performance on the Brits that year - a moment I have never forgotten! The fifteen-year-old me was very impressed.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives. You can make an appointment to see this the City Life collection by emailing: archiveslocalstudies@manchester.gov.uk

This was a huge gig for Suede, maybe one of their biggest at the time; their debut album was sitting at the top of the UK album charts and Radio 1 were broadcasting the gig to an audience eager to find out what all the fuss for ‘The Best New Band In Britain’ was about.

The gig was rammed, uncomfortably so, and I couldn’t see a thing but the band played superbly, I remember thinking they had more power and punk attitude than most of the alt rock / grunge bands they were supposed to be the antidote for. I was a closeted homo in 1993 and was excited that there was this band who were flying a flag for sexuality but strangely the crowd was littered with pre-Oasis Lads, heckling the band between songs, homosexual oppression in action maybe?

The other thing I remember were pockets of girls screaming when Brett posed or wiggled his bum, it was like being transported to a Take That concert, real Beatlemania stuff.

The Radio 1 recording was aired on the Mark Goodier show and has featured on two big selling bootlegs. Search YouTube for ‘Suede Strange Fascination’ to listen for yourself.

This must have been a bobby dazzler. PJ Harvey's second Manchester gig, straight in at Academy 1. (The first had been at the Boardwalk in 1992). The band had released the Albini-produced classic 'Rid of Me' twelve days prior to this gig and it had reached number 3 in the album charts.'Rid of Me' captured the trio at their most raw and exciting, spawning singles '50 Ft Queenie' and 'Mansize'. Gallon Drunk also released 'From The Heart of Town' in '93 - arguably their best record.

Taken from City Life.

An editorial by Harry Stafford ahead of Peej's first gig at the Academy.

Courtesy of Manchester Libraries, Information & Archives. You can make an appointment to see this the City Life collection by emailing: archiveslocalstudies@manchester.gov.uk

The Stereo MCs' brief moment in the spotlight following the success of 'Connected'. It took them 10 years to record its follow up.

Photo: Steve Manford
Story: Steve Manford

This photo of Damon Albarn is from Blur's gig at MDH in 1993. It was the Modern Life is Rubbish tour. My friend was interviewing the band for a magazine, so even though I wasn't really a fan, I went along.

I used to stand in a special place on the stage, just behind the PA. There were no obstructions there. I drank a bottle of Thunderbird Red during the gig and was absolutely fucked. I ended up in the Cellar Bar (now Club Academy) afterwards with Graham Coxon and Alex. I remember wandering off for while and asking them to look after my camera bag. They said they would, but when I got back they'd buggered off!

Sooz remembers:

See-through PVC troos, lots of sweat and a six pack - typical Iggy Pop!

Iggy released 'American Caesar' this year - considered his best album of the 90s by many.