Hmmm, my last post was in March last year and was apologising for the lack of posts… Not a great track record I know, and it’s not as if there hasn’t been anything to tell you about. I’ve spent the last eighteen months or so covering and working with some amazing talent but it has been very busy and sadly I have to admit to concentrating more on doing the work than telling anyone about it. On the plus side, that means there are loads of great music images for you to have a browse through over on my archive.

Rather than spend this post telling you what I’ve been doing for the last eighteen months I’m going to go straight back to posting about gigs and shows. Hopefully I’ll find time over the coming weeks to tell you about some of the bands I’ve been working with lately because you really want to know about them. There seems to be another glut of talent spilling out of Manchester at the moment. Turrentine Jones, Jessie Rose and Rae Morris (okay I know she’s from Blackpool but she’s adopted Manchester as a second home so that’s good enough for me) to name just three and if you’re not aware of them you need to catch up soon. Meanwhile last week I was back in Liverpool catching one of my favourite bands – Maximo Park.

I’ve been a huge fan of the Park for about 7 years or so now, and must have seen them twelve or thirteen times now.  The first time I saw them live was back in July 2005 at The Old Market in Brighton.  I wouldn’t go as far as saying Paul Smith was nervous on stage back then but there was a lot of ‘..ummm’ and ‘…errr’ and I definitely remember the little red lyrics notebook he used to pull out and read from when performing ‘Once A Glimpse’.  Whiz forward to 2012 and any nervousness is well and truly buried. Paul Smith bounds, leaps and dances around the stage like he owns it now and it’s fair to say the show in Liverpool was one of the best performances I’ve seen from them yet.  I was off duty and without a camera of any sort at the Liverpool show but had my photo pass lined up for the gig at the HMV Ritz in Manchester.

Support for the current Maximo Park tour is provided by French five-piece “La Femme”.

With four synths lined up across the stage I wasn’t sure what to expect but I have the feeling this band was hand picked by Paul Smith and the rest of the boys from Maximo Park.  My French is strictly school boy level so I can’t offer any insight into their lyrics but with a distinctly lo-fi surf pop sound and more than a passing nod to early eighties electronica they’re a band I can’t wait to see again, and not just because lead singer Clémence has a similar look and style of dancing to one of my earliest childhood crushes – Kim Wilde (around the time of Kids In America).

Maximo Park on the other hand seemed to have fleshed out their sound even more.  There seems to be a new found confidence and complexity in their sound, vocalist Paul Smith thrives on the reaction from the crowd and despite having seen them perform three times already this year I’m eyeing up the XFM Winter Wonderland  listings  for Manchester and thinking about making it four.

Maximo Park performing live at HMV Ritz, Manchester, Greater Manchester, 2012-11-06 (Mike Gatiss / Music Pics)

Still not sure about Lukas’s Boycey impression though, really hope it’s a temporary measure in support of Movember

Maximo Park performing live at HMV Ritz, Manchester, Greater Manchester, 2012-11-06 (Mike Gatiss / Music Pics)

Maximo Park performing live at HMV Ritz, Manchester, Greater Manchester, 2012-11-06 (Mike Gatiss / Music Pics)

Maximo Park performing live at HMV Ritz, Manchester, Greater Manchester, 2012-11-06 (Mike Gatiss / Music Pics)