Monday 14 November 2011

Salford Ents

Salford University Union Ents



Help me here guys. I have memory syndrome. The one on the left in the Ents sweater is the chairman at the time Dave Sowerbutts.

Dave was a really good friend and support throughout my time in Salford. He also kept an eye on what was going on in other parts of the city and it was probably with him that I went to see gigs at Manchester Union or Owens Park as we called it, the Poly Disco, Stoneground (which has a blog site, http://cres1.lancs.ac.uk/~esarie/Stoneground/) and Magic Village (another place with a blog site http://www.manchesterbeat.com/venues/manchester_cbd/magicvillage/magicvillage.php). Owens Park and the Free Trade hall were regularly visited, the other places only occasionally. Later, mid to late 70s, I would occasionally go to the Band on the Wall.



see stoneground site where I have borrowed this from, link above.


As a 'roadie' or 'Enti' I had back/side stage acces or sat in the balcony operating the lights. Is this Bonzo Dog Do Dah?
Does the keyboard player with a cigarrette help identify? Sorry about the camera shake, I used available light on a wide aperture. Almost forgot that as well as dripping with condensed sweat, many venues were full of smoke. Although having turned vegitaraian I smoked. I was inhaling secondary smoke anyway.

And who is this? It could be a support act because the Tailor's dummy bass behind him/her isn't plugged in yet.

 Must be Curved Air with Sonja Kristina, can you tell we are having a good time? Bands loved Salford because the response was always good.

 I loved the Peel building. We discovered the way in to the Victorian air conditioning system. There is a door just off the stairs to what was a studio for photography at the top of the middle tower. Looking down into the massive fan was quite spooky. You could peer through the grills into the lecture rooms. This was another of my unusual places to take girls I wanted to impress. Because it was up the stairs near to the Victorian gents they thought I must be taking them there, but no it was far more impressive than that. Actually, the gents near the bookshop still had mahogany loo seats and lead lined mahogany high level closets. Lovely and comfy. The pic above is from the same day we were running the open air disco to test out our amps and speakers.

1 comment:

  1. One of the guys in the top photo, the one with the moustache. is ... Mike...and next to him is ...Graham; and I think that's Ewan with his back to us

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