Simon Rushworth
He’s back – the man in the know when it comes to rock is our very own Self Made Man.
Read his essential weekly blog right here every week! To the City Hall and a step back in time but for my mate Paul, it was a journey which had its limit.
“There’s no way I’m having a drink down there,” he reiterated for the umpteenth time and in all honestly, I couldn’t blame him.
The downstairs bar at the City Hall was the scene of some almighty tussles in bygone years in our frenzied efforts for alcoholic refreshment before a gig.
We can both recall scenes of desperation as three or four frantically overworked bar stuff tried in vain to service the drinking requirements of hundreds of denim-clad adolescents.
It wasn’t a picnic on our side of the bar either from what I rememberl. For starters, back in the late’70s and early-80s, a policy of social apartheid existed.
This meant that getting served rarely depended on how long a potential customer had queued. And we found to our cost that shouting loudly was not the answer either.
Being female, petite and preferably attractive was the prerequisite to grabbing the attention of the mostly male bar staff.
If by chance you managed to overcome this handicap, you were served then served a watered down (or so we alleged), beer in a flimsy plastic glass, having paid significantly more for the pleasure than you would have outside the venue.
And then came the hardest bit of all, trying to negotiate a route through the mass of sweat-fuelled humanity, much of which was sprawled across the floor, drunkenly oblivious to the blockage being caused.
Paul had more reason than me to recoil at such memories, being a fanatical anti-smoker both then and now. He still wonders how he survived so many suffocating experiences “down in that pit” in his youth.
With a low ceiling and handicapped by the sort of ventilation even a Chilean miner would struggle to cope with, the stench of nicotine, stale beer and body odour combined to provide an earthy counter to any hallucinogenic substances that might have been smuggled in.
And yet there was always one redeeming aspect to that downstairs cavern -the toilets.
In stark contrast to the adjoining bar area, they were spacious, clean, didn’t smell and didn’t involve lengthy queuing.
For all its nuances, the City Hall remains my favourite venue to watch a band and Sunday’s trip to see the imperious Joe Bonamassa evoked countless more good memories than bad.
The auditorium lends itself to an acoustically crisp and clear sound and whiIe in my teenage years, I’d have regarded any row behind the mixing desk as seats in the back of beyond, the reality is every seat in the stalls and most on the balcony offer decent sight-lines.
Our seats were 12 from the front, dead centre. Perfect. Or at least they would have been had not nature called.
Concert-going is a risky business for those of us who like a pint or three beforehand. Sensibly, we hadn’t over-indulged so all was peace and calm for the opening hour of JB’s set.
Then the urge came and not having the benefit of an aisle seat, it was a case of deciding the optimum moment or at least the least disruptive moment to take that walk of shame towards the back doors and downstairs to the loo, which required six fellow concert-goers to stand up to allow me out.
My toilet break seemed to be trend-setting for within minutes of re-taking my seat, I was up again and again as almost everyone in our row chose to do the same. Including Paul.
And do you know what he said on his return? “It’s quite nice down there these days.
“We’ll have to have a drink in the bar next time.”
How the years change us!