The Greatest City on Earth?

[Silent Orchestra]

You get the idea with that

But it's not all doom & gloom...

[Silent Orchestra]

Teenager Rewarded for Bravery

AN INSPIRATIONAL teenager who has survived dozens of major operations and beaten cancer twice has been named one of Britain's bravest children.

Helaina Stone, 13, has spent much of her life in hospital after being born with the rare genetic condition Costello Syndrome.

It causes physical disabilities, learning and speech difficulties and Helaina will join nine others to meet Gordon Brown when she receives a Woman's Own Children of Courage Award next month at Westminster Abbey.

Helaina, of Parkfield Road North, New Moston, has undergone open-heart surgery, brain surgery, corrective spinal surgery, a hysterectomy and chemotherapy, spending more than 60 hours in theatre.

Cathedral Rings With Sound of Xmas

MANCHESTER Cathedral is gearing up for its most hectic Christmas.

It will host 25 carol concerts, musical events and services throughout December in one of the busiest periods on record for staff.

And more than 20,000 visitors are expected to hear the two cathedral choirs sing.

Director of music Christopher Stokes said: "Christmas is our busiest time of year. Preparing to sing at so many events, in addition to our usual services, means we are running at full steam.

"It is a credit to the professionalism of our choirs that we are able to present such a festival of services and music."

And the punishing 11-hours-a-week rehearsal schedule has meant some members of the 15-strong main cathedral choir have suffered from winter bugs.

[Silent Orchestra]

Seeing as Manchester cathedral just got a mention, I will give you some pictures of it.

It was at the centre of a bit of a storm lately, as a computer game, developed by Sony, depicted the player running amok with a machine-gun, shooting the place up.

Needless to say, the God-squad weren't happy, but soon shut up when Sony opened its wallet & chucked a fat donation in their direction. Strangely, I didn't notice any maniacs taking to the streets calling for beheadings & genital mutilation.





Being shot to pieces in the computer game Resistance - Fall of Man.

[zipcode]

Teenager Rewarded for Bravery

AN INSPIRATIONAL teenager who has survived dozens of major operations and beaten cancer twice has been named one of Britain's bravest children.

Helaina Stone, 13, ...rare genetic condition ...a hysterectomy

Forced sterilization?

[Silent Orchestra]

I don't mind a bit of thread-drift, but let's keep it light-hearted

[Propagator]

Gotta pass some love around before I can green you for the thread

[Silent Orchestra]

I mentioned G-Mex earlier - here's a bit of background.



The complex started life as Manchester Central railway station, one of the city's main railway terminals. It was built between 1875–80. In 1982 work commenced on converting the former railway station into an exhibition centre, and the G-Mex opened in 1986.



^ This time, you can see the Bridgewater Hall in the background.

In 2001 the Manchester International Convention Centre (MICC) was added to the complex, with an 804 seat auditorium plus breakout rooms and Great Northern Hall. During 2005 the company running the G-MEX and MICC was bought by Manchester City Council. In September 2006 it was announced that the venue would regain its old name of Manchester Central.

The G-MEX centre stopped hosting concerts in 1997 (the last one being performed by Oasis - on my birthday, I was there - in December 1997), due to the popularity and size of the nearby MEN Arena, which is Europe's biggest indoor concert venue.




^ The MEN (Manchester Evening News) Arena



The only gigs I have been to here are the Prodigy & some black guy who I found tickets for on a chair in the pub where I worked. I took my girlfriend & nearly died when the owners of the tickets came up to take their seats. The bastards even went to complain to my boss at work the next day, but lucky for me, the boss was okay & told the guy to fuckoff

[Silent Orchestra]

The greatest nightclub in the world was Mancunian.



It was the Hacienda.



Sadly, it has been demolished & they have built flats on the land.



£120,000 for a bedsit

[Mathos]

Great City, I was born in Crumpsall Hospital. Used to sell 'Greyform' at White City dog track and programmes at 'Old Trafford'
That's when they were Matt Busby's ;-

'Busby Babes'

When they come to your town
You must go to the football ground
Then you will see quite plainly
Football taught by Matt Busby
At Manchester!
Manchester united
A buzzing bunch of Busby Babes
They deserve to be knighted!

[Silent Orchestra]

It wouldn't be right to mention the passing of the Hac, without mentioning the passing of Mr Manchester - Tony Wilson.



He died recently of cancer.

Unbelievably, he was refused life-saving drugs because they cost £3000 a month & he lived in the wrong postcode

You can read about Tony & see some TD member's tributes to him on this thread, which (again) a big-hearted member took the trouble to post.

https://teakdoor.com/the-teakdoor-lou...lson-dies.html

NOTE TO MOD - I would like this link cleaning up also, please - I notice you haven't done the other one yet. Though to be fair, I thought this thread would be a bit more popular than it turned out. I guess I'll have to come up with an epic, sure-fire massive hit thread, like What's for Dinner Tomorrow?

[Silent Orchestra]

I was born in Crumpsall Hospital

Me, too. I know it as Booth Hall.

They didn't let me out until I was three because of some kidney defect. They tested some new steroid on me in the end & here I am today - drinking myself into oblivion every weekend

Drugs are the best thing mankind ever invented.

[Silent Orchestra]

Manchester is world-famous for its music. Nowhere else has the credibility Manchester does when it comes to musical talent.

Let's take a look at some of the bands & individuals that we have spawned...

[jizzybloke]

Unbelievably, he was refused life-saving drugs because they cost £3000 a month & he lived in the wrong postcode

Or an asylum seeker!

[Silent Orchestra]

Although Manchester had an impressive music scene before 1976, with groups like The Hollies & The Bee Gees, undoubtedly, the key moment in Manchester's musical history occurred on 4th June, 1976, when the Sex Pistols, at the invitation of Howard Devoto and Pete Shelley of Buzzcocks, arrived at the Lesser Free Trade Hall in Castlefield to play a legendary gig - legendary, because in spite of an audience of less than 42 people, several key members of Manchester's future music scene were present: Tony Wilson Granada TV presenter and creator of Factory Records, Peter Hook, Bernard Sumner (of Joy Division & New Order), Morrissey - later to form The Smiths with Johnny Marr - producer Martin Hannett, and Mick Hucknall of Simply Red.

Soon after this gig, Wilson created Factory Records and signed Joy Division. Another influential event was the release of Buzzcocks' Spiral Sctratch in early 1977 - the first independent-label Punk record.

With the industrial revolution as its model, Factory Records played upon Manchester's traditions, invoking at once apparently incongruous images of the industrial north and the glamorous pop art world of Andy Warhol.

While labelmates A Certain Ratio and The Durutti Column each forged their own sound, it was Factory's Joy Division who somehow managed to grimly define what exactly it was to be a Mancunian as the '70s drew to an end.

At the same time, and out of the same post punk energy, emerged Mark E. Smith's groundbreaking group The Fall, who would become one of the most inventive, original and prolific groups of the next three decades. New Order rose from the ashes of Joy Division combining rock, pop, and dance music to earn much critical acclaim while selling millions of records.

The group that would ultimately become the definitive Manchester group of the '80s was The Smiths, lead by Morrissey and Marr. With songs like 'Rusholme Ruffians' and 'Suffer Little Children', Morrissey sang explicitly about Manchester, creating songs that are as iconic of Manchester as the paintings of L.S.Lowry.

As the '80s drew to a close, a new energy arrived in Manchester, fuelled by the drug ecstasy. A new scene developed around The Haçienda night club (again part of the Factory Records ‘empire’), creating what would become known as the Madchester scene, – the main proponents being the Happy Mondays, The Inspiral Carpets, and The Stone Roses. The history of the Manchester music scene over this period was dramatised in Michael Winterbottom's 2002 film 24 Hour Party People.

After the "Madchester" period, Manchester music lost much of its provincial energy, though many successful and interesting acts were still to emerge. Other notable musical acts in Manchester have been Take That, 808 State, M People, Oasis, The Verve, Magazine, The Durutti Column, A Certain Ratio, James, Badly Drawn Boy, Chameleons, Charlatans, Simply Red, Michael McGoldrick, Elbow, I Am Kloot, Autechre, Lamb, Marconi Union, A Guy Called Gerald, Mr Scruff, and Doves. Morrissey and The Fall still continue to garner critical acclaim while Oasis remain the most popular, having played to more than 1.7 million people worldwide during their Don't Believe the Truth tour of 2005/early 2006.

Click the links for the lowdown on each person/band.

Anybody know of a city or town that has given the world so much to listen to? I doubt it.

Manchester is the undisputed music capital of the world

[Silent Orchestra]

Another great thing to come out of manchester was the painter, L.S. Lowry. I didn't want to bang on about our achievements of old, so I won't. What I will do, is show you our multi-million pound art gallery, named after Mr Lowry, instead.



Around 100 of his original paintings hang here.

The footbridge, leading to the gallery (it was built on an island - to keep out various rouges of the night)

[Silent Orchestra]

We have an impressive library or two.

[Silent Orchestra]

Manchester University is ranked 6th in the world, behind Yale, Harvard, Oxford & Cambridge (I forget the other one).

[Silent Orchestra]

Chinatown.

[Silent Orchestra]

The oldest pub in Manchester - 500 years old.





Sadly, the IRA bomb blew it to pieces. Happily, they rebuilt it - 500 yards down the road - using all the original bricks & features they could salvage from the rubble. A lot of it is new, but it still maintains its character.

[Silent Orchestra]

Anything those Southern fairies can do, us Northern monkeys can do, too.



It's not as big though.

That's because up North, we don't get buckets of government cash to fund all these closet-homo projects & have to fund our own shit. We funded this one by getting the owners of it to pay us to site it here & let them charge whatever they want for a ticket. Last I heard it was £12.50, the robbing bastards.

Sharp-eyed readers may notice it is in the same spot as the bomb went off.

[peterpan]

Excellent thread SO, gives us a good feel for yr city, sadly only been to Manchester on the occasions when it was raining.
I used to do some business with a bakery there, Waburtons I think.
But then again maybe that was in a different country, its all just fading away now, like dream that you only remember bits of.

[Silent Orchestra]

Coming next - the moody side of Manchester.



While this may not exactly show manchester to be the greatest city in the world, it does show that we're not a soft touch.

[astasinim]

Great Thread SO
Gotta admit its quite a good city these days. Like most cities built around our industrial past, it had become quite a depressing place. Is athlecs palace still there? Went to the bridgewater hall a few years ago, to see the BBC philharmonic. Very impressive place it was too. You can also buy a good selection of thai food here.
Wing Yip - Oldham Rd



The only problem i have with Gunchester, sorry i mean Manchester is, the travelling distances from bar to bar. It maybe because i dont know the city too well, but it always seems im walking from one end of the city to the other, unless you go to canal st.

[Silent Orchestra]

I suppose I should cover Canal St before I go onto the robbers & murderers.

Afflecks Palace is still there - but by the skin of its teeth. With the property prices what they are now, the developers have got their eye on turning it into flats.

There's an article on it here. I have only quoted a small section Manchester Confidential - Affleck’s Palace to close!

Affleck’s Palace – arguably the heart of Manchester’s bohemian and creative spirit - is under threat.
The labyrinth of independent retailers on Tib Street is Manchester’s answer to Camden market and has been selling individual clothes, accessories, trinkets and unconventional goods to the Manchester’s non conformists for 25 years

For anybody who doesn't know, Afflecks is a kind of shopping institution in Manchester, mainly for the young. It is a strange place, consisting of many market-type stalls selling market-type shit. The attaction is that the rents are very low & almost anybody can open a shop or stall there & sell anything they want (a blind eye is turned to selling soft drugs, too), so you will find things here that you won't see anywhere else.





Most of the retail space is taken up by students, running their first business.

It will be a great loss to Manchester's young & student population if it closes.

[Silent Orchestra]

As for Canal St, it is the heart of Manchester's 'Gay Village'.

I've got crazy gangsters & wild-eyed mass-murderers to tell you about, so I won't waste too much time talking about some blokes who's idea of a night out is packing fudge.

Actually, I think a big-hearted member (again) did a thread on the gay pride march that they all had not too long ago. I'll see if I can dig it up - that will save me having to bang on about it now.