Ever get the feeling you’ve been cheated?
Johnny Rotten peddling butter… Fender selling pre knackered Telecasters as official Joe Strummer merchandise… Punk is dead. Long live capitalism.
Gimp Masks, Leonard Cohen LPs, Clint Boon and Toast
It’s a common problem. You absolutely have to have a gimp mask, a samurai sword, a Leonard Cohen picture disc and a bakelite wireless but there is only a couple of shopping hours left in the day. There is only one place to go; Oldham Street, the heart of Manchester’s Northern Quarter.
The grungy mix of nightspots, junks shops and emporiums both pawn and porn is a reflection of the shifting fortunes of Manchester’s answer to Soho. The Northern Quarter was born out of the boom of the industrial revolution. At one time as many as 100 textile mills were vying for space amongst the bustling Victorian streets.
The area earned a reputation as a centre of commerce and entertainment, thriving until German Bombs left their mark on the city during the Second World War. Whilst the Northern Quarter itself was largely undamaged, investment shifted towards rebuilding the areas that wore the scars of war.
Businesses relocated, the mills closed and the cheap rents attracted cheaper tenants. The area became the haunt of grubby individuals in long macs until the early 1980s when Manchester’s artisans moved into the faded grandeur of a department store on Oldham Street and created Affleck’s Palace, marking the birth of an inner city bohemia, the creative output of which would shape Manchester’s cultural identity. Today even the Oxfam is self aware and trendy selling as many rare records as any of the other groovy outlets in the neighbourhood.
Decades have now passed since the creative output from the Northern Quarter enjoyed national attention as the Madchester elite, shopping for baggy Joe Bloggs jeans at Affleck’s Palace, rubbed shoulders with the fans they would entertain later that evening at the equally hip Hacienda.
But even the bricks of the Hacienda couldn’t survive on history alone, the site eventual succumbed to the demolition ball making way for apartments that trade on this once glorious name. As large parts of the Northern Quarter are being given over to residential development the question begs; has the Northern Quarter become a trendy lifestyle brand with the power to sell homes at the expense of the indie artisan ideal and individual creativity?
“I still consider the Northern Quarter as up and coming, certainly in terms of musical creativity” says Rob Dart, proprietor of Mostly Toast Productions, a recording studio on Oldham Street. “There are bars and venues cropping up all over the place and most of them are successful and sustainable. Ok some of them have been here for years and to a certain extent that generates nostalgia but new bands still come to the Northern Quarter and you can find one every night at all kinds of venues around here.”
The historic vibrations of the Northern Quarter certainly predate the Happy Mondays heyday of the late 1980’s. The post war relocation of businesses and the development of the Arndale Centre meant that the Oldham Street neighbourhood survives largely faithful to its early Victorian roots.
“All the buildings around here are amazing” says Rob. “If you look up when you walk around the streets there’s some fabulous architecture – statues and engraving. It’s a different world. You can see the history all around.”
The musical creativity of the Northern Quarter also predates the tie-dye vendors at Affleck’s Palace. In the early 1900’s Oldham Street was a popular haunt for youths who would dance to a soundtrack dictated by the immigrant buskers who entertained the late night shoppers.
“It’s well documented that there has been a musical culture around the Northern Quarter since the Victorian days” says Rob. “We’re not trading on the past, this is evolution. People are still getting involved and, fair enough they might be building on roots laid down by others but what’s wrong with that?”
Clint Boon of Oldham band the Inspiral Carpets and a DJ on XFM has been a visitor to Oldham Street since the early days of the Madchester scene. Despite the increase in residential development remains confident that the Northern Quarter has a creative future.
“The area has evolved to some extent” says Clint. “Where you used to get the baggy kids in the late 80s and early 90s you now get the Emos. They’re both youth cultures but they’re different cultures all the same. It’s unfair to say that they are trading on the past. Someone lived in my house a hundred years ago but now I’ve made it mine, it’s the same thing.”
The economic slow down will spell uncertain times for the Northern Quarter. The developers were late arriving having exhausted most other real-estate options in the inner city first so now many of the apartment blocks are part finished or simply vacant as money gets tighter. But Clint has a feeling that the organic nature of the Northern Quarter will eventually stamp its own mark on these buildings.
“It is true that there isn’t as much creative output as there has been” says Clint. “It has been given over to redevelopment in recent years but that wont last. Who wants to live in a city when there’s a recession? The apartments will gradually empty and I would like to see the space given to studios for the local artisans.”
Even the future of Affleck’s itself was recently called in to question until landlords Brunswick took the unprecedented step of buying the business to safe guard its future.
“I don’t think Affleck’s Palace was ever in any real danger. It’s a high profile building on a high profile street,” says Clint. “Mancunians see it every day so it will always be a talking point and one thing Brunswick discovered was that there’s a lot of love for the place.”
Whilst the facades remain the same three decades of artisan community coupled with recent private and council investment have managed to make the Northern Quarter a slightly sweeter place to be in the 21st Century, as Clint explains;
“It’s certainly cleaner than it was. My enduring memory of Oldham Street was in the late 80’s after an Inspiral Carpets gig. We were having a brew in a café and a prostitute stopped outside, squatted in the gutter and had a wee. It’s come a long way since.
“It never used to be an area where you could take your mum for a cup of tea but now I’m quite happy to take my family there for a spot of lunch.”
As the rest of Manchester begins to resemble every other major European city, with uber posh high street haberdashers like Selfridges and countless Seattle caffineries lining the dearer streets, the Northern Quarter remains passionately Mancunian and is part of the identity of the brands based here. Like Manchester as a whole, the Northern Quarter may be edgy but, despite the gimp masks, it is no longer rough with it.