Live Review: The Stranglers - Manchester
15th March 2023
Words: Dan Barnes
Photos: Bill Mawdsley
The announcement a couple of years back that punk institution, The Stranglers – or Stran-gull-uz where I’m from – would be scaling back their touring schedule, was a sad day. It’s been a couple of years since the In Memory of Dave Final Full Tour, and a sold-out Apollo reminds the Guildford four-piece how revered they still are.
From the get-go, it’s clear that this Fifty Years in Black Anniversary Tour was going to be a bit different. Usually the support act is named at the same time as the tour, and The Stranglers have always toured with some big-hitters: Therapy?, Dr Feelgood and The Ruts DC, most recently.
The easy option would have been to put a high-profile support on and deliver a couple of hours wall-to-wall classics; but half a century in and The Stranglers eschew the easy option in favour of a long-time fan’s dream set.
Split over two performances, the first thing noticeable is the last of the Waltzinblack intro. Instead, it’s walk on, plug in and fire into the unsettling electronica of Just Like Nothing on Earth and the noodling Hallow to Our Men from 1981’s fifth album, The Gospel According to the Men in Black.
JJ welcomes Manchester to the evening and dedicates the performance to the sadly departed Jet Black and Dave Greenfield, both men’s presence still standing colossus over the legacy of the band.
It’s a step backward to The Raven for the title track, the saucy Baroque Bordello and Genetix, with a captivating version of Aural Sculpture’s North Winds separating the latter two. Although some of the band’s early output might lack the power and bottom end on vinyl, the live renditions are firmly pinned to the ground through JJ’s heavy bass work.
The first half of the show plays out with a power through of three from the illustrious debt: Princess of the Street, Hanging Around and Down in the Sewer are all greeted like the old friends they are and even the interloping Breathe, from 2021’s Dark Matters record, feels as though it belongs amongst the established classics of the catalogue.
A short break and the band return, this time with a truncated version of the Waltzinblack. Who Wants the World? Dagenham Dave and Duchess are perhaps more familiar to most than Time to Die and Ships that Pass in the Night, but there’s no less love shown for any of the band’s progenies. The bass riff of Peaches makes the Apollo explode, as does Skin Deep and the obligatory singalong that is Always the Sun.
Vocal duties are more evenly split between JJ and Baz, with the former commenting that last night in Newcastle he had to mention it was Steak and BJ Night and Baz remarking that it was good to see so many people with hair at a Strangler’s gig. “Usually, it looks like a load of eggs…” he quips, before ripping into the wearers of man-buns.
Possibly some of the least enviable roles in music is when performers have to step into shoes vacated by others. Baz has done twenty-five years, but Jim Macaulay, replacing Jet as touring drummer in 2012, only took a full-time post in 2018. Whereas Toby Housham had barely three years on the keys, replacing the ever-popular Dave Greenfield. The weight of the band’s history does not seem to affect either player, as The Stranglers are as tight as any fifty year old troupe could be.
There’s a few set staples missing tonight, but not Golden Brown’s hypnotic lilts. Relentless and Lost Control sit before and after a rollicking 5 Minutes and, in my opinion, one of the best tracks of the past twenty-years, White Stallion.
Something Better Change and Tank finish the set, with an encore of the first song The Stranglers wrote, Go, Buddy, Go’s infectious grooves, introduced by JJ admitting they wear the critical badge of Pub Band with pride and honour. Which leaves only No More Heroes and that bowel-disturbing bass opening. Hands and voices are raised, people are on their feet and going with the flow, and the curtain is brought down on another spectacular Strangler’s show.
Not many other bands would delve as deeply or as broadly into their own back catalogue as The Stranglers did tonight. Only – by my reckoning, at least – the 10, About Time, Written in Red, Coup de Grace and Giants albums weren’t visited. Maybe next time, on the next anniversary tour.
Half a century of doing this Rock thing and The Stranglers is nothing but honed to perfection and tonight proved that in spades. Next time we cross paths will be in the opulent(ish) surroundings of the Empress Ballroom in Blackpool for their Friday Rebellion headlining slot.
That should prove to be another damned fine evening.
Photo credits: Bill Mawdsley
