Summer Sundae, Leicester, 2010

Belated review of this festival now. We were lucky enough to win tickets through Go Leicestershire, along with fancy-pants hotel accommodation, so we weren't immersed in the full festival experience. This along with the, er, modest size of Summer Sundae made it kind of feel like a weekend away during which we caught a few bands in the local park. In fact, that was exactly what it was. However it was a very nice local park, with tasty food and some great bands.

It was very family-friendly, with lots of cute things going on like this Punch and Judy show.

Music highlights included the lovely Laura Veirs, with her new band the Hall of Flames.

Tunng were without a doubt the band of the festival for me. Last time I saw them, at the Band on the Wall in Manchester, they seemed nervous to be back, but this time they through themselves into the set with abandon, and I loved it so much I had a little cry. There had been wine that afternoon. Got a good feeling about these guys, think they might cross over to the mainstream if they carry on producing songs of this quality.

This was the first time I'd caught Liam Frost ( and live in Manchester, I know!) and it was everything I had expected and hoped for - gentle, heartfelt songs sung simply with just a guitar. Beautiful.
The Besnard Lakes were our last band of the festival, and although they didn't maybe click with the Sunday afternoon crowd they put in an impressive effort on one hours sleep in 36 hours, and since seeing them live I'm starting to really enjoy the album. They're growers I reckon.

All in all a good weekend. Would I go back under my own steam? Maybe not, but something like this closer to home would be a proper treat. Get on it Platt Fields.

Antlers @ St Philip's Church, Salford, 20 May 2010

I think I would go and see any act on at St Philip’s Church. Seriously. Even Diana Vickers who I accidentally went to see the other night (don’t ask). Its just the most perfect venue: beautiful Grecian church, pews to sit on, and in a lovely spot just round the corner from the New Oxford and 15 minutes walk from St Peter’s Square. It certainly encourages a more reverential atmosphere, as commented on by Peter Silberman of the Antlers last night. But it does differ from mass in one important way: parishioners run a bar from a trestle table at the back, and provide a frankly better service than most bars in Manchester. They recommended Mr Noggin buy me a cider as “the wine tastes of bleach”. It’s that kind of guidance you need from a barperson.

It’s only fair to say up front that I hadn’t listened to the Antlers before that day and wasn’t sure what to expect – I was going along with a couple of fans. I’d also had a rather nice tea and a couple of beers and was half expecting to have a snooze at some point (see title of blog). But there was no risk of that with this band. They were intense from the very beginning, and worked their way through the album Hospice in track order, as it tells of a traumatic relationship with a patient dying of cancer. Silberman’s voice is hypnotic and the audience is drawn fully into the story-telling.

The mood broke only a couple of times. At one point a member of the audience asked if they were going to play Two, and they smiled and coyly said “Maybe” – surely redundant as they were clearly playing the whole album. Later on Silberman commented on how respectful the audience were, proceeding to shush the crowd when they laughed. It was a welcome break from the intensity of the music, but they were soon back into it.

The album alternates pained quiet singing with loud crashing of Silberman’s guitar and Michael Lerner’s drums. Darby Cicci hides behind a mop of hair as he provides anguished keyboard. There is a real synchronicity within the band as they play. They aren’t going through the motions, there are genuine connections made as they look to each other throughout the show.

It seems there has been much chatter around the subject matter of the album and whose story it tells. But this wasn’t the question at the forefront of our minds as we walked into the warm Salford night. We were wondering what on earth the band would do to follow that.

Bubble Cafe, Manchester

If you read food blogs from around the world, you can build up food envy for products and restaurants that aren’t available in the UK. For example I can only fantasise about Meyer lemons being made available in the UK as I read blog after blog singing their praises, and I peer at photos of exotic looking Vietnamese food, until recently unavailable in Manchester. But the latter has been rectified by the opening of the Bubble Café, above Red Chilli on Portland Street. It’s a casual, neatly decorated place with two long tables with stools if you want to eat in, although there was a brisk takeaway trade while we were there.

The menu is rather mysterious to a person with no knowledge of Vietnamese food, and I am no expert myself. The name of the café comes from the Bubble Tea they serve. This can come hot or cold, and is a tasty drink, either fruit or milk based, with the surprising addition of tapioca pearls in the bottom, black balls visible through the glass. The tea is served with a large straw, wide enough to suck up the pearls as you drink. The taste of the pearls is hard to pinpoint as the chewy, gummy texture is the most prominent sensation, and is rather enjoyable in a strange way! Mr Noggin had a banana milkshake he described as the best thing he’d ever tasted – I suspect it’s down to the Movenpick ice cream they stock.

There is a short food menu of around seven items, including salads and noodle soups. We ordered the prawn and Vietnamese ham spring rolls to start, and then the Bubble sandwich as a main.

The spring rolls were different but brilliant; huge, cold, wrapped in a paper thin casing and packed with juicy prawns, veg and noodles. They were perfect dipped in the accompanying hoi sin or fish sauce.

The sandwich I had read about in blogs as Bahn Mi, and is a baguette filled with pork, liver pate, and a pickled salad. The Bubble Sandwich was good, but had an overriding taste of salad cream, which was a bit of a shame as it drowned out the other flavours.

The whole meal came to around £16 for two, and you can currently get free frozen yoghurt after your meal if you mention Manchester Confidential. It’s a very cool little place with charming staff and I cannot recommend it enough.

PS. I have just had a scout around on Google and it appears my guesswork was a bit wrong – Bubble tea originated in Taiwan, and is common across a lot of Asia now, so not strictly Vietnamese as I thought.