its grim, up north

!!!

Is Hebden Bridge really Britain's lesbian capital?

its not grim, at all, again it shouldnt be on this list (especially as grimethorpe is not)

it was lesbian boho stretching way back before the 60s

Surely Heckmondwike, no?

brings back many memories

all of them shit

Sale
Manchester
Leeds
York
Chester
Scarborough

Lived in:
0

Cleethorpes
Grimsby
Scunthorpe
Scarborough
York
Sheffield

The place I live seems to be about 10 miles too far south to be on the list, but it's pretty grim here too. In the whole of Lincolnshire in fact, not just Grimsby, Scunny and Cleethorpes.

I always thought it a pity that no one ever did a "It's Grimmer Down South" answer record.

I live there. It is. That news article was the big front-page headline in yesterday's Grimsby Telegraph.

Places in the song that I've lived in: just Grimsby and Cleethorpes. Places I've visited:

Barnsley
Bradford
Wigan
Leeds
Hull
Salford
Derby
Keighley
Glossop
Clitheroe
The M62
York
Scunthorpe
Scarborough
Sheffield
Manchester
Castleford
Doncaster

Keighley is pretty grim but the retro railway station is nice and it's only five miles away from Haworth and Bronte country and all that.

Beverley, Barnsley, Bradford, Bingley, Bolton, Bury, Blackburn,

Bradford,
Crewe,
Warrington,
Leeds,
Derby,
Harrogate,
Macclesfield,
The M62,
York,
Scarborough-on-Sea,
Ikley Moor (bah't'at),
Sheffield,
Manchester,
Doncaster,
Hali-fax,
Bingley,

Me muther's frum Sheffild.

Harrogate, York and Leeds are by no means grim. It's posh up North Yorks.

Bolton,
Bradford,
Buxton,
Crewe,
Warrington,
Leeds,
Knutsford,
Salford,
Harrogate,
Huddersfield,
Grimsby,
Brighouse,
Macclesfield,
Cleethorpes,
The M62,
Preston,
York,
Skipton,
Scunthorpe,
Scarborough-on-Sea,
Chester,
Cheadle Hulme,
Sheffield,
Manchester,
Castleford,
Doncaster,
Hali-fax,

And of those, the grimmest was Castleford.

Lived in: York.

I've lived in Chorley, and my sister's lived in Chester and Runcorn too.

I wouldn't like to say which was the grimmest - some I haven't been to for over 15 years, and I guess it depends on the season and the weather.

also:
Pickering (quite nice)
Whitehaven (bit grim)
Whitby (nice)

are any of the towns or mentioned in 'It's Grim Up North' in Teeside, Durham or Tyneside? Couldn't The JAMMS have gone further North? Did they just bottle it?

No.

Milton Keynes

Lived - Rochdale, well, Heywood, (near junction 19 of the M62) and Lancaster.

Just going through the list makes me realise how much I really don't like West and South Yorkshire and East Lancs. Those milltown yellow stone terraced streets hewn into places that really aren't the best places to live, geographically and geologically speaking.

xpost - There's an argument that the North begins at the Manchester Ship Canal. There's another one that counts Nottingham and Derby nand such like as Northern. I'd don't count Staffordshire as the North, and Cheshire, whilst Northern, is just Surrey-manque, so Merseyside, Manchester, Lancs, West and South Yorks are my dividing line. That would make Sheffield the most southerly northern Town, and Chesterfield the most northern southern town.

Warrington
Bolton
Chorley
Manchester
The M62

And I've never lived further north than Coventry.

Actually, no I think I'll eat it myself, num num...

You live in a different country, though!

Derby's by far the southest in the list. Not sure how that in got there.

I lived in Whitehaven for far too many years, and it's more grim than any town mentioned in the song. As is Barrow, Workington and Maryport. They should do a song "It's Grim Up West Cumbria".

Wherefor Grimsnargh? Goosnargh? Longridge? Adlington?

EXACCKKLEEEE.

I don't think I've ever been to a more soul-sapping place than Crewe.

although it is the birthplace of the do-re-mi scale, and the blackpool illuminations.

and im applying ofr a job with kirklees council!!!!

Is there a song, called 'It's Grim Up North'?

I'm not sure if many of the places it mentions are 'interesting' though.

I sometimes wonder, about the pinefox.

yea, thats my reasoning basically

the newcastle/carlisle thing is interesting, because 'the north' seems to be mean a)the north, or b)yorks/lancs, at different times. then you get this northeast thing to describe the tynetees region, and, carlisle/cumbria is just ignored.

newcastle and carlisle, sunderland and penrith, are clearly the north, yet, when people say the north, you know what they mean, they mean, well, most of those places in the list

No, that would be Grewelthorpe, which is lovely btw

2)There are lots of little intimate villages around Preston - Broughton, Eaves, Woodplumpton - can Starry tell me some more of this ilk to visit?

X-post

derby is a lot further south again, virtually the midlands.

Might have been to more, but those are the definites.

http://www.coastaltown.nildram.co.uk/jim/slicecity.jpg

There are next to no pubs, very few shops. The entire thing is a circle with the different areas marked in alphabetical order going around the central point, which is a large shopping complex called The Concourse. The "C*%$^onny" as it is know locally (there's a peculiarity in Skem that as it's a Liverpool overspill their accents have become a lot harsher than they should be - they sound more Scouse than Scousers to the point where they can get that Gggggg-about-to-grolly sound onto the beginning of the word "Conny" - try it, it's the linguistic equivalent of a double somersault). The Concourse takes 1 year off your life for every lap of it you do. Fact.

To give you an idea here's a lovely mid-terrace
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/viewdetails-5755289.rsp/svr/3002;jsessionid=DA765E89E1F07DFDC50A8BB76DD6478E?pa_n=1&tr_t=buy&chnl=buy

1. A crazy old man who ROLLERSKATES past all the pubs of an evening to massive applause from all the locals
2. It used to have a fishman that sold things like whelks from pub to pub. He seems to be known worldwide.
3. The local paper frequently charts the battles between the local model boat society and the local duck population.
4. The town centre sports an incomplete Stargate
5. a piss poor collection of Celebrity ex-residents including Kilroy-Silk, Marianne Faithful and Johnathon Pryce, Gazza, Joe Royle, Roy Evans and at any one time about a quarter of the Merseyside footballing population.
6. A church has BOTH a SPIRE and a TOWER. This is apparently INTERESTING.
7. a water tower that looks like a UFO
8. a clock tower in the centre of town that for many years was graffiti'ed with the phrase "FOGHEAD IS GAY"
9. No football team
10. A mushroom farm that wafts the pleasing smell of rotting fungus all over town on every hot day.

Skem has -
1. Wannabe Scousers
2. Stabbings

I gather that walking into Skem shopping centre from where Tag Senior worked (Co-op bank) becaming increasingly hazardous over time. From mere gobbing to actually taking your life in your hands every time you visited.

and i live in sheffield and it's anything but grim!

Remind me why we left Ormskirk again?
Oh yeah, something to do with it being ridiculously expensive to live there, and that it's soul was being slowly eaten alive by Skem, and Sports Studies Students.

If doing laps of the C*%^h&^onny adds a year to your life then I estimate that I'm currently about 326 years old.

I am the ultimate Soft Southern Poof.

I am also a Soft Southern Poof.

My mum's family are all from Manchester but most of them left.

Hebden Bridge is great, as is Ormskirk especially the double apendaged church.

I really like Scarborough too, particularly Peaseholme park.

Buxton's good. The Peak's are generally a good bet. Monsal Dale's a great place to go for hiking purposes.

it seems i have been to 44, not 42. but, why is leigh included twice?

I've never been a big fan of buxton though, it always seems a bit *too* fond of it's Victorian grandeur, which is all a bit shabby really

Of other places mentioned, Garstang seems quite a lovely little place. I went to a wedding there once. It is exactly what me as a Scottish person thinks that little English villages look like (Nantwich is a bit like that too, but bigger).

Been to: Bradford, Buxton, Wigan, Leeds, Hull, Salford, Southport, Leigh, Glossop, The M62, Scarborough-on-Sea, Chester, Ormskirk, and Leigh, Sheffield, Manchester, Castleford. (and Parbold)

Been through: Bolton, Crewe, Warrington, Derby, Huddersfield, Bootle, Runcorn, Macclesfield, Lytham St. Annes, Doncaster.

(I've been through Doncaster on the train too, if that's on the way to Cambridge, which I think it is, but have no opinion whatsoever on it. It spawned Lesley Garrett and Jeremy Clarkson though, didn't it)

Knaresborough didn't get mentioned...

feel the stink you gimp.

taste your own blood.

this board is now kapput.

we'll never forget you, you made us what we are

i haven't been to any of the places in the original post.

I live in Ormskirk, which is actually quite nice. We've got a university now, you know. My wife used to live in both Grimsby and Leigh, both of which are appalling. Evertything that's said on this thread is about Skem is true, particularly the part about the Connie. The best thing that ever happened in Skem was the council spending tens of thousands of pounds on these laser-cut steel sculptures depicting the faces ordinary skem citizens to enliven their many roundabouts, then having to pull one down as he turned out to be a convicted coke dealer. So far I've racked up:

Bolton,
Burnley
Bradford,
Crewe,
Warrington,
Widnes,
Wigan,
Leeds,
Knutsford,
Hull,
Sale,
Salford,
Southport,
Leigh,
Derby,
Keighley
Maghull,
Harrogate,
Huddersfield,
Oldham, Lancs,
Grimsby,
Hebden Bridge,
Bootle,
Speke,
Runcorn,
Rotherham,
Rochdale,
Barrow,
Morecambe,
Macclesfield,
Lytham St. Annes
Clitheroe,
Cleethorpes,
The M62,
Preston,
York,
Scunthorpe,
Scarborough-on-Sea,
Chester,
Chorley,
Ormskirk,
Leigh
Ikley Moor,
Sheffield,
Manchester,
Castleford,
Skem,

http://immortal.battlegrim.net/img/covers/small/1995_battles_in_the_north.jpg

1. Battles In The North
2. Grim And Frostbitten Kingdoms
3. Descent Into Eminent Silence
4. Throned By Blackstones
5. Moonrise Fields Of Sorrow
6. Cursed Realms Of The Winterdemons
7. At The Stormy Gates Of Mist
8. Through The Halls Of Eternity
9. Circling Above In Time Before Time
10. Blashyrkh (Mighty Ravendark)

Battles In The North

Come forth demonized
Under the banner of Blashyrkh we ride
In the battlesky we lie estranged
Kings of the ravenrealm
We trample bejeweled thrones of the earth
In an age undreamed of
Viewing myriad battles
Yet our eyes sparkling strident with strength
To trample bejeweled thrones of the earth
In an age undreamed of
The ones to sit upon the elder thrones
With shadowed faces for the coming centuries

Riding towards the masterfields
A ride from the north to the north
By our sacred raven we are one
In the deadwhite moonlight
Far above we reign mercilessly
Kings of the ravenrealm
Stronger than ice stronger than stone
A horde of heathenhearts to come

Battle... Battles in the north

Those who adhere to principle above battlelust
Sing your songs with dying breath
For the kings of the ravenrealm

For the kings of the ravenrealm
Battle... Battles in the north

Grim And Frostbitten Kingdoms

Frostbitten I became forthwith to see
Crystalized dimensions
To where the unfaithful fly
You might say I'm demonized
But yet not the only one
You must come to me
There are nocturnal paths to follow

Painted faces from earlier centuries
Wander by desecrating winds
Binded shadows cast out from daylight
And from the beaten lands

Frostbitten I became forthwith to see
Crystalized dimensions
To where the unfaithful fly
You might say I'm demonized
But yet not the only one
You must come to me
There are nocturnal paths to follow

Enjoying the circle of eminent silence
Amidst the glacial abyss
Join my yearning emptiness
And the knowing of being beneath
Grim and frostbitten kingdoms

Descent Into Eminent Silence

Standing by ringwalls of stone
Deepest dungeons
Passing irongates
Nor the golden sent dreams
Under towers that once stormed in sight
That never storm

Hill... the elder ravens
Above borgs layed in fog
Forget not the blasphemic nordic deeps

Shadows... steal our souls
Into what we once were
I'm feeling that well be taken there

Closed in time for those
Who shall not pass our gates

Throned By Blackstorms

In circles concentric against the earth
I enthrone my spiritworlds
Obviously of frost shall be
Blizzard beasts encompassing me
To vipe the faces of the earth
In memorial to the ones with pride
And glance of day will never shine
For the realms are mine

Master of nebulah frost
Await the solar fall
Creations of ice shall behold
Wings majestic funereal
Guide through spectral lands
None shall pass me there

Hidden within churning chasms of an elder age
Come the mighty sons of dawn
Shadows of aurora
A time for pure holocaust to rise
Decades a thousand fold

In circles concentric against the earth
I enthrone my spiritworlds
Obviously of frost shall be
Blizzard beasts encompassing me
To vipe the faces of the earth
In memorial to the ones with pride
Glance of day shall never shine
These realms are mine
Stillbreathing waters
Made birth to the beasts
From the throne of the north
Throned by blackstorms

Creations of ice shall behold
Wings majestic funereal
Guide through spectral lands
None shall pass me there

Throned by blackstorms

Moonrise Fields Of Sorrow

Moonrise fields of sorrow
Our mighty fathers fell
Mountains watches memories
From a darkshining past

Layed in frost below a bleak sun
Under icicled paths
Mighty were the fathers of norsemen
And in us they shall return

Shine for me fields of sorrow
Shine for me dread moon
And make for me neverending snowfall

Moonrise fields of sorrow (repeat)

Layed in frost below a bleak sun
Under icicled paths
Mighty were the fathers of norsemen
And in us they shall return

Cursed Realm Of The Winterdemons

Eyeless in eternal time
For I have worm the moonshine
Burning away daylight glimmer
With my nocturnal senses
Winds have come for me
Winds will come to me
Descending now
Towards the frostmoon eclipse

A spectral spiritkingdom rises
In stormscreens covered by eyes
Night emits its shadow
There is no difference between the ravens
They have come for me
They will come to me
To the cursed realms
Of the winterdemons

Lavender eyes had only known the underdark
From crypts of stone they rise beyond the blinding glare
Eyeless in eternal time
For I have worn moonshine
Burning away daylight glimmer
With my nocturnal senses
Winds have come for me
Winds will come for me
Descending now towards
The frostmoon eclipse

Out from the chambers and horizons will open for me
The face of the earth will be to know black silence
For I saw them march for the lights...

At The Stormy Gates Of Mist

Endless tall mountainsides
Gates to open wide
Land of dragonbirths
Sorrow always rains

On a frosty path to sorrow
Guarded by unearthly beasts
Darkening memories claim that winter never dies

With bad moons enshrined in the heart
Northern darkness walks
With me hand in hand

At the stormy gates of mist

On a frosty path to sorrow
Guarded by unearthly beasts
Darkening memories claim that winter never dies

With bad moons enshrined in the heart
Northern darkness walks
With me hand in hand

Endless tall mountainsides
Gates to open wide
Land of dragonbirths
Sorrow always rains
What waits me there behind the permafrost
Views that eye can never bear
At the stormy gates of mist
I'm still standing...

Through The Halls Of Eternity

In storm I ride toward the shadowruins
Infernally vasts take my sight
To color my vision
From an endless dripping sky

Paint the visage centuries old
Of those that rode by my side
The hovering steel desecrators

Nearer have I never been
To this that I always searched
The crystal cleared opening
In which I shall be gone

From an endless dripping sky
Cryptic visages centuries old
Of those that rode by my side
In storm I stand upon ruins
Infernally vasts take my sight again
The light is dim before me
For the vision was frost

Chiming bells of immortality
Sings through the halls of eternity...

Circling Above In Time Before Time

In time when dragons sprang out from the earth
I was at one with a blackening moonlit
And from a borg to the open sky
I saw an raven circle

Born out of thorns to the surface world
With mesmerizing strength
To fly among the blackest rain
And soar into the deepest gorge

For this I would battle kingly palaces
For they learn to be false
And outshine all that I once knew

Circle above the open sky
To fly among the blackest rain
Know in the underdark
To soar into the deepest gorge
In time when dragons sprang out from the earth
I was at one with a blackening moonlit
From a borg to the open sky
I saw an raven circle

In time when dragons sprang out from the earth
I was at one with a blackening moonlit
And from a borg to the open sky
I saw an raven circle

Circling...
Circling above in time before time

Blashyrkh (Mighty Ravendark)

Far above the ravengate
The spreaded wings of Blashyrkh waits
Above the roaring depths
Sits the oath of frost on the elder raventhrone

Older mountains sleeping in my sight
By chilling woods I stand
A grimly sound of naked winds
Is all that shall ever be heard from here

Cometh the rightful kings of highest halls
Cry of ravens lurk the realm
Eternally through the noctambulant grimness

...Demons stride at the gates of Blashyrkh...
...Blashyrkh... Mighty ravendark...

I have been to:

Bradford, Wigan, Leeds, Hull, Salford, Derby, Keighley, Huddersfield, Grimsby, Glossop, Brighouse, Rotherham, Cleethorpes, The M62, York, Scunthorpe, Scarborough, Ossett, Otley, Sheffield, Manchester, Castleford, Doncaster and Dewsbury.

Speaking as someone who grew up in a slum, I think that the lax use of the word "grim" is to be discouraged.

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/nelson/large/1.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/1.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/5.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/7.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/6.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/8.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/hartlepool/large/9.JPG

dope photos http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/

I'm transported!

dude in second pic looks fly. what's with the hats/helmets?

like that corner one too.

looks identical to where i grew up but less hilly

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/4.JPG

(xxxxpost) Williams S. Burroughs: "I don't think we're in Kansas anymore Toto!2

yeah, thought about posting the pit pony guy to It's the 1p3 What Do You WISH You Looked Like Thread

lol manchester

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/7.JPG

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/11.jpg

great embroidery on the denim there

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/6.JPG

It's bugging me that I used to know where this is, but I've forgotten. Anyone?

Now this is annoying me too. Somewhere round Fairfield st/whitworth st maybe? Not convinced and can't identify the white building in the background.

http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3604/3373936786_ec5da97ed4.jpg

also, cheAdle hulme.

Hyde Park Flats RIP

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/113/299035840_db043a6f6a_o.jpg

Hole in the Road RIP
http://l.yimg.com/g/images/spaceball.gif

gah - flickr blocking most photos

http://www.firthparkgrammarschool.co.uk/sheffield/08.jpg

remember getting my shoes resoled at the hole in the road.

It's bugging me that I used to know where this is, but I've forgotten. Anyone?

Ok, that's going to annoy me. I thought it was the one between Tasle Alley and John Dalton Street but it's not. Would really like to know.

caek, those John Bulmer pictures are just incredible. Serious thanks for linking.

seriously. i love this one so much

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/1.JPG

it's not grim it's beautiful

The horse at the back is saying "Don't blame me I voted conservative"

Amazing archive. From the People section, we travel down south:

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/people/4.html

aaaarghhhhh.

Hmm, I think the building to the right is the Corn Exchange, the building in the background next to that is the Renaissance Hotel on Blackfriars Street. We're stood on Corporation Street.
This is approximately the view now, if that's correct:

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=manchester+triangle&sll=51.500152,-0.126236&sspn=0.052255,0.154324&ie=UTF8&hq=The+Triangle&hnear=The+Triangle&ll=53.484848,-2.242363&spn=0,359.997589&z=19&layer=c&cbll=53.484848,-2.242363&panoid=GiCbqtBjfyDt8nB9LLFXoA&cbp=12,272.4,,0,-16.62

This probably means I've never actually seen that original building, but there seem to be quite a few in that style, like the Laser Eye Clinic Ned mentioned.

excellent eyes. where would the oyster bar be? behind the central building?

Williams S. Burroughs

Didn't know he was such a family man.

Yeah, I guess maybe that's Shambles Square behind there? I only lived there from 1998 'til 2002, and I don't think I'd even been there pre-IRA city planning modifications. I should point out that the breakthrough was made by a uni friend of mine.

Going to do some digging at http://www.images.manchester.gov.uk/ - probably going to end this evening being nostalgic and looking for jobs and wondering just how much cheaper the rent would be.

I mean, the rent would be cheaper if I moved there, rather than 'oh I bet the rent was really cheap in 1905'.

almost the same view, 1955

http://www.images.manchester.gov.uk/web/objects/common/webmedia.php?irn=10342

definitely this building, 1966

http://www.images.manchester.gov.uk/web/objects/common/webmedia.php?irn=10350

the road is Hanging Ditch. Still can't work out where the Sinclair's was.

I read that post-bomb it was moved about 300 feet nearer to the cathedral. It all looks so empty in these pictures, where were people at?

Blimey, well spotted there UC, colleagues and I were racking our brains over this earlier and we all work in m/cr! Sinclairs and the Old Wellington are now round the corner of the right hand building ie. the former Corn Exchange, although when this was taken they'd have been in the "original" Shambles Square a bit further away still.

All credit to my friend for spotting the hotel and the Exchange building. I guess this building was demolished for Arndale construction then?

In the original pic I think the building far left is the M&S building the bomb was parked outside. I think I've got enough information now.

I wonder if its the same invincible post box

loved this...

http://nastybrutalistandshort.blogspot.com/2010/08/steel-yourself.html

Sheffield's Lib Dem City Council got wind of a proposal to English Heritage to list the structure, immediately loudly made their opposition known, and have tried to start a letter-writing campaign. In response to this, and given they'd once stolen an article from me, I tried to interest the Sheffield Star in a defence of it, but they ignored me. Most things about the possible listing on the internet are besmirched with dozens of comments along the lines of 'its ful of chavs drop a nukleer bom on it lol', which makes clear what's really at stake. The Castlegate area of the city is where working class people come to shop, meet people, hang around. It's been left to rot for over two decades without serious maintenance, and the council have a lot of money riding on the prospect of building a crap simulacrum of Leeds here - when the nearby Castle House, a building with incredibly expensive materials and built-in artworks, got listed, they appealed (and lost). They want this place, and these people, out...

Someone on a certain boosterist architectural forum described Park Hill as 'a wet dream for Communists and social fantasists'. Well, yes. This is a photo of Hyde Park, the even more crazily ambitious Park Hill Mark Two that was built further uphill, whose remains we will come to presently. Sheffield's architects obviously worked out that the thing which made it interesting, topographically, was the landscape, the extraordinary slopes and dips which got Ruskin so excited when he visited, and decided to make that the focal point of the entire city - gigantic buildings which would rise out of the peaks and crags, a massive, metropolitan and wholly northern architecture that actually owes very, very little to any real precedent - darker, more raw, less arty, less Mediterranean than Corbusier, closer perhaps - but craggier, both more organic and more sober - to the skycities Erich Kettelhut designed for Fritz Lang's Metropolis. Look here at how it rises, in gradients, from the terraces and 1930s tenements below, with each block higher until you reach the 18-storey peak, with real human activity palpable in the façade, in its walkways and balconies. It's a completely original new urbanism, which only survives now under sufferance. Sheffield should have been incredibly proud of the fact it was capable of this...

Almost all the new buildings built here over the last thirty years have been appalling, pomo then pseumo, of equal lack of inspiration in both cases. There are but four arguable exceptions - one block of studios by Fielden Clegg, one university building by Sauerbruch Hutton, a car park by Allies and Morrison, and this, the Winter Gardens/Millennium Galleries by Pringle. I didn't mention this in the book, so I would like to correct this oversight here. It is officially Quite Good. I don't know if these four things are enough, but there they are. But it's surrounded by business park bullshit you'd expect to see on the Great West Road or Reading, their nothingness a sort of anti-matter trying to vapourise the thrilling smoke-blackened aggression of the Town Hall clocktower. So here I intend to start a campaign to list all the interesting buildings in Sheffield until it makes Paul Scriven and Nick Clegg cry.

great photos from liverpool in 1975 by paul trevor, exhibit next year

http://www.flickr.com/photos/liverpool1975/sets/72157624383733904/with/4730552319/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwtSdJaPCSI

looks identical to where i grew up but less hilly

― caek, Wednesday, 3 February 2010 16:12 (10 months ago)

I think that one is Halifax?

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/manchester/large/11.jpg

left hand side of jesus guys coat looks like it says "YOU JERK" with some french stuff on other side. one of the footie kids has that ace 70s les mcqueen (league of gentleman) look, with added chutzpah. great pictures these, can't believe i haven't seen them before (esp the manc ones). love how old man + family pic has the head of the household unashamedly right up front with his arm round his favourite: the dog.

This, the greatest list in song, shoulda been a poll.

idk, u can do a poll u know

I know. I'm psyching myself up.

ilkley moor

The maximum number of poll items is: 50

Would vote: Morecambe
Most overrated: Hebden Bridge
Sorely lacking from this song: Bury

You may or may not be interested in It's Grim Up North - what, no BlackPOLL!?

I started reading Thinking Northern and it's brilliant. The essays cover everything from unemployment to farming to music and art, and truly does try to paint all aspects of the "Northern soul" and identity. In a non-stereotypical, genuine way. Only just a third in but I highly recommend it.

Are there more books like this out there on this subject?

there's a book by Stuart Maconie that's almost certainly fucking awful so don't try that one

Oh shit, Pies and Prejudice?! Wouldn't touch a book with that title with a ten foot pole

that's the spirit :D

This sums it up nicely.

xp :-)

"By the end of the odyssey, our guide professes himself to be "in love" with the North and ready to "go back and be a part of it". The facing page reveals all, explaining that the writer lives in the West Midlands."

I lol'ed

Mrs V had it but she has a much higher tolerance for twee bullshit than i do

Apparently Maconie has a follow up coming out soon called Much 'Ow Do About Northwich.

a musician friend of mine was going to call a side project Sense and Sensimilia

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4068/5125569962_4cb33d05fb_o.jpg

http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6010/5936704234_4243d0561d_o.jpg

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4144/4833944990_e72206872c_o.jpg

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/pictures/2011/7/29/1311954145623/A-girl-with-Sex-Appeal-ha-002.jpg

Blackpool?

yes

I've seen that last one before somewhere? It's from 1980. Seems grimmer to me than the rest but then I hate ketchup.

via http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/gallery/2011/jul/31/blackpool-through-the-camera

http://www.johnbulmer.co.uk/collections/north%2Duk/large/1.JPG

worth a re-repost.

would totally read Thinking Northern, but that Amazon link has it as costing £60.80 currently! Is it some super deluxe coffee-table tome, or is out of a small academic press?

Great photos caek.

@Bill A, it's small academic press. I got very lucky finding it here in Holland on a Dutch equivalent of eBay, sold by someone who obviously didn't know the value, cost me 3 euros. Shame it is so expensive because it is a wonderful read.

Ah, I'll keep an eye on the 2nd hand market then. Thought it might be a small press, I flogged a load of my old University text books on Amazon Marketplace recently and was amazed to be able to price rare stuff (in some cases) at twice what I'd paid for them 18 years ago, like £20 for a 150 page book on Berkeley etc. You got a great deal on that though!

Yeah it's quite amazing how well those academic books do. Must also have to do with them rarely getting a re-print? In some cases I do wonder why that is.

I mean, Thinking Northern for example, is such a fantastic collection of essays. it is academic, yes, but could definitely speak to more people than just, erhm, academics. I don't understand why there's not another run, I'm positive it could be pushed to a broader audience.

Yr right on the reprints, think the ones I did best with had never been reprinted and were v.small runs originally. That crossover from academic work to a wider audience is rarely made (ime), I suspect that some authors/editors don't really know what they've got on their hands, and social history is def. a bigger market than it used to be I'd say.

...and yeah, great photos from Blackpool. Last time I went out there was about 10yrs ago for a reunion with oldest mates. We stayed in a devastatingly grotty B&B and wound up in a club called Heaven & Hell, which lived up to the 2nd part of the name at least. One mate procured a pill so strong it made one of his eyes shut and on leaving he managed to turn his ankle in a tram track so we took turns to help him hobble the mile down the front back to our lodgings, at 3am. Finally got back and were just settling down when a colossal Scotsman in only his underpants wandered into our shared bedroom thinking it was his. A brilliant weekend.

Set in Manchester in northern England, the series stars Will Mellor as Liam Flynn, Niky Wardley as his wife Caroline, and Nadine Rose Mulkerrin, Daniel Rogers, and Lorenzo Rodriguez as their children, Chloe, Steve, and Mikey. Other characters include Liam's brother Tommy (Craig Parkinson) and Liam and Tommy's father Jim (Warren Clarke).

Originally given the working title of Meet the Doyles, this was changed during production. The theme song Is "For Anyone" by the band Beady Eye.

On 22 December 2011 Will Mellor confirmed in an interview that the show had been given a second series which will be filmed and broadcast in 2012. Taping has finished taking place at the new MediaCityUK in Salford and the second series has begun on BBC One on 17th August 2012 for a further six episodes

clitheroe is a nice town, castle is dece

i once knew a woman from grimsby, ontario

probably a bit different, if for no other reason than its greater distance from scunthorpe

What dirt has Will Mellor got on BBC casting editors? I was surprised to see White Van Man (or something) after 2 Pints.. finished, but seeing thing start is something else.

http://listings07.skiddlecdn.co.uk/2/6/4/293580_0_debbi-francis-live-bank-hoilday-weekend_400.jpg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rySzvvnE33g

?

bloody hell that looks like the Grafton

Why do Englishes say "oh I'm from the North" when they are from Manchester and not Newcastle or Scotland

It seems kind of disingenuous like "Penrith don't exist"

the North in many respects is a state of mind

newcastle is latitudinally north but not 'the north'

i feel like it's just tangentially in The North like maybe the Ultima Thule of the region

'the north' = lancashire, yorkshire, bits of surrounding counties like cheshire, maybe northern bits of nottinghamshire or derbyshire or staffordshire, places like scunthorpe and grimsby, cumbria south of the scenic areas

obv i will defer to the superior local knowledge of NV and any other north residents, but in doing so they run the risk of becoming one of those northernness correspondents that litter the media whenever ian brown does a really big shit or someone from oldham firebombs a place of worship

i'm immunised to some extent by being brought up a midlander, so whilst i'm constitutionally inclined to sympathy with my Northern brethren i don't have to buy into the full blown mythologising that stage Yorkshiremen and Lancastrians are so prone to

also altho Hull is unquestionably The North it has a slightly wary relationship to yr Leedses and Yorks and all that other white rose malarkey

the Geordie and the Mackem are strange alien creatures obv but are usually welcomed quite happily as fellow Northern travellers round these parts

i'm immunised to some extent by being brought up a midlander, so whilst i'm constitutionally inclined to sympathy with my Northern brethren i don't have to buy into the full blown mythologising that stage Yorkshiremen and Lancastrians are so prone to

― Roobarb and Custos (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, 12 December 2012 01:08 (1 minute ago)

those stage IV yorkeshiremen who have failed to respond to any treatment and are entering terminal yorkshireness

OK see with all the -ness's and "prone to" I guess Northiness has less to do with geography and more to do with... what?

Taste in cheese? Accents? Football preference? My father's family is Northumbrian/Cumbrian and live in bloody Hexham but I have no concept of "what it is" (the North) because to an outsider it's all the same M&S still stocks the same sandwiches etc.

opposition to the South, small c conservatism vs airy-fairy novelty/sophistication of Londoners, emphasis on working class values and culture even by the middle classes, history of industry/"graft" (hard manual work), bluntness in speech, suspicion of Received Pronunciation or Estuary English, hospitality to strangers even if it looks grudging

i feel like it's just tangentially in The North like maybe the Ultima Thule of the region

― Roobarb and Custos (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, December 12, 2012 12:57 AM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Nah, Ultima Thule is in Leicester.

NV thank you for such a perfect post

also altho Hull is unquestionably The North it has a slightly wary relationship to yr Leedses and Yorks and all that other white rose malarkey

― Roobarb and Custos (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, December 12, 2012 1:08 AM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

i think this is true to an extent of sheffield, too

i had a gf from york and i always felt like i was visiting a foreign country up there.

here is Northumbrian poet Basil Bunting drawing a distinction between his (Scandinavian-coloured) North and the rest of England, including the cultural-ideological "North" we're trying to delineate here:

The Northumbrian tongue travel has not taken from me sometimes sounds strange to men used to the koine or to Americans who may not know how much Northumberland differs from the Saxon south of England. Southrons would maul the music of many lines in Briggflatts.

My father's family is Northumbrian/Cumbrian and live in bloody Hexham but I have no concept of "what it is" (the North) because to an outsider it's all the same M&S still stocks the same sandwiches etc.

― bosch's bish (flamboyant goon tie included), Wednesday, 12 December 2012 01:17

those places historically were more of an interzone between scotland and england and were subject to the whims of the border reivers (clannish warlords)

the north = something like the austro-hungarian dual monarchy, an uneasy pseudo-alliance between flinty psycopaths in the east and the slightly more reflectively miserable to the west with heavy celtic influence

rural north yorkshire/harrogate is the worst imo

iirc the Humber marks the southern boundary of the Danelaw - area of England controlled by Viking types during 9th/10th century, tho their influence extended much further at times - and it's quite possible that Northerness is also imbued with this Norsemen vs Saxons memory/antagonism

idk whether any of this historiography-ethnography is 'true' in some verifiable way, but it has the eldritch intrigue of tolkien but for those who aren't actually children or 'breathers

xxp yeah rural North Yorks is where you find your real white-rose-tie-wearing "it's still 1935" "eh up son, you'll never play for Yorkshire" psychos

and yeah Sheffield is not a "Yorkshire" city in the same way as the real power centres is it? pulled away by the gravity of the Peaks i guess

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elmet

and here's your real Tolkienesque (pre)history

i didn't know about Leicester's Ultima Thule! there used to be a similar shop in Stafford when i was a kid where i first heard of this frightening stuff like Nurse With Wound and the Leg Pink Dots and Krautrock even tho for a long time i didn't dip my toe in very far cos they didn't have lyric sheets like Marillion records did

newcastle has as much in common w/ yorks as liverpool imo. the north retained more celtic traces than the south, but i think yorks is also the most nordic part of the country, what w/ all the viking place names &c. lancs had more of the industrial revolution & concomitant immigration, esp from ireland, which is different to all the yan tan tethera tweedy malarkey. football vs rugby.

of course all true yorkshire folk see themselves as old-school & southerners are viewed as upstart, continental and treated w/ the suspicion you'd expect from ppl who take great care in bearing a grudge long after it makes any sense to them.

“I persecuted the native inhabitants of England beyond all reason. Whether nobles or commons, I cruelly oppressed them; many I unjustly disinherited; innumerable multitudes, especially in the county of York, perished through me by famine and sword…I am stained with the rivers of blood that I have shed.” - william i according to orderic vitalis

^that's not an apology, it's prob not even real.

the north is the only bit of england i really know, tbh

'well if it isn't old 11 cameras simon' is very north imo

ty

is this thread title a reference to something

besides it being grim up north

The opening post is the lyrics to It's Grim Up North by the KLF.

The saying predates that though.

oh yeah thats what i was thinking of

"cheers," as they say in your country

"mate"

It's Grim Oop North

It's Grim, Oppa Northern Style

xp to hungry4ass - that would be "ta"

Get down't Dewsbury market and get yer'sen a box of broken biscuits lad.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_Nice_Up_North

How can you say it's grim up north with pictures like this?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2256796/Rows-boarded-terraced-houses-Accrington-brought-life-10m-revamp.html

What about pictures like this?

[img]http://www.peakdistrictonline.co.uk/images/ah-image1_kinder_stones.jpg[img]

Love it up Kinder Scout, was in Edale the other week, plan to walk along the tops if it ever stops raining. Starting at sunrise and finish with watching sunset. Nothing grim up north about that.

http://www.citylife.co.uk/img/12019/17014_490250_firedamaged_panacea.jpg

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/__ecYQ0ZydAA/TSxRJQT4mRI/AAAAAAAAAx4/RdGYuHZ4MJU/s400/DJQ.jpg

http://sphotos-a.xx.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ash4/c0.21.403.403/p403x403/318560_10152377029720006_1613004091_n.png

http://s2.reutersmedia.net/resources/r/?m=02&d=20070308&t=2&i=450263&w=460&fh=&fw=&ll=&pl=&r=450263

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/74/Yorkshire_NF.jpg

http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2013/06/12/article-2340116-1A460F99000005DC-711_634x403.jpg

http://i3.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/incoming/article4305605.ece/ALTERNATES/s615/cave-pic-4305605.jpg

Which building is that in the background to the BNP march? It is a post '75 photo because that is the year Huddersfield/Bradford Building Societies merged, but there are still lots of flares. I love the way these concrete buildings looked just as prematurely aged and degrading to the human spirit in the 70's, relatively not that long after they were built.

Looks like Bradford, but I am not sure.

yeah i am drawn to that corrugated concrete

Description
English: National Front march in Yorkshire, Great Britain. 1970s.
Date 1970s
Source Own work
Author White Flight

white flight doesnt seem to have the greatest memory

Was the St George cross as big a thing back then?

the North in many respects is a state of mind

― Roobarb and Custos (Noodle Vague), Wednesday, December 12, 2012 1:47 AM (6 months ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=bradford+uk&hl=en&ll=53.795353,-1.741633&spn=0.011863,0.032058&sll=40.697488,-73.979681&sspn=0.489355,0.977783&hnear=Bradford,+West+Yorkshire,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=15&layer=c&cbll=53.795603,-1.758098&panoid=0rkqtxlAq64odOdrXt6hVw&cbp=12,268.27,,0,-9.22

I think this is the streetview of the National Front photograph

roy you are a prince

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-MqQEii2yFFY/UWBXt1oAbpI/AAAAAAAADWs/jr_KUZgfBFs/s640/expose_API_17.JPG

lol that's amazing.

i don't know why i'm a magnet for lost drunky boys but i wish them bon voyage and i'm sorry for running away on the sly from the last one

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BfE9T5HCUAAH6EJ.jpg

did this guy appear on the freemen thread?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aeu-xX3-hdw

i don't think so, but he should of

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CYMXyeg2Ot8

quite enjoyed scholeshenge

a lament for England

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyUWsr-ltps

I know these are opinions people will have heard enough times already, but they take on this odd poignancy when being delivered by a maudlin looking guy alone in his back garden, taking into a camera phone, imo

and the segue from 'we used to rule the world' to complaining that he got barred from a comedy club for telling racist jokes is kind of spectacular

yeah, it's more poignant for being so familiar, that huge well of collective sadness & disenfrachisement that ppl teeter on the edge of

I only found this because I googled 'rodney'

http://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/Rodney-Kray-Gang-poured-boiling-water-threatened/story-20827401-detail/story.html

A MAN says he was attacked and had boiling water poured over him by a gang threatening to gouge out his eyes. Rodney Kray – who changed his name in honour of the Only Fools and Horses character Rodney Trotter and the notorious Kray Twins – was attacked by three men in a neighbour's flat in Woodbine Close, west Hull, on October 20 last year.

Mr Kray, who has the Kray twins' faces tattooed on his back, was earlier asked why he had taken their name.

"They used to look after people, pay people's rent," he said.

"What, by killing them?" asked Paul Genney, Mr Macnamara's barrister.

"Well I don't admire that so much," said Mr Kray.

http://i.imgur.com/rpt8RUH.jpg

http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/photographing-strangeways-prison-1980-228

the strangeways documentary is good

i went to Brighouse the other week, i shd've taken my camera. it was v. much the North.

hell of a lot of mid-range sports cars/Beemers being driven quickly and thoughtlessly. saw 3 near-misses in the space of half an hour.

https://news.sky.com/story/amp/line-18-staggering-figures-lay-bare-deadly-divide-between-north-and-south-11388970

it could be worse, we could live in the south

I'm going to Leeds in August. O God, why have you forsaken me?

I'd take dying from self abuse over slowly choking on carcinogenic fumes in a £600 a week bedsit for an extra 8 years anyday!

they seem to have as many homeless on the city centre streets as in London these days, so you'll feel at home, Tom.

tbf Leeds is shit

the pubs are shit these days as well, it's a soulless, loveless shithole.

and that's a quote from the tourist board

they seem to have as many homeless on the city centre streets as in London these days, so you'll feel at home, Tom.

Same all over :(