During the peak of my gig going days I went to see a band called Half Man Half Biscuit at The Boardwalk club (this closed down in 1999) on Little Peter Street in Manchester. I went with a mate on a cold and wet midweek night. It was very much The Hacienda era (I was never part of that scene at all - I preferred alcohol to drugs and moshing to dancing) and The Boardwalk was only 5 minutes walk from there.
I met my mate in Piccadilly, then we downed a few pints before walking down to the gig. We had to pass the Hacienda to reach The Boardwalk As we approached the Boardwalk a young couple in their 20s(male and female) asked us if we knew what time the Hacienda opened. They spoke with a German accent. At this time The Hacienda was world famous and people were regularly attending from all over the world. We had no idea, of course, but as there was no one else around at all, we told them it looked unlikely that it was open that evening. They were very disappointed as they were travelling around Europe in a camper van and only had this one night in Manchester and had come specifically to visit The Hacienda.
They asked us if we could advise them of a decent place where they could go for a drink. I told them there were lots of pubs and bars around the city centre that were worth a look and advised them the Oxford Road area might suit them as it was (and still is, of course) a favourite student hang-out. We told them we were going to see Half Man Half Biscuit and asked if they had heard of them. Unsurprisingly they hadn't. They briefly spoke to each other in German then the lad asked if we wouldn't mind if they joined us for a drink. I wasn't sure about this.
Our plan had been to have one more pint in the City Road Inn then head to the gig, so we told them we were going there but before we knew it the 4 of us were sat in the aforementioned pub with pints of Lowenbrau in front of us. We started chatting about where they had been, where they were going next after Manchester etc and we seemed to get along well. The lad was fluent in English but the girl was less so. This meant he did most of the talking. We ended up getting a second pint in and before long we were all going to the gig together. They had no tickets of course but they were still able to pay in at the door. Once inside, they drifted off for a while so it gave my mate and I a chance to chat about what was going on here.
The gig was ok but HMHB are one of only a handful of bands I've seen who are better in the studio than on stage. Margi Clarke(actress) also joined them for a couple of songs which was rather unexpected. At the end of the show I expected to say "Auf Wiedersehen" to the couple then go our separate ways. This is not what happened.
We rejoined the German couple at the end of the gig and they wanted to thank us for our hospitality by inviting us back to their camper van for a "nightcap". I was concerned they were either axe murderers or that they had a porn film crew waiting behind the curtains of the van. Putting this in to context we'd had several beers and one's judgement is not always sound at times like these so we agreed to take up their offer though, to be fair, they had seemed genuine so it wasn't that tough a call.
Their van was parked up near the Hacienda for the night so they unlocked it and we jumped aboard. It was spacious, clean and well stocked with lots of food and alcohol. We chatted for a few hours and consumed far too many more beers and snacks. Our departure from the van is still a bit hazy but nothing untoward happened. I assure you!
My mate swapped phone numbers with them and kept in touch. Indeed on one occasion he even visited them in Germany whilst attending a music festival.
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