Easy now. Bad news for Sheffield music as Barfly goes tits up. As thisGIRL point out in their interview there aren’t that many places to play in Sheffield. The days when virtually every pub had some sort of live music are long gone. Live music is all a bit messy and uncontrollable for the chain pubs which have colonised our city centres, much like, and about as welcome as genital warts.

The other problem is licensing. Most places have the ridiculous ‘no more than two playing at a time’ rule which condemns pint drinkers to a million Proclaimers cover groups. This is just inhumane. Funny isn’t it, while Sheffield’s great and good spout on about their intention to be up there with other Northern cultural capitals such as Manchester and Leeds – 24 hour party places all – their main concession to sociability is to get a titty bar in – right in the middle of the Cultural Industries Quarter.

One thing that Leeds and Manchester share are highly active and organised scenes where people actually get together and try to create their own environments. The Coral are a case in point, they put on their own nights and got a buzz going and off they went. You’ll be surprised, try approaching some promoters and see if they’ll let you do something at their venues. Offer them a worthwhile night and they might take you up on it. Be quick though, The Barfly might not be the only place to vanish in the next few months.

The drawback is that it does require a hell of a lot of work and more importantly a lot of cooperation (it would be nice to see bands going to see other bands’ gigs rather than moaning about how difficult it is to get audiences themselves. Create your own frigging audiences.) Take notes from the underground club scene. They’re not successful because it’s trendy, you know (and they willing to take a few risks).

Good things. More baby news. Love to Jamie and Judy and young Finlay. It’s almost Christmas. Ash from The Grapes is out early, so let’s all cross fingers for a speedy recovery.

Bad things. The English cricket team once again pissing their way round Australia blithely unaware of the trauma they’re inflicting on at least one Sandman. It’s buggered our body clock and it’s unbelievably depressing. Apparently Matthew Hayden, the Australian opener who has been a massive pain in the arse this winter has just undergone surgery for haemorrhoids. Good.

In the last issue we offered to come to your house and cover a couple of Sheffield bands for a small fee. We thought it was funny. Unfortunately so did Paul from the Free Radicals and being Sandmen of our words expect to see us on his front doorstep murdering Don’t You Want Me Baby sometime between now and Christmas. G’night.