Commentary
A gig in the rather large park just round the corner from Prestwich.
Cities In The Park was a two-day open air show held in Heaton Park, Greater Manchesterville on Saturday & Sunday 3rd and 4th August 1991. The concert ran from noon to 10pm and tickets were what appears to be a whopping £32 (for the time) for both days or £20 for one day. Those hardy types with weekend tickets were allowed to camp in the park. 10 per cent of the ticket price went as a donation to African Famine Relief and the Kurdish Trust Fund. Another reason for the concerts was as a tribute to Martin Hannett who had died some four months earlier
The unofficial Factory records blog seems to have excised the gruppe from history reporting that the first day featured The Wonderstuff, The Beautiful South, The Soup Dragons, Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, Cabaret Voltaire, The Buzzcocks, The Railway Children, Ruthless Rap Assassins, Paris Angels, Ashley & Jackson and Amok. However I have a shiny silver disc courtesy of my chum Toby, which tends to imply otherwise. I seem to recall that this was because the band was a late call up for the gig. Simple really....... given the proximity of the lead singers home to said green sward.
The second day was 'Factory' day, headlined by Electronic featuring guest appearance by Pet Shop Boys amongst others. But we are not bothered about that nonsense now are we?
This is a fantastic gig with the band locking into a muscular wall of sound over a whooping and yelping Smith. A couple of debut outings here with a short version of "Two Face!" starting things off. Bush comes into his own on "Hit the North" adding a denser and more challenging feel to the keyboard parts. "IJS" and "Lies" are played well as is a plaintive "Edinburgh Man".
A lot of the "Shiftwork" material seems somehow fresher with the addition of the keyboard tonalities although there are some serious keyboard/guitar failure problems during "Pittsville" leaving Mark, Paul and Simon to perform it as dub version with some amazing dexterity from Hanley. "Hip Priest" leads into a simply sultry rendition of "Prinz" with all the funk that Si will allow.
"The Mixer" is as amazing, if not more so than "Prinz".....again the sampled Brady adds some additional nuances but its Scanlon's shimmering guitar which adds the menace on this. "Free Range" gets its first live outing which is a glorious tangle of noise , sequenced arpeggiating and visceral animal noises from Craig. Eschewing the later building chord tension Scanlon tends to rely on grunge like noises until the later parts of the song where he drives things on over a vital polyrhythmic tangle from Wolstencroft.
The band finishes the foreshortened set with a tense and fulsome version of "Shiftwork" - Smith drawls over a boisterous melange of noise from the boys - again Scanlons guitar provides a vital layer of noise delivering an unforgiving but compelling sound.
An important one to own with Dave Bush's first appearance and the first outings of "Two Face!" and "Free Range". A solid gig with some great playing from all.