Sleuth is a sideways glance at the city every week, it's the truth, but Sleuth's truth. He's several people all at once. Sleuth sometimes even gets serious @mcrsleuth
NEW NQ 'NEIGHBOURHOOD EATERY'
Sleuth finds it odd that none of this ever seems reported in the press or conceded by the Police and the NHS...
Sleuth's been talking to Jobe Ferguson and Lyndon Higginson, two thirds of the gang that brought us such city venues as BlackDog, Cane & Grain and TNQ. They've been telling Sleuth about their next project, The Loading Bay, a new 'neighbourhood eatery' based within an old Victorian, well, loading bay, on Tariff Street. "It's going to be more food-led, really cool, really neighbourhoody," says Higginson. "We offering high-end rotisserie chicken, hog roasts and beef ribs," says Ferguson, "the bar will lead into an open kitchen, very theatrical. The majority will be seating, split over three levels."
The fellas tell Sleuth they've taken inspiration from London's Tram Shed, which you may or may not recognise as the one with Damien Hirst's cow and cockerel, preserved in formaldehyde, leering over diners (sounds like a load of cock'n'bull to Sleuth). Should planning go smoothly, The Loading Bay should open in late-summer.
The Loading Bay, Tariff StreetNEW BAR (ISH)
Meanwhile, those lads have been busy drawing up plans for a rejig of the bar on the first floor of Cane & Grain on Thomas Street. "We're renaming it Science & Industry," says Higginson, "it's a nod to the very make-up of Manchester with a strong emphasis on crazily scientific drinks made in our lab over two or three days. Our head bartender, Massimo, has drafted in a lecturer from Manchester University to talk about the things we can get away with. We want live music too, and a piano, really Bluesy... this is going to be the best bar in Manchester, easy."
Though Sleuth reckons that name could prove a muddler for tourists. "Obviously there's a nod in there to our own Museum of Science and Industry," says Higginson, "let's call this the Boozeum of Science & Industry."
The first floor bar at Cane & Grain is set for a molecular rejigVOLTA'S OLD-FASHIONED VALUES
Sleuth had a gorgeous meal at Volta, West Didsbury on Wednesday. Small plates, big flavours, ooh baby that beetroot and feta, that lamb shawarma, the belly pork. Yet Volta is seriously failing the age in which we live. It's so moody and dark bloggers and writers and just general customers find it hard to take pictures of every course. Not snapping the nosh in restaurants is weird, it's just not normal 2016 behaviour.
Volta: a blogger's nightmareFOPPISH BANNERS AND PISSED-UP FALLERS
Sleuth was hanging around Rochdale Canal in the city centre. He goes there not for that reason (you dirty minded lot) but because he's trying to prove that 'The Pusher' is a palpable lie. While down there Sleuth's been amused by the total waste of money of the 'Don't Drink, Don't Drown' signs. Firstly, Sleuth assumes they refer to alcohol not the canal water which is presumably more dangerous. Sleuth can't stand meaningless gestures such as these, where state agencies attempt to show their concern for us. The signs fail every which way. If you're too pissed you won't see them, if you're sober and then become too pissed you'll forget them. The money should have been spent cleaning and beautifying the canal environment so more people use them and therefore can help if a pissed person falls in. Or even falls victim to the mythical pusher.
Careful now...ALCOHOL TRUTH, WE'RE NOT GOING TO HELL...
Speaking of alcohol, Sleuth owes the Curmudgeon columnist in beer magazine Opening Times a pint. Speaking of agencies again, they've become more puritanical and joyless than they were under Queen Victoria. Sleuth loves the myth-busting facts in the recent addition discussing the ten years since the implementation of the 2003 Licensing Act, which allowed pubs and bars to more or less open when they wanted should they get the nod from their local authority. Sleuth remembers the daft, small-minded MEN painting pictures of hell on the streets. The Daily Mail went further, naturally. The Police warned of 'lots more crime and disorder' and the Royal College of Physicians said, '24 hour pub opening will lead to more excess and binge drinking, especially among young people'. In other words, we were headed to the abyss.
Funnily enough none of this happened.
Media predictions following the 2003 Licensing Act... none of this happenedFREEDOM GIVES US WINGS
As columnist Curmudgeon writes in Opening Times: 'Today we are drinking a fifth less than we did in 2003, frequent drinking amongst young adults has fallen by more than two thirds. Rates of binge drinking have fallen amongst every age group, most sharply amongst 16-24 year olds. Criminal damage is down 48%, domestic violence by 28 %, general violence by 40%. Drink driving has fallen more sharply in England and Wales, where the new law was applied, than in Scotland where it wasn't. Alcohol related deaths have flattened out since 2005 and not risen since.' The writer is not complacent and concedes there can still be flashpoints on city streets but also points out there's a lot less than there used to be. Sleuth finds it odd that none of this ever seems reported in the press or conceded by the Police and the NHS. But of course not, because the agencies would all rather us stay home wrapped in bubble-wrap in case we forget to think for ourselves and take responsibility for ourselves and slip in a canal after brawling in a boozer.
SLEUTH'S WORST ESTATE AGENT
Sleuth was catching up on the frequently illuminating SkyScraperCity forum this week, reading up on the proposed 5plus Architects-designed Oxygen Tower at the corner of Store Street and Millbank Street near Piccadilly, when he came across this from a user called HeatonParkinCakes:
'For the retro junkies, it's Mary, Mungo and Midge in 1972, just before the lift stops working, the bagheads move in, the oil powered heating is turned off as its too expensive and the landings start intensively smelling of 'elephant fluid'.
'I see the initial Heston Blumenthal and Kane Dingle look-a-likes already phoning for the removal vans just before the first cracks in the grey unrelentingly depressing concrete and steel falls apart onto the local stab frenzied 'youths' and hipsters seeking something 'edgier' than their home village in rural Hampshire.
'In the 70s towering infestation versions, it was war widowed grannies and personality disordered druggies left to itch uneasily in such concrete prison blocks. This time it will be silent despairing Spanish students amidst ghostly, mildly threateningly corridors of empty 'investment opportunities' for Asiatic rich daddies and Premiership footballers.'
...Sleuth doesn't reckon that'll make the brochure.
Heston: 'Where's that bloody removal van? HeatonParkinCakes has moved in next door...'SLEUTH'S FAVOURITE TWEET THIS WEEK
Comes via Observer and Guardian restaurant critic Jay Rayner, who appears at some point to have subscribed to Confidential's Body newsletter, which, along with stories on yoga retreats, fashion bloggers and Ann Summers sex toys, includes offers on hair stylists, baby and toddler shows and, yes, 'intimate' waxing. Sleuth's unsure whether Rayner has a brood, and appears to have his intimate areas covered, but how about that stylist eh?
Od I do love my @mcrconfidential email on a Friday with its intimate waxing offers. If only I hadn't already been there, done that.
— Jay Rayner (@jayrayner1) February 12, 2016
'I usually cut it with this...'
