It’s been a mad busy couple of months for Manchester’s clubs as our calendars are filling up rapid with gigs and club nights.
And whilst we’re nearing the end of festival season, music events are still coming in thick and fast.
Here, we’ve pulled together a selection of the club nights taking place this Friday. From garage tunes with DJ Q, to a Mike Skinner DJ set, there’s loads of house, techno, minimal and drum and bass in between.
And the best thing about going out on a Friday? Two whole days to recover…
Read on to find out our top picks.
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The Streets Afterparty
Earlier in the evening, The Streets will be playing Castlefield as part of this year’s Sound of the City event series.
But if you didn’t manage to get down to the Bowl for it, YES’s Pink Room will be hosting The Streets afterparty from 11pm, with a DJ set from the man himself, Mike Skinner.
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He’ll be spinning all the best in drum and bass, hip hop, house and UK garage.
Tickets are £15 on Skiddle right now. Get them here.
The Libero crew are putting on their last Manchester night of the year.
Manchester-based label, Libero, will take over Gorilla on Friday too, in what will be their final show of 2021 here in the city before the brand focuses on their upcoming UK-wide project.
Founders Luke Welsh, Mike Morrisey and Dan Costello will all be playing, of course. And they’ll be joined by Joseph Emmanuel who’ll set the tone beforehand.
Running until the early hour of 6am, there’ll be plenty of house, minimal techno and tech house to go at, if you can last the night.
Tickets will only set you back £6. Skiddle has some here.
Andy C playing WHP back in 2018. Credit: Metropolis/IG
The 12-week long Warehouse Project series kicked off this month with some serious lineups filling out the 10,000 capacity Depot Mayfield.
On Friday, Metropolis will take over the former train depot as part of the season, with one of the biggest drum and bass lineups you’ll find in Manchester all year.
Heavyweights Andy C, Sub Focus and Wilkinson will headline the show, with a huge list of other big names who’ll be warming up for them throughout the night, like High Contrast, North Base, Mark XTC, Mollie Collins and Friction.
If you fancy some house and techno, popular Manchester club night and record label Haus 22 will be joined by Slam at Joshua Brooks. The pre-party will kick off at 7pm in the bar with things moving downstairs to the revamped basement from 11pm.
Scottish duo Slam will be playing a rare all night long set until 4am. The producers have been making music and putting on their own club nights for decades and so have a load of experience in creating top class nights.
Tickets are a tenner. But student and group tickets come a bit cheaper. Find all the info here.
Calling all students: this one is a rite of passage.
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Ghosts of Garage has been making moves in the student scene for the past couple of years. And coinciding with Manchester’s freshers week the popular garage night will visit Hidden on Friday.
Clothing brand turned music label Dr Banana will be appearing, whilst Soul Mass Transit System will make his Manchester debut.
DJ Q will also play an extended UKG set. Plus, expect to see some Ghosts of Garage faves like Tht Girl, and of course Rich Reason, with B2Bs from Mattik and NG.OMA too, all hosted by T-Man.
Originally planned for March, organisers managed to confirm a new date and a new venue, now taking place at Hidden. All previous tickets remain valid though. And early bird tickets are already gone. But you can get first and second release tickets on Skiddle here.
For more music and events head here. And make sure you’re following The Manc Audio to stay up to date.
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Blossoms deliver most rock and roll performance in years as Declan McKenna joins them on stage
Danny Jones
Last night, we were fortunate enough to be there in the flesh not only to see Blossoms play a special anniversary show in Manchester, but to witness Declan McKenna join them on stage.
A tiny part of us was wondering if we’d see Rick Astley roll out into the venue, but let’s just say we’ll absolutely take this.
Celebrating a decade to the day since the release of the self-titled debut LP – yes, we feel old, too – Blossoms announced the one-off intimate show at The Deaf Institute, a venue they hadn’t played in 12 whole years (good lord…), and it served as much more than a night of nostalgia.
But we’ll admit, the highlight was almost certainly seeing the ‘Brazil’ and ‘British Bombs’ singer join Tom Ogden, Charlie Salt, Josh Dewhurst, Myles Kellock and Joe Donovan on stage for their smallest gig since god knows when.
We’ve gotten somewhat used to seeing the Enfield-born solo artist popping up at random venues across the country and even performing DJ sets at local pubs.
If you haven’t seen that Kylie Minogue clip before, you really need to…
However, we don’t think anyone in the crowd was expecting this cameo, let alone hearing them perform a co-written track off the new record live in front of the audience for the very first time.
As if all of this wasn’t already a bit bonkers and left-field, the song in question, entitled ‘Additional Driver’, was self-admittedly so surprising in SO many ways that Tom felt he needed to explain the full story behind it and why Declan shouted “shoulda got the 192” before they started playing.
Yes, in some kind of Greater Mancunian fever dream, we’ve finally got artists writing lyrics about the region’s most infamous bus route that we’re sure most, if not all of you, can relate to.
But it wasn’t just this moment that had us debating in our heads, ‘are they the best Manc or maybe in Northern band full stop going right now?’, it was seeing them slip so seamlessly back into the more straight-down-the-line indie rock from their first chapter of studio material that did it.
Everyone knows and loves the biggest bangers from that inaugural outing: ‘Getaway’, ‘Charlemagne’, ‘At Most a Kiss’, ‘Honey Sweet’, etc.; but it’s hard to forget just how quintessentially rock and roll tunes like ‘Blow Rose’, ‘Cut Me and I’ll Bleed’, ‘Texia’ and even some of the other deep cuts/early releases are.
Don’t get us wrong, we love how much the dressing up (musically and quite literally) they’ve done over the years as their production, creativity and experimentation has increased, but it’s always hard to beat that feeling you get when finding an artist’s first album – especially one as good as Blossoms‘.
In fairness, listening back to ‘Deep Grass’ all these years later, we’ll still remember how spacey, psychedelic and downright different that intro felt back in the day; it now feels like a fitting end to that maiden outing and the perfect jumping-off point for what has been a real sonic exploration ever since.
For a lad born in SK2 and lucky enough to have seen these lads right from the start, stuff like this will never not feel surreal to me.
Long live ‘Blossoms from Stockport‘, and roll on Songs From The Wedding Cake this October.
Nostalgic rock icons Weezer announce huge arena show in Manchester
Daisy Jackson
Weezer have announced a massive gig in Manchester as part of an upcoming arena tour, celebrating a brand-new album release.
The nostalgic rock icons will be playing at the Co-op Live next spring, alongside gigs in UK cities including Leeds, Newcastle, and Glasgow.
The American rockers have announced The Gathering 2027 World Tour and released the music video for C.E.O, starring Tony Hawk, Curry Barker, and more.
They’ll also be releasing a self-titled new album, Weezer, on 21 August, which Rolling Stone has already called ‘one of the best Weezer albums of this century’.
It’s set to be their 20th (twentieth!!!!) studio album, joining chart-topping records like Make Believe, Maladroit, and the Green Album.
Weezer will be performing hits from their huge back catalogue, including Buddy Holly, Hash Pipe, and Say It Ain’t So.
The huge tour will kick off in the States in February next year before heading across to Japan and Europe.
And Weezer will have some huge support in the form of fellow American rock group, Taking Back Sunday.
Weezer will be performing at the Co-op Live in Manchester on Saturday 25 May, 2026.
You can pre-order the new album from the Weezer webstore before 3pm on Monday 10 August to get pre-sale access.
Then the general sale begins from 10am on Friday 14 August, with tickets on sale HERE.
Weezer, The Gathering World Tour – UK and European dates in full
Wed 12 May – Dublin, Ireland – 3Arena
Fri 14 May – Newcastle, UK – Utilita Arena
Sat 25 May – Manchester, UK – Co-op Live
Mon 17 May – Leeds, UK – First Direct Arena
Wed 19 May – Glasgow, UK – OVO Hydro
Fri 21 May – Birmingham, UK – Utilita Arena
Sat 22 May – London, UK – Alexandra Palace
Sun 23 May – Cardiff, UK – Utilita Arena
Tues 25 May – Paris, France – Zenith
Wed 26 May – Amsterdam, The Netherlands – AFAS Live
Hannah Starkie -
23rd September 2021 
