Three Salford siblings are fighting to keep the memory of their late father alive by continuing with his life goal of helping Manchester’s homeless.
Alan Dolan spent much of his life on the streets of Manchester helping the city’s most vulnerable.
He was fondly known by family, friends, and those in the community as someone who would lend a hand to anyone he met, and was described as “caring too much for everyone”.
Even at times when he found himself without a job, technically homeless, and needing to crash with relatives, his years of “selfless” work to give back to the community were commended, and he was guided by his dream to build a shipping container village in the centre of Manchester to ensure that nobody was forced to sleep rough and would instead have access to food, clothing, shelter and a place to stay the night.
This was something he was so “passionate” about, and would often discuss with his three children.
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But sadly, his vision never made it to reality.
On 26th November 2020, Alan suffered a heart attack whilst out helping some homeless friends, and was taken to hospital, where he sadly died at just 55-years-old.
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Now, his three children – Robyn, Grant, and Jenna Dolan – are striving to continue his legacy by promoting the message that “love always wins” and #RealLoveMatters, and by carrying out his life-long goal of helping Manchester’s vulnerable when they truly need it most.
They are doing this through their newly-launched charity Humble Souls, alongside a JustGiving fundraiser, with the aim of raising £2,000 – a target they are so close to reaching.
Humble Souls – which has been created to “continue the work and legacy” of Alan Dolan – is being ran by Robyn, Jenna, Grant, his mother, and a family friend.
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They have described him as “the best dad”.
“Anyone who knew him knows how passionate he was about [his shipping container village dream] and just helping people in general.” the Dolans said.
Grant Dolan, 29 – who has recently achieved his own personal goal of setting up a recruitment company, which was something he talked about with his father often – added that: “Even though my dad was going through so much of his own stuff, he’d always do the daftest things to make you laugh,
“He just felt for people, and his message was that all that matters when you go, is how you’ve helped people”.
He continued: “We’d been talking about my dreams to start my own recruitment company for years [and] around half an hour before he died, I got the call to say I’d received the funding I needed [to start the company], but I never got to tell him.”
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Grant’s new company, Real Recruitment, will donate 10% of all profits to the Humble Souls project.
On the charity’s long-term aspirations, Grant said: “We are starting the project in Manchester, but want to make it UK-wide eventually. We’re looking to build the container village for the homeless in the city centre, and we also want to build a community centre [too]”.
There are also future plans to release an album featuring a series of Manchester-based artists, with all sales being donated to the Humble Souls project.
“We just want to do something positive in my dad’s memory,” Grant said.
The Dolans added: “He was a great dad and a great soul, [and] we just want people to know that if you cant donate any money [to the fundraiser], you can always donate your time, old clothes, food, and even just a smile to brighten someone’s day,
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“Words of encouragement when someone needs it the most are what our dad was about,
“[He was] 100% real”.
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The Dolans’ fundraiser for the Humble Souls project has now raised £1,767 of its first £2,000 target, so if you able to spare a couple of pounds for this truly worthy local cause, then all donations are welcome.
Didsbury favourite Rustik has confirmed its will sadly be closing this month
Danny Jones
West Didsbury favourite Rustik has sadly announced it will be closing for food after a decade at the end of this month.
The beloved Burton cafe and bar has been a staple of the tight-knit foodie neighbourhood since 2015, but now the independent Irish eatery has confirmed that the business will be shutting down permanently in less than a fortnight.
Confirmed on Wednesday afternoon, 17 September, the casual Manc restaurant and hangout informed their loyal followers of the unfortunate news.
Unsurprisingly, their social media has been awash with condolences, collective sadness and support for the local institution.
Posting across all of their accounts, Rustik wrote: “After an unforgettable 10 years on Burton Road, the time has come to close our doors. It’s hard to believe how far we’ve come — never in a million years did we imagine Rustik would grow into what it became.
“From the bottom of our hearts, thank you to every single one of you who walked through our doors and supported us along the way. We poured everything we had — our time, our energy, our lives into making Rustik a space for everyone. And what a ride it’s been.
“From the chaotic, beautiful brunch shifts to late nights dancing on tables to ‘Wagon Wheel’, pushing through the challenges of COVID and helping our community with meals during hard times— we’ve done it all, together.
“To our amazing staff, past and present: thank you for your hard work, your dedication, and the love you brought every single day. You helped build something truly special, and we’ll never be able to thank you enough.
“To the incredible musicians who filled our space with life — keep doing what you do. The noise complaints? 100% worth the unforgettable nights.”
The team go on to detail that the official closing date is Tuesday, 30 September, reiterating that it is “business running as usual until then” and urging fans to “come down, grab your last Rustik fix, and raise a glass with us one final time.”
Signing off with an emotional farewell, they add: “Lastly, a message close to our hearts: please support your local cafes, bars, and independents. Hospitality is tough right now, and they need your support more than ever.
“Thank you for the most incredible decade of our lives. It’s over and out from us.”
It goes without saying that we’re gutted to see Rustik go and know how much it meant not only to the Burton Road community, but also to the Didsbury community, Chorlton and many other Greater Manchester natives.
Review | Villanelle debut: Liam Gallagher’s son’s band release their first track – here’s our review
Danny Jones
Liam Gallagher’s son, Gene, and his band Villanelle, have officially released their debut single to the masses, and since we’re still very much immersing ourselves in everything even remotely to do with Oasis, we thought we’d give this first track a review.
Now, if you’re expecting a familiar Britpop vibe like his dad and uncle used to bash out back in the day, you’d be very wrong…
It’s one thing to settle into something similar to what you’ve grown up around and try to continue a lineage if you’re from a successful family – especially with a legacy as important and influential as the one left by Liam and Noel – but we’re glad to report they’ve done something pretty different.
24-year-old Gene Gallagher and his bandmates Ben Taylor (guitar), Jack Schiavo (bass), and Andrew Richmond (drums) haven’t just tried to do an impression of Oasis; instead, they’ve found their own sound, and while it does give somewhat of an old-school flavour, it’s not what we expected.
It takes literally milliseconds for you to click into realising the vibe they’re going for.
‘Hinge’ is a simplistic but hard-hitting, grungey and dark debut from Villanelle, who, despite having played a number of in-progress songs live over the last year or so, have only just dropped their first studio single.
In fact, they’ve actually taken the admittedly bizarre and unorthodox first steps of having already played live with Liam Gallagher on the Definitely Maybe 30th anniversary tour before they actually released anything people can easily listen to outside of their live performances.
Nevertheless, the young four-piece introduces Villanelle as the latest post-punk outfit amidst the ongoing revival of the classic rock genre.
That is to say that punk is a tried and true classic style of music, not that these lads are trying to sound like The Rolling Stones…
Anyway, we’re getting sidetracked: Villanelle draw plenty of influences from both original and contemporary examples of this sonic subculture, and while it isn’t explosive per se, ‘Hinge’ is short, direct and hits the same formulaic notes.
It’s also fair to say you can hear a bit of the recognisable LG whine in Gene’s vocals at times, too. Listen to it in full down below and see if you agree.
Even the basic found-footage style video fits into the same category.
To call it straightforward isn’t intended as any kind of a diss, by the way – some of our favourite tunes and best artists spearheading the renaissance of the punk scene write like this.
What we will say is that it looks like bloody good fun to both play and listen to in a small, sweaty room, with plenty of pits and people bouncing off the walls.
Gallagher Sr. might be surprised to see his son going for a slightly heavier, more hardcore route with his sound, but he can’t accuse him of forgetting his roots as the child of a ‘Rock ‘N’ Roll Star.’
The boys are actually hitting the road this winter, including a date at The Castle Hotel in the Northern Quarter, if you fancy grabbing a ticket.
You can grab your tickets to see Villanelle on tour HERE, and in the meantime, let us know what you think of their debut track down in the comments.
Emily Sergeant -
3rd February 2021 
