Party: *TONIGHT* JULIAN COPE

Party: *TONIGHT* JULIAN COPE

JULIAN COPE + guests HOLY MCGRAIL

Tickets - http://www.soundcontrolmanchester.co.uk/events/julian-cope/ or call 0161 832 1111

Julian Cope is a singer, poet, occultist and photographer who has enjoyed a 30-year career in the rock business, and is described by his Bloomsbury book publishers as a ‘visionary rock musician and musicologist, hip archaeologist and one-time front man of the Teardrop Explodes’. During that time, Cope has released over 20 solo albums, countless collaborative projects, and six acclaimed books, including his autobiography HEAD-ON and the much-lauded KRAUTROCKSAMPLER. Cope began his career in 1977, as bass player in the short-lived Liverpool punk group The Crucial Three, alongside future Echo & The Bunnymen singer Ian McCulloch, before forming the Teardrop Explodes in late ’78. This band’s four-year reign as a Top Ten chart act collapsed at the end of 1982, when Cope’s infamous love of munching LSD onstage proved too much for both his management and record companies.

An attempt to re-launch his career ended in disaster in March 1984, when Cope ignored the presence of several important media figures in his Hammersmith Palais audience, and proceeded to lacerate his stomach in a drug-induced frenzy. A brief wilderness period ensued, during which time he and his young American wife Dorian moved back to Tamworth, the Staffordshire town of his childhood. Now remaining indoors for long periods and collecting 1950s Dinky Toys, it was during this time that Cope’s legendary FRIED album was released, featuring his signature death-and-resurrection lament ‘Reynard the Fox’ and clad in a record cover that showed Cope naked save for a giant turtle shell. In the late ‘80s, however, Cope made his welcome return to the charts with the single ‘World Shut Your Mouth’, and attendant album SAINT JULIAN, which was followed in the ‘90s by such acclaimed albums as PEGGY SUICIDE, JEHOVAHKILL and AUTOGEDDON. However, Cope now moved away from the rock’n’roll business and turned his attentions instead to making a detailed first-hand study of the occult, mythology and Britain’s prehistory.

Throughout the mid-90s, Cope scoured the British Isles for lost stone temples of the first monument builders, incorporating three tours of the Highlands and Islands of Scotland in the process. After eight years of research, these results were published in his best-selling tome THE MODERN ANTIQUARIAN, a full colour 484-page hardback that shocked the publishing world by selling over 50,000 copies. Five years later, Cope followed up this extraordinary achievement with an even larger sequel entitled THE MEGALITHIC EUROPEAN that covered mainland Europe plus many of its islands. Cope has performed live with Sunn0))), also appearing as lead vocalist on their acclaimed album WHITE ONE, and has recorded three albums with his proto-metal power trio Brain Donor. He has also lectured three times at the British Museum. In October 2007, Cope’s JAPROCKSAMPLER was released to critical acclaim, thereafter he hosted Manchester University’s William Blake exhibition BLAKE’S SHADOW, at the Whitworth Gallery in January 2008. In May of the same year, his new album BLACK SHEEP was released to tremendous acclaim, and has since formed a band of the same name, which in 2009 recorded the massive double-LP KISS MY SWEET APOCALYPSE.

After a brief hiatus, 2012 saw the release of the well-received PSYCHEDELIC REVOLUTION, while 2013 saw the even better received REVOLUTIONARY SUICIDE, complete with its epic 16-minute lament ‘The Armenian Genocide’. In June 2014, the venerable Faber & Faber published Cope’s debut novel ONE THREE ONE, which received ecstatic reviews. The Guardian described the book as ‘One of the most brilliant, serious, funny, life-crammed novels any reader is likely to lay their mitts on’, while The Quietus declared: “ONE THREE ONE is a triumph’. The Irish Times called the book ‘Beckett on a bender’, Bobby Gillespie described it as ‘a total skullfuck of a book’, while Stewart Lee admitted “I read it in one sitting’. In early 2015, Cope will release a new ‘Best Of’ compilation covering the years 1999-2014, entitled TRIP ADVIZOR. Julian Cope lives in the West of England with his wife Dorian, and daughters Albany and Avalon.

Invited: Adam Smart, Daniel Savage, Charlie Wilton, Daniel Nuttall, Francesca Davies, Lawrence Tilli, Fiona Man, Hannah Jane, Gem Wolf, Chris Eatough, Craig Dodgson, Adrian 'Bren' Brenner, Nathon LIu, Alex Beirne, Adam Thorpe, Dave King, Dan Rowlands, Andy McMahon, Tony Pacey, Sammy Powell, Jonathan Barrett, Amy Iman Zayed, Andy Ollerhead, Anthony Rigby, Carrie Lawson, Andy Carson, Gary Harkin, Emily Victoria Farrant, Neal Neal Bo Beal, Chris Haddon, Anthony Honeyford, Helen Malarky, Dave Haslam, Aloisia Abrahams, Nick Fildes, Vicky Walker, Ben Taylor, Georgina Hill, Andrea Yurty Kerti, Jacky Carroll, Andy Hunt, Chris Holt, Louise Bolotin, Dave Owen, Aidan Cross, Bethany Jeany Thornton, Alex Staszko, Emma Kate, Emma Tricca, Tom Dunn, Chloë Purkis, Briana Rose Norton, Andy Lundy, Cath Aubergine, Alex Jones, Ant Hickman, Alexes Rogers, Ash Darko, Ged Camera, Hugh Mc Creesh, Christopher Grant, Craig Chowdown, Dominic Ryles, Alice Whatley, Claire Delahaye, Andy Stubbs, Dave Greenberg, Holly Coy, Chris K's, Iftaq Iqubal Mohammad, Davina Elizabeth Kettle, Col Denton, Anthony Barratt, Francesca Thelma Roffe Ridgard, Boyd Sleator, Chris Horkan, Donna Hurd, Graeme Borland, Adam Martin, Andy Murdoch, Dress To Undress Denim, Alexis Hume, Honey Clarke-williams, Phil Carr, Dave Sweetmore, Andy Amberson Fairnington, George Borowski, Euro Cultured, Ali Hudson, Jan Eddowes- Was Ashton, Lee Eddowes, Damon Valentine, Anthony Pendleton, Dom Hirst, Daniel Clifford, Gaffs Fallowfield, Alex Armstrong-Holding, Christopher Lamb, Adam Webster, Ian Sanderson show more »