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We found Dave Pollock’s Guardian piece about the ‘slow death of music venues’ thought-provoking and a lot of research has gone into it. We’re less convinced that it told the whole story about Glasgow. A number of us at Glasgow Music City Tours have or still do work as music journalists. We understand that an article has to fit the brief, make clear points and not muddy the waters but Glasgow’s live music scene appears to be in rude health rather than facing a slow death. We wrote a reply on the article’s comments page: ‘As a former music journalist who wrote about many of the same Glasgow and Edinburgh venues as David Pollock, I appreciate the power of a punchy headline. However, this article greatly exaggerates the slow death of live music in Glasgow. While the closure of The Arches was indeed a…

One of the real pleasures of doing Glasgow Music City Tours is the experiences that our guests bring to the tours. We have had people who remember going to the dancing at Barrowlands and guests who have performed on the band stand at Kelvingrove. Some have met their life partners in the venues we visit and others have had their lives changed…

This Saturday Paolo Nutini headlines Glasgow Summer Sessions at Bellahouston Park. With support from the amazing Grace Jones, the line up also features sets from The View, Soak and one of our own favourites, Tuff Love. Earlier this year one of Glasgow Music City Tours’ founders, Fiona Shepherd, met up with Paolo for what can only be…

Linden is the latest musical project from songwriter, singer and ex Superstar, Joe McAlinden. This Thursday 27th August, Linden return to play The Poetry Club for the first time since the release of the critically acclaimed, and very lovely, Rest And be Thankful. Superstar were originally signed to Creation Records by Alan McGee in 1992 and, up until 2000,…

We had such a great response to the writer and journalist Damien Love’s blog about his unexpected correspondence with Ivor Cutler that we’re re-running it for those of you who might have missed it. Damien unearthed a previously unpublished interview he conducted with the great man, along with another couple of very special Ivor artifacts….

On each of our Glasgow Music City Tours, there are places that evoke particularly strong memories. The site of the late, lamented Apollo, which features on our Music Mile Tour, is a favourite, where people pause and sigh at the memory of what used to be. Such is the fondness in which its memory is…

We recently took the blogger Rob Lloyd out on a Glasgow music city tour. Rob writes the mighty fine Stop Having a Boring Life blog which documents his travel adventures all over the globe. We took him all over the Merchant City and East End of Glasgow. Barrowland Pathway At Jim Lambie’s Album Pathway in Barrowland Park, Rob was particularly taken with the blue police box which sits at one corner of the park. When you live here, police boxes are still common enough that you tend not to notice or remark on them. Of course, if you are a visitor then the sight of an old blue police box means only one thing: Dr Who. But, aside from Barrowland Park police box, do you know the connection between Dr Who and Glasgow’s music scene? It’s a story we cover on our Glasgow’s…

The 2015 Glasgow Jazz Festival ended on a high note with a 20% increase on ticket sales. Far from resting on their weary laurels, planning has already begun for 2016 when the festival celebrates its 30th edition. We grabbed a quick natter with the festival’s indefatigable director, Jill Rodger, about how she came to be…

Built in 1924, the proud little bandstand in Glasgow’s Kelvingrove Park lapsed slowly into disuse by the last decades of the 20th century, and was finally closed in 1999, from which point it was left to crumble into what looked like terminal disrepair. Anyone who remembers it from that period will recall the open-air amphitheatre as a sad,…

As a follow-up to Tuesday’s blog, in which Roddy Frame shared memories of his formative gig-going at Glasgow’s lamented Apollo in the late-1970s, we called on our pal Anne Ward, who has kindly agreed to share some of her photographs of the town that was helping to form Frame in the same period. Ladies and gentlemen: East…

It has been a beezer week for Glasgow Music City Tours. Yesterday, we finished our last of four special tours for Merchant City Festival. We had lots of guests come out on tour with us and our TripAdvisor reviews are all glowing with good comments. We finished each tour with a concert from special guests at Mono. Many thanks to Miracle Strip, Spinning…

To end our third walking tour for the Merchant City Festival, Breakfast Muff play a free set in Mono today at around 4.30pm. You can read more about them here. On Sunday we’re delighted that the rather wonderful Sound of Yell will be performing. Piloted by Stevie Jones, Sound of Yell are based in Glasgow and can number as many…