Mathew Street Festival is back — or is it?
Plus: an update on the Athenaeum and a bland diet for metro mayor Rotheram
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Big story: Mathew Street Festival is back — or is it?
Top Line: The Mathew Street Festival — once a central part of the Beatles Week festivities — is returning. Well, sort of. In something of a curveball, the revived event won’t actually be on Mathew Street. Go figure.
Details: Starting from humble beginnings with a simple stage outside the Cavern in 1993, the Mathew Street Festival became a major part of International Beatles Week, a massive party that spilled out across town. However, the festival became a victim of its own success. Soon the area around Mathew Street and beyond became rammed with tourists and bank holiday party goers every year.
This was accompanied by some grumbling from time to time about the extent of the partying; reports of chaos in the streets led to calls for tougher regulations of the event.
By 2007, the council had enough and Mathew Street Festival was prevented from taking place over health and safety fears.
It wasn’t long before it was resurrected however but by 2013 the event was cancelled for good with the Liverpool International Music Festival (LIMF) later taking its place.
Mathew Street. Wikimedia Commons.
Is it really back? Well, the team behind the new Mathew Street Festival have said so. They announced it would be returning to the city during this year’s August bank holiday weekend (between August 23 and 26)
The festival, which will be ticketed, centred at Pier Head, rather than Mathew Street.
People will soon be able to book tickets for £25 online. However, the only place you can currently get them are as part of one of a series of record-themed packages for the wider International Beatles Week. These start at £130 per person for event tickets only, and stretch up to £825 a pop if you add in accommodation.
What’s more, the event will be 18+
Activities include events at the Cavern, day-tripping across the river, and the ever popular annual convention at the Adelphi, where guests can also opt to stay, should they wish (although thankfully there are several other options on the table).
What can we expect? The line up is currently a closely guarded secret with specific acts yet to be revealed, but it is understood there are likely to be a number of ‘favourites’ from past festivities channelling a range of 60s stars.
With the event not actually taking place on Mathew Street (and no longer being open to anyone who wants to attend), there has been some controversy. Can actually really justify the claim to have resurrected the once-popular festival? After all, it’s not even on Mathew Street.
While there’s been plenty of excitement about the event, many too have posted on social media perturbed by the changes, such as:
The International Beatles Week website, perhaps preempting the grumbles, have described it as more of a “tribute” to the original. In any case, the four-day festival will be taking over the pier head later this year, so plenty of time to get your mop top ready.
Post Picks
🍷 Lark Lane’s Experiment 625 hosts another Drink and draw session on Wednesday. Illustrator To Lierney leads the session, with all materials included. Find out more here.
🎸 J Madden, the man behind Wirral’s favourite band, Hooton Tennis Club, takes to the Jacaranda’s stage this Thursday for the launch of his new solo EP Slow Illumination. Expect nostalgic piano and jangly guitars — tickets here.
😂 On Saturday Channel 4 comic William Thompson heads to the Irish Centre for a night of stand up. Joining him is Mick Moran, shortlisted for the Tempest Comedian of the Year back in 2023, and the night’s host, Mark Devine. Tickets are on sale here.
📖 Actor, presenter and author Linda Robson hosts her book signing at Waterstones on College Lane this Saturday. The memoir, titled Truth Be Told: Tales From a Baggy Mouth, came out earlier this month, with the signing including a copy of the release.
Photo of the week
A wonderful snapshot of the fun at Wombat Jazz Club last Friday at Ettie’s on Bold Street. Wombat is a pop-up event in Liverpool, creating inclusive events and celebrating black music. Find out more here.
Your Post briefing
An intriguing update on our reporting at The Athenaeum: the member at the centre of an ongoing racism row (accused by multiple sources who spoke to The Post of making brazenly racist comments and “arguing for slavery to be brought back”) has walked from the club. A number of Athenaeum members told The Post they were appalled by the club’s decision to stand by the young man, who was a civil servant working for the government, but the club told us he was being unfairly maligned. Now, he’s gone.
Good news for Everton FC today after they won an appeal against being docked ten points in the Premier League. Back in November, the team lost ten points after breaching financial rules outlined by the football league, including failing to fully disclose information about the new stadium’s debt. Now, an independent commission has said it was “wrong” to punish Everton so harshly, changing their punishment to just six points.
On the grapevine: Steve Rotheram is a man who knows what he likes: devolution, football, Andy Burnham. What he’s less keen on — apparently — is eating his greens. The metro mayor’s dining companions at a swanky Indonesian restaurant were baffled when Rotheram — presented with a banquet of beautifully steamed vegetables on a bed of rice — tipped up his plate, got rid of the vegetables, got a slice of white bread from the kitchen and made himself a rice sandwich.
Mixed responses to G’Wed, a new ITV sitcom exploring the lives of working class Liverpudlian teenagers. Over on Reddit, reviews ranged from “forced and cringeworthy”, to “regional accent theatre for people in the Home Counties” to the blunter: “It's absolutely bollocks”. Nonetheless, one man sticking his head above the parapet was legendary screenwriter Russell T Davies, who declared G’Wed both “FUNNY” and “FILTHY” on Instagram (all caps). “Oh my God, it’s filthy, the very last line made me laugh so much, I rewound it five times. I’ve only seen one episode, and it’s HILARIOUS,” wrote Davies. So who’s right? Russell or Reddit? Let us know in the comments.
Home of the week
This six bedroom Victorian house in Oxton is giving us serious home envy. The real showstopper is obviously the garden — with ample green space and a rustic decking perfect for the summer months. Oh, and it has three gorgeous bathrooms too. Not cheap, mind — it’ll set you back £875,000. Take the full tour here.
Recommended reads
This piece published by Liverpool Irish Festival tells the stories of five sailors who fled Ireland after being sentenced to death, delving into our city’s connections with their homeland. “In a somewhat miraculous turn of events Richard Faber, despite suffering the same fate as his fellow sailors, regained consciousness as he was being buried. He had somehow managed to survive the hanging and eventually successfully escaped Dublin [to Liverpool].”
What next for Wirral’s Waterfront? Jon Egan tackles the other side’s big regeneration question in a Liverpolitan longread. It’s well worth your time — read it here.
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I saw the trailer, that was enough.
Sooooo, first off we're being told that "The Matthew St Festival" will be returning, but then when you read the actual story, you find out that not only is it NOT THE ACTUAL MSF, but some sort of condensed version, which will all take place over the holiday weekend at the Pier Head. THEN they casually drop in the fact that not only is it all taking place at the Pier Head, but you're also getting banged 25 notes a go if you fancy watching it, and also the fact that the area will be fenced off to the rest of the waterfront. NOW they're saying that you apparently can't just attend the concert, but you also have to pay for the whole Beatles week Convention, anything else they've forgot to mention? Said this elsewhere when it was originally mentioned, but it wouldn't come as any kind of shock to me if all those involved, decide that this is an experiment to try and guage reaction and that if they decide to do this again next year, the Pier head site will be deemed inadequate, and it will be moved to everyone's favourite trendy Hangout, The Baltic Triangle (More venues, probably each being able to charge individually.
As regards the reason for the original stopping, somebody seems to be rewriting history here. As I seem to remember, back at the time, the City Council were complaining/pointing out that while they were responsible for most of the stages and security, as well as the health & safety of those attending, the hospitality sector were apparently raking it in, with almost everywhere (or at least everywhere in the City Centre & immediately beyond) being booked solid all week, yet they never offered anything towards offsetting the costs, and in the end the Concil warned that it was becoming more and more expensive for the Council alone to be expected to foot the bill, "so how about all of you, chipping something in to offset the costs?" To which the Hospitality Sector replied that the festival helped offset the occasions when you barely saw anybody around the City Centre from one day to the next, so you can basically do one with your bumming requests, so in the end the City Council said they had no other option but to jib the whole thing, and in future there wouldn't be any MSF