Andy Potts
Bio
Community focused sports fan from Northeast England. Tends to root for the little guy. Look out for Talking Northeast, my new project coming soon.
Stories (95/0)
Happy ever after
It started with a kiss. Which makes a change, since usually it pretty much ends with a kiss. You know that bit. Frog turns into prince, princess awakes from a deep slumber, active hero marries passive heroine and we all live happily ever after. Or we assume so, since nobody checks back for the wedding anniversary a few years later when our beautiful prince(ss) is run ragged by a brood of royal brats and our handsome prince(ss) is casting a roving eye elsewhere.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Fiction
Playlist: Aelius
Another weekend, another festival. The Aelius Alternative festival in Newcastle is preparing its first edition on Saturday and it promises to be a belter. At a tough time for smaller music venues, it’s great to see a cluster of bars around the railway station work together to showcase some exciting local talent.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Beat
Living on Video / Trans X
Nothing dates as fast as someone else’s idea of the future. Back in the day, Trans X seemed like a glimpse of life in the unimaginably sci-fi year 2000. From synth sounds to hi-tech visuals, this was music destined to make an impression on an 80s schoolboy.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in 01
Playlist: Russia
Gnoomes - Loops A big gigging weekend starts at Stockton Calling and continues on Easter Sunday with Gnoomes playing Newcastle’s Cumberland Arms. The latter gig, in support of last year’s Ax Ox album, might be a bit special. Gnoomes are that rare thing: an independent Russian band. It won’t come as much of a surprise that, in a country where most things are centralized, grassroots cultural life is also greeted with suspicion. Hailing from Perm, a Ural city that briefly enjoyed a reputation as a provincial centre for experimental, contemporary art, Gnoomes has little choice but to embrace outsider status.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Beat
Pints & Parkruns: Chopwell Wood
Strange things happen, deep in the woods. Terrors lurk here, usually in the form of steep inclines. Chopwell Wood, in an unexpectedly rural outpost of Gateshead, boasts some nasty little hills. The steepest gradient on the course comes in at 14.3%, as part of an extended 500m climb about 1km in. Then, after a gratifying downhill, there’s another long rise, about 800m, with some 10%+ sections. Mercifully, the last 600m or so is dead flat. Just as well, since most runners are dead on their feet by this point.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Longevity
Playlist: Stockton Calling
Cortney Dixon – Summer Love Well, this is everything you could want from a pop song. Catchy, distinctive, and blessed with a distinctive purring vocal that sends shivers down the spine with each verse. Cortney grew up listening to the likes of Fleetwood Mac, the Pretenders and Bowie and she clearly picked up a song-writing trick or two along the way. Summer Love, as the title suggests, is a bright, fun slice of disposable flippancy, laced with a slightly pensive twang.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Beat
Not Pints & Parkruns: Durham City Junior
There’s nothing more reckless than a parental promise. Daughter has been getting ever more curious about Daddy’s parkrun trips and had a go at a few junior parkruns last year. Then winter came, it got cold and dark, putting the idea safely on the back burner.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Longevity
- Top Story - March 2024
Playlist: PoliticsTop Story - March 2024
Jen Dixon – The Sound Political is personal. The rumbling scandal around the Teesside freeport might seem arcane, but the whiff of dodgy deals seeps into people’s lives. And, when those people are gifted songwriters, it sparks the creative process. Jen Dixon’s work has tended to be a response to her own relationships and feelings, but the more she read about the freeport in the likes of Private Eye, the more she was inspired to write.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Beat
- Top Story - March 2024
Pints & Parkruns: Marshall Drive, Brotton
We knew this was going to be tough. Reports from other visitors suggested Marshall Drive was all about hills and mud. A look at the relief map showed four sharp, nasty-looking points of elevation on a four-lap circuit. A closer look suggested that not a yard of the course was actually going to be flat. Suddenly, I had an idea why this is one of the smaller parkruns in the region, typically attracting a couple of dozen intrepid runners to a playing field in a village near Saltburn.
By Andy Potts2 months ago in Longevity
Playlist: Folksy flavours
Amelia Coburn - See Saw With echoes of a nursery rhyme, and lyrics that gently straddle the boundary between fairy tale and dark fantasy, this is a delight. If a tribute to a great new song is that it reminds you of a forgotten old favourite, this one had hints of Copenhagen’s Blanketshow, another waltz with a hint of the macabre that got some heavy rotation in the early 2000s. The video, which continues Amelia’s collaboration with the Whippet Up puppet theatre, is also well worth a look, highlighting some acting talent to go with the music.
By Andy Potts3 months ago in Beat
Pints & Parkruns: Silksworth
There aren’t many British parkruns in the shadow of a ski slope. But when Silksworth colliery closed down in 1971, the regeneration of the site saw a former hive of industry transformed into a leisure complex. That meant finding a new role for the enormous spoil tip, and the man-made hill proved ideal for an artificial ski slope.
By Andy Potts3 months ago in Longevity