Much of today’s post will take place high up in the air and back in time.


The highest peal of ringing bells on all of the Earth, a sign up here tells me.
But the Cathedral is not our subject today, it’s merely a vantage point.
Neither is our subject the magnificent views of the 21st century city Centre.

No today’s subject, today’s Friday Walk, is Liverpool 8. A place close to my heart and all over this blog. But today’s way of looking at it and walking around it has been suggested by my lifelong school friend Paul Du Noyer in his book about Deaf School.
In 1973 the people who will become Deaf School are all arriving at Liverpool Art College, at precisely the same time as I turn up at nearby Liverpool University. And crucial to the education we’ll all go on to receive over the following 3 years is Liverpool 8, the place and its people. We’ll all meet significant numbers of black people, for the first time in our lives. And we’ll meet the bohemians. The artists, poets, musicians and free spirits who live here as well. And who we all want to grow up and become.

And yes, I fully realise that much of the Hope Street area isn’t technically in the postal district of Liverpool 8 at all. But we’re not talking about postal districts here, we’re talking about a place that’s much more real than that.


The band of Liverpool painter and poet Adrian Henri.
And where did we get our LPs? Well, for us ‘Liverpool 8’ began as soon as we walked up the hill from town.

In the book, Paul makes the point that though Liverpool is particularly remembered for its music from the 50s and 60s, that memory has obscured the fact that at the same time the place was bursting with art, poetry, theatre and life. So much so that when the Beatles split in 1970 it didn’t matter all that much to those of us who were here at the time. We got to Liverpool 8 as soon as we could and threw ourselves into everything that was going on here. As had John Paul and George a generation before us.


No, I’m not calling it ‘Ye’ anything.
Tempted by the promises on notices outside I go in for my lunch.






So this is the neighbourhood where Deaf School and the rest of us arrived. Where poets were the people sitting at the next table to you in the pub, and writing your own stuff and putting together your own plays and adventures was just a matter of time.



Having been denied lunch at The Crack I go to Hope Hall. Epicentre of the Liverpool 8 poetry scene.


By 1973 the Everyman Bistro is open in the basement, beginning 40 years of nurturing friendship and creativity in Liverpool. But the pubs mattered too.



Note the Rev’s up to the minute cassette recorder there. I used one like that for recording my first songs.
(And by the way, Deaf School member Steve ‘Mr Average’ Lindsey’s been in touch to tell me the above picture was taken in CBGB’s New York in 1977. I should have realised no Liverpool pub, then or now, would be advertising things ‘to go’!)



Opposite the end of Falkner Street, in 1973, the Hahnemann Hospital is still open.




And no, these are not their real names. But the ones they made up are good aren’t they?


And many friends I would come to know over the next few years did. Making me aware of something special that was going on around here. Something called ‘housing associations’ were gradually trying to buy up houses, keep them out of the hands of slum landlords, and start doing them up to a decent standard for people to live in decently. Much more on this as I discover Liverpool Housing Trust.









Just round in Upper Parliament Street was somewhere very important to us all back in the 1970s.

Licensing laws were still very restrictive back then and no decent poet wants to stop drinking at 11o’clock on a Friday night. So we’d come to The Somali, as would Deaf School. Crowded, smoky, all the music from a juke box and open ’til 2, some nights it seemed the whole of Liverpool 8 was jammed into there.


The Real Thing had grown out of The Chants, Beatles friends and contemporaries from Liverpool 8.







And being a Friday, the road is filled with the parked cars of the faithful.





But we still have four of the original streets.







News of which I hope to be able to bring you soon.
Meanwhile over on the Welsh Streets?



Which is where our walk through the Liverpool 8 of 1973 and Deaf School and me ends.

No, though it’s part of Liverpool 8 by postcode it’s always been a distinct place called ‘The Dingle’ as opposed to ‘Liverpool 8’ where I’ve wandered today and these many years since I first arrived.

And later on in Liverpool 8 there were righteous riots, caused by the policies of the police. After which, out of sheer revenge, much of Granby was destroyed, accompanied by a diaspora of its peoples.
But Liverpool 8, the true spirit of the place survives. Seen here at its purest form in the Granby 4 Streets Market – ‘By the people, of the people, for the people’ – where Liverpool 8 regathers and the names of the disappeared streets are once again spoken.
And Deaf School? After briefly being ‘the next big thing’ and then not, quite – they too regather at times. And we sing all of their songs with them like every one was a hit to us. Oh frabjous days. ‘Cocktails at eight?’ L8? I’ll meet you there.

‘Deaf School: The non-stop pop art punk rock party’ by Paul Du Noyer is the inspiration for doing this walk via the top of the Cathedral. Thanks Paul.
And looking in the opposite direction, at the city centre and the river, here.
Oh shame on you Ron, you missed Chambre Hardmans house.
Didn’t miss it Stan. Saw it was there and walked right past!
You are right about The Dingle being separate from Liverpool 8. At the age of 87 I remember such facts, which younger folk forget or never knew.
Thank you and welcome to here.
There are so many boundaries and places in a city. Many not shown on any maps but held in the heads of us who live there.
Such a wonderful area – as rich and varied as life itself!
(But Ducie Street is now gone – or almost gone! It was the subject of a significant UK housing case law initiative (known as the “Granby Decision”) whereby for the first time in the UK compulsory powers were used to transfer badly managed properties (in this case squalid multi-lets) to responsible ownership (I.e., housing associations). Housing associations? Responsible ownership?
Good to hear from you Des. And good news will soon be emerging about the remaining half of Ducie Street. I can say no more!
Great piece Ronnie. Many memories. Had two of my kids baptised at St Bernards Kingsley Road.
Walked past there this morning with Rob and son.
hi ron can you tell me which street the “crack” is in please. i saw it many years ago during the ambulance dispute but cant remember the street ..
Hi Stan, all well here. It’s in Rice Street Stan. Well worth a visit. I was in there the other night. A warm and friendly place.
Hi Ronnie, love your work.
– The fancy dress shop you refer to as O’Connor’s, on the corner of Hardman St & Pilgrim St, served initially as a synagogue for Liverpool New Hebrew Congregation, from 1842-57. They had split from the original Liverpool Hebrew Congregation in 1838 & worshipped in rooms on Hanover St for four years. In 1857, they moved to Hope Place Synagogue (now Unity Theatre), where they stayed until 1937, when they merged with a much smaller congregation to create Greenbank Drive Hebrew Congregation. They closed in Jan 2008. A photo of the O’Connor’s building appears in Philip Ettinger’s 1933 book “Hope Place in Liverpool Jewry”.
– The plaque dedicatd to “The Dissenters” is the unmistakable work of Fred O’Brien, with whom I’ve had dealings in relation to Deane Road Cemetery.
– I’ve seen an engraving of the Liverpool Institute building done around the time it opened. I don’t think I have a copy, but I know a man who does!
– The Philharmonic pub was designed by Walter William Thomas (1849-1912), whose career I’ve researched in detail because he designed the prayer hall at Broad Green Jewish Cemetery. His main Liverpool works were large buildings, including Toxteth Pk Workhouse (additions only, c.1881 & 1884), Hyam’s Dept Store (58-60 Lime St, c.1882), The Phil (1898-1900), The Coffee House (originally a “Temperance pub”, Church Rd North, Wavertree, remodelling only, 1904), prayer hall, Broad Green Jewish Cemetery (Thomas Dr, 1904), The Vines (Lime St, 1907), the TJ Hughes building (London Rd, c.1910), possibly some houses around Sefton Pk, The Brookhouse (Smithdown Rd, additions only).
– I love The Quarter! Great food & service. I take various guests there.
– Huge fan of the Canning district. I note the stone-faced houses on the north side of Percy St, possibly designed by Samuel Rowland (1789-1844), architect of the screen wall at Deane Road Cemetery & another subject of my research.
– St Bride’s Church (1830) was Rowland’s most famous work. He also designed the Northern Dispensary building (Vauxhall Rd, c.1826), Scotch Secessionist Church (Mt Pleasant, 1827), St James’s church (Latchford, Warrington, 1829), parts of Percy St housing (unconfirmed, early 1830s), Bootle National School (1835), Deane Road Jewish Cemetery entrance (1837), Queen Insurance building (Dale St, 1839).
– And finally, Princes Rd Synagogue, on the board of which I served 2006-14 & your blog entry about which I’m about to read! One of only 3 Grade I listed synagogues in the country.
I’m a big fan of your work & would be delighted to meet up & chat at your convenience. Please keep blogging!
Saul Marks.
Thanks for all this Saul. I knew the Unity was a synagogue but had no idea O’Connor’s was too. That was where I learned how to drink beer with some considerable skill!
I will definitely keep blogging, our place is so full of the stories of the things we’ve all dreamed of and then done. Good to hear from you.