Nicky Crewe - Factory Records Memories
by Nicky Crewe
published: 25 / 11 / 2015

intro
Nicky Crewe reflects on what she both remembers and does not remember about knowing from her teens Factory Records boss Tony Wilson and working the door at the legendary Russell and Hacienda clubs
Memory lost. They say if you can remember the sixties you mustn’t really have been there. I have the same problem with 1980. I began the year living with my Dutch boyfriend in Longsight, Manchester. He had come to Manchester as a roadie for Alberto Y Los Trios Paranoias. We both had day jobs, but he was occasionally asked to roadie for Manchester bands and promoters. I started to do the door at Rafters for Alan Wise and at the Russell Club in Hulme for Factory because of these connections. There were other significant links too. I’d shared a house with Martin Hannett. I’d known Tony Wilson since I was about 15, through family friends and Catholic grammar school contacts in Salford. He was older than me, definitely going places. In fact he had already gone to Cambridge to read English. When I was torn between two universities, he quoted Carlos Castaneda to me. ‘Follow the path with heart’. I did and went to Exeter. I had left by Christmas. We met again when we were both back in Manchester and it was always a pleasure to see him. I enjoyed working on the door, taking the money, checking the guest list. It introduced me to people and music I might have missed out on. I once refused to let Mark E Smith in to venue and got the ‘don’t you know who I am ‘ treatment. I didn’t back then, and it was still no reason to treat him any differently back in those far off days, before the Fall. I’ve read the history books. I know I was around when Joy Division were playing in Manchester. I know what I was doing in May 1980 too. But I don’t have any memory of seeing them, or of the shock of Ian Curtis’ suicide. By September 1980 I had run away to Morocco and was teaching English in Casablanca. By the time I got back to Manchester in the summer of 1981 the Hacienda plan was well under way, Martin Hannett had disassociated himself from it and in May 1982 I was offered a job in the ticket office a couple of nights a week. I had a day job as a local history researcher, which I loved, so I was never going to do it full time. I was there in the box office on opening night, though I don’t get a mention in ’24 Hour Party People’. Once I did the cloakroom with Johnny Marr. I remember that, because I assumed his name was a play on the French for ‘I’m bored’. I stayed involved for about six months. I saw New Order there, in their khaki shorts and ‘tings’, looking more Hitler Youth than boy scouts. Did I miss out because I was too busy taking the money, checking the guest lists, chatting to the bouncers, guarding the cash? I’ll never know, unless someone reading this can remember.
Band Links:-
http://historicgigguide.blogspot.co.uk/http://thenicoditch.blogspot.co.uk/
https://www.facebook.com/nicky.crewe
https://twitter.com/Thenicoditch
features |
A Life in Music (2021) |
![]() |
In the first in a new series, 'A Life in Music', in which she will be talking to a Pennyblack writer about how music has affected and influenced them, Cila Warncke chats to Nicky Crewe. |
Ticket Rewind (2019) |
digital downloads
most viewed articles
current edition
Robby Krieger - Set The Night on Fire, Living, Dying, And Playing Guitar with The DoorsBoomtown Rats - Ten Songs That Made Me Love....
Lida Husik - Interview
Cathal Coughlan - Interview
Rick Wakeman - Interview
Peter Doherty and Frederic Lo - Cavern Club, Liverpool, 27/3/2022
Cliff Richard - Not Fade Away
Simon Bromide - Interview
Candlelight Tribute to Coldplay - Manchester Cathedral, Manchester, 1/4/2022
Wolfgang Flur - Interview
previous editions
World Party - InterviewSam Brown - Interview 2008
Cliff Richard - Vs Elvis Presley
Trudie Myerscough-Harris - Interview
Eric Chappell - Interview 1
Pete Brown - Interview
Ruskin Arms - The Image That Made Me Weep
Half Man Half Biscuit - Ten Songs That Made Me Love...
Joy Division - The Image That Made Me Weep
Melanie Blake - Interview
most viewed reviews
current edition
Rupert Wates - For The PeopleBanjo Jen - Fine Line
Kiki Dee and Carmelo Luggeri - The Long Ride Home
Dead South - Easy Listening for Jerks Parts 1 and 2
Bonham-Bullick - Bonham-Bullick
Family - A Song for Me
Loop - Sonancy
Stereophonics - Oochya!
Weather Station - How Is It That I Should Look At The Stars
John Mayall - The Sun is Shining Down
Pennyblackmusic Regular Contributors
Adrian Janes
Adrian P
Amanda J. Window
Andrew Twambley
Anthony Dhanendran
Benjamin Howarth
Carl Bookstein
Chris O'Toole
Cila Warncke
Daniel Cressey
Darren Aston
Dave Goodwin
Denzil Watson
Dixie Ernill
Dominic B. Simpson
Eoghan Lyng
Fiona Hutchings
Harry Sherriff
Helen Tipping
Jamie Rowland
John Clarkson
Julie Cruickshank