Dr Dave Robinson

A groundbreaking study of music and musical history in Leeds. This is the first scholarly volume to focus on popular music in Leeds.

This chapter examines the Austin music scene as a site of contested meaning for the musical field known as Americana. Focusing on the practices and experiences of three groups of Austin scenesters—countercultural survivors, marginalised musical voices, and creative class actors— Robinson examines the ways in which both residual and emergent cultural practices have shaped the Americana scene locally, and how this corresponds with a contestation of meaning between survivalist and revivalist musical discourses more widely. So too, the continuing sustainability of a vibrant grass-roots music scene is considered in the context of Austin’s shift from university town to technology hub, and the concomitant shift in demand for more accessible cultural attractions which provide only the feeling of the alternative.

Pubs and popular music share long-standing connections, both through commodified entertainment practices and ones which cultivate a sense of belonging. In this article we consider how new spaces for drink and music related leisure form sites of community, distinction and resistance in a Yorkshire Dales market town. Pubs in urban areas have long contributed to the vitality of more diffuse music scenes, but instances of pub-based scenes in rural areas have been rare and disconnected. However, the conjunction of reduced demand for retail space and an emergent do-it-yourself culture has brought about the transformation of redundant retail outlets as independently-run leisure spaces in both urban and rural locales, including a growing number of micropubs. Foregrounding the role of individual agency and the significance of locally-negotiated meanings, we examine how Habermasian communicative leisure is performed at recently-opened micropubs which stage live music. Through observational analysis and semi-structured interviews we examine how these performative spaces foster a sense of belonging and how this is enhanced through activities including music quizzes, trips to music festivals and amateur music-making. We consider how locally negotiated trading and exchange practices constitute resistance to corporate capitalism and the extent to which this community’s preferences for real-ale and less-mainstream musical styles also serve as markers of distinction in a Bourdieusian sense.

Ale Trails, where a series of pubs noted for serving real ale and craft beer are linked together along a prescribed route followed either on foot or by bus or train, are now a well-established activity in the UK and beyond. However, in some cases they have become associated with large groups of rowdy drinkers characterised by excessive consumption and disorderly behaviour. While copious research has focused on drinking urban leisure spaces, few studies have examined leisure mobilities involved in drinking in, and intoxicated mobilities through, rural and suburban spaces. This article uses Henri Lefebvre’s concept of rhythmanalysis to analyse leisure mobility through the spaces constituting the Ale Trail – including pubs, train carriages, station platforms and village streets. In these spaces, the differing rhythms of diverse individuals and groups as they move through heterogeneous spaces on foot and by train give rise to both shifting alignments and conflicts. The article concludes with a discussion of the spatial, temporal and affective dimensions of alcohol consumption and demonstrates the relevance of rhythmanalysis concepts and methods for exploring contemporary forms of leisure mobilities.

Skipton, on the edge of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, is an old mill town that has seen tourists flocking to it since the arrival of the railway in the 19th century. Like many other old mill towns in northern England, Skipton has lost those mills-as-factories and the workers in them—and has struggled to retain a sustainable local economy. At the same time, Skipton has become increasingly gentrified, and has become a focus for day visitors and tourists attracted by the beautiful countryside seen when Le Tour de France came through Yorkshire in 2014. In this article, we explore the area of Skipton, dubbed the Canal Quarter. We focus on the leisure spaces that have opened there as attempts to construct alternative, authentic experiences around the consumption of real ale, the performance of live music, and the curation of second-hand vinyl records. We have previously explored how these might be shown to be a space for Habermasian rationality. In this sequel, we use critical theory to show how the alternative, authentic space of vinyl, real ale, and live music has already been compromised by two conflicting hegemonic powers: the cooption of leisure into the economics of tourism and tourism policy, and the meaninglessness of cool capitalism and Bauman's consumer society.