The Long Listen · series

Visit notes

Matt's first-person notes from rooms he has stood in, with his own photographs and film. On the Doorstep is the North East; Away is everywhere else.

Photo: The wub, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

2 so far

On the Doorstep

Newcastle and the North East, the gigs and rooms on Matt's own patch, written the morning after.

Durham Castle and Cathedral floodlit at night above the weir on the River Wear, Framwellgate Bridge to the left, the water blurred to silk by a long exposure01
Visit notes

Time, in the dark at Durham Cathedral

On the closing night of Time by Luxmuralis, I walked into some of the earliest rib vaults in Europe and was carried, in forty-five minutes, from a…

26 October 2026 · 5 min read
Low, rain-soaked street view of King Street Social Club's tiled mosaic facade at night, red tail-light reflections on the wet tarmac, parked cars and a mural to the left02
Visit notes

Knats, upstairs at King Street Social Club

The night after the Mercury Prize, Newcastle's Knats opened their tour in the concert room of a working men's club in North Shields, with bingo on…

26 October 2026 · 8 min read

1 so far

Away

Further afield: the trips, the halls and the courtyards worth the train, the plane or the boat.

The twin domes and colonnades of the Old Royal Naval College lit at night, reflected in the Thames01
Visit notes

Moby on the Thames

Thirty years of meaning to see Moby play live, settled on a sold-out Saturday in a square Christopher Wren built for sailors, with the Thames at one…

26 October 2026 · 6 min read

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Photographs on this page: Photo: Matt Renton / Sonic Paths; Photo: Matt Renton / Sonic Paths