Death Disco was our favourite place to perform, as the crowd was always so appreciative of anything out of the ordinary. The most memorable night was one where we wore discoballs over our heads and created an installation of light shining and moving in all directions in the dance arch. People really wanted to touch the heads, as if they weren’t real somehow, and I remember being in the midst of the performance when one guy licked my armpit.’ Nic Green, theatre-maker NOV 2002 11. INAUGURAL ARCHES LIVE The annual festival of new theatre i rst comes into being. Now in its tenth year, the event has given a foot in the door to the performance world to the likes of Kieran Hurley, Rob Drummond, Nic Green and Gary McNair. OCT 2005 12. GALAXY 2 GALAXY PLAY PRESSURE ‘The i rst time we had Galaxy 2 Galaxy playing live was a very special occasion. We had been fans of Underground Resistance since the beginning and had asked them many times to bring a live show to Pressure. Mike Banks – the main guy – covered his face with a bandana and set his keyboards up as far to the back of the stage as possible. The wizard behind the scenes. That night Glasgow and Detroit showed their connection.’ Slam, DJs
MAR 2006 13. DANTE’S INFERNO Andy Arnold’s adaptation of Dante’s epic poem takes over the venue. Audience members are led through the venue’s subterranean rooms while a cast of 80 recreate the underworld. OCT 2006 14. SPEND A PENNY ‘Spend a Penny stands out for me... a selection of writings performed by solo actors in toilet cubicles, so it was a one actor, one audience experience. Andy [Arnold – former artistic director] somehow managed to turn the stinky Arches toilets into an underground haven of intimacies, where you were confessed to by various characters. It was an absolutely brilliant piece of theatre.’ Cora Bissett, actor and theatre-maker
DEC 2007 15. VASHTI BUNYAN, THE TWILIGHT SAD AND FRIGHTENED RABBIT ‘I remember playing the Arches back at the Fatcat Records Christmas night in 2007. I think we’d just come back from a European tour supporting Beirut and we headed straight to the Arches for the gig. It was a pretty mental night as there were lots of people from the label and
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because we’d both been touring pretty relentlessly we hadn’t hung out with the Rabbits for a while so we all went for it. There was a stage invasion during the FR’s set and some poor bastard even fell and broke his arm I think. All in all it was a pretty great night.’ James Graham, Twilight Sad APR 2009 16. TRILOGY Nic Green’s triptych about contemporary feminism had its roots in the Arches’ Behaviour festival in 2009 before going on to win awards and universal critical acclaim at the Edinburgh Fringe and beyond. OCT 2010 17. THE LIST’S 25TH BIRTHDAY Featuring Errors, King Creosote, RM Hubbert, Come on Gang!, Ben Butler & Mousepad, Den Haan, Christopher Brookmyre, Ewan Morrison and more.
‘We’ve played in the Arches twice as headliners and both times were two of my favourite shows we’ve ever done. It’s pretty much the cultural centre of Glasgow, not just for the music and club scene but for the theatre community as well.’ James Hamilton, Errors FEB 2011 18. GOBLIN The Italian horror-prog-synth soundtrack overlords deliver a memorable performance for their i rst ever Scottish show. MAR 2012 19. ANN LIV YOUNG The provocative performance artist spits raw i sh at the audience in Mermaid Show, her re-interpretation of The Little Mermaid fairytale. APR 2012 20. BEATS Kieran Hurley teams up with resident DJ Johnny Whoop for his monologue piece on rave culture. The show went on to storm the Edinburgh Fringe.
‘It’s really difi cult to pick a favourite, most important memory connected to the Arches, so I’m going to cheat and pick two. Josh Wink playing ‘Higher State of Consciousness’ as the lights come up for chucking out time at the end of Pressure, and Tim Crouch performing ‘An Oak Tree’ as part of Behaviour, which was game-changing for me.’ Kieran Hurley, theatre-maker
APR 2012 21. PRESSURE’S 20TH BIRTHDAY ‘It’s hard to i nd the right words to dei ne accurately what we can feel while we’re playing at Pressure in Glasgow. After 25 years of DJing, I can easily say that Pressure is FUCKING UNIQUE (excuse my French)!’ Laurent Garnier, DJ 18 Oct–15 Nov 2012 THE LIST 15
Trilogy, 2009
Spend A Penny, 2006 Arches Live, 2012