Bernard Sumner, Stephen Morris, and Gillian Gilbert of New Order spoke today (March 15) at this year’s SXSW and discussed becoming musicians, the evolution of their sound and growing up in Manchester.The trio were keynote speakers at the annual tech and marketing festival, in conversation with Will Hodgkinson, rock and pop critic of The Times. Andy Burnham, Mayor of Manchester, introduced the keynote, calling New Order “the ultimate Manchester band” before adding that it was “a big statement”.The band kicked off their chat by discussing how they weren’t necessarily “anti-musicians” but they were “anti-success”, with Sumner pointing to growing up working class before “punk came along” giving him the chance to express himself, without being a virtuoso. “I didn’t want to be famous, I didn’t care about that at all.
'I fled sirens and explosions after my city was invaded... now Manchester is my home'
24.02.2023 - 22:31 / manchestereveningnews.co.uk
Twelve months ago, Masha Semeniuk was met with the sound of sirens. The 34-year-old had made her life in Kyiv.
Her friends, her family and her job were all in Ukraine's bustling capital. But on February 24, 2022, Russia invaded Masha's home city, and her journey to Manchester was weeks away.
She told the Manchester Evening News: "We were almost the first who understood that trouble was near, that war was here. I remember explosions all the time, alarms.
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"At the building [I lived at] we had an [underground] floor without any communication. It was just a room without anything, but we hid there.
"The alarm went off every two hours - in the daytime, at night, all the time. Lots of explosions. It was really scary, especially the first night because Russia came to Kyiv.
"They started to walk through, not near my house but still it was very scary. I had friends that lived [closer] and they saw everything by their eyes."
Maria Romanenko, 30, had already been warned that central Kyiv might not be safe the day before Russia's invasion. Her father had encouraged her and her Mancunian partner, Jez Myers, to stay with him 30 minutes out of the city for the night.
On February 24, Maria woke up to the worst news. "My partner woke me up, shaking me, saying there have been bombs dropped everywhere," she said.
"I couldn't really grasp what was happening. I went on Twitter and saw multiple reports."
Jez, 45, knew very quickly that he wanted to cross the border to Poland before making his way back home to England - but for Maria it was a tougher decision. "My life was in Ukraine," she said.
"I was choosing between my
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