There’s an interesting feature by Simon Binns in the latest issue of Crain’s Manchester Business about the future of the In The City music conference.

The original company, In The City Ltd, is being wound up by the late Tony Wilson’s partner Yvette Livesey - but Jon Paul Waddington (formerly of CityLife) and his team plan to keep the event going on 5-7 October.

And the 17th year of ITC will, for the first time, include the involvement of Manchester City Council who want to ‘discuss the production of a report on the next steps for the growth of the music industry in Manchester’.

Waddington believes that ‘the Peter Street corridor is probably a bit out of sync with what we do - there are probably closer ties to the Northern Quarter’. He’s right too - watching hopefuls giving their all in the far-from-rock-n-roll surroundings of Walkabout, Teasers and Life Cafe has never felt quite right.

So might we see ITC switching from its Midland hotel base to the Malmaison, for example, in the coming years?