Despite its plentiful supply of restaurants, Didsbury Village is noticeably short of good, independent drinking establishments – especially ones where you feel equally safe order a coffee as you do asking for a pint. I was in The Art of Tea on Barlow Moor Road on Saturday and, when I’d finished being distracted by the halloumi salad, spotted details of a regular event that’s launching there tonight:

Gesampt is a new night bringing together all things creative and offers people an opportunity to exhibit their work for one night only in a Salon style – this could be anything from paintings to objects and videos to soundtracks.

Gesampt will also be showcasing acoustic and folk musicians that are either traditional or experimental in style.

Offering acoutic entertainment this evening will be Luffy the Acoustic Man, Clare Helen, Callum Plowright and Dan and Lee from No Drones for Leopold, while Cygnus and WEAR will be providing ‘experimental electronic shenanigans’. The event kicks off at 7.30pm and runs until about 11.30pm. Visit the Salon Gesampt blog for more information about future events.

One new thing and one old to tell you about today…

The former is An Apathetical Reader, which is ‘a creative community site that hopes to give a voice to the vast numbers of unsupported, disillusioned young people in the city and question why individuals feel apathy towards their own work’. It’ll achieve this through local news, national political comment, features of Manchester, music journalism and artist’s profiles.

The latter is The Chapel on the edge of Platt Fields in Rusholme/Fallowfield. This building, which dates back to 1790, was used as a meeting place for Manchester Amateur Photographic Society (itself founded in 1885) and the Russell Leite Theatre School until it was purchased a couple of years back.

Now, however, it’s being run by the same ambitious group of ex-students who launched Platt Fields’ Mad Ferret festival last year and who took over the (now closed) Ram & Shackle pub. Their aims, according to a post on Indymedia.org.uk, are  to provide an autonomous space for performing arts, learning, access to the arts and local campaigners. I’m hearing lots of grand ideas coming out of this unusual building, so best of luck to them.

And the link between these two? AAR will be holding an open meeting at The Chapel this coming Wednesday from 7pm. If you fancy getting involved, email Alice or join the AAR Facebook group.

Kate’s only gone and organised a drinking session for Manchester’s bloggers! These things used to happen a bit more regularly back in the day, with afternoon sessions at the Hare & Hound on Shudehill and Oldham Street’s the Castle – soon to be back in business – particularly memorable.

This time, the venue’s something of an upgrade: Centro on Tib Street. The place is impossibly busy and loud on the weekend but reasonable enough during the week, and stocks some great beers (though the hand-pulls are usually off). It’s just past Matt & Phreds – but if you reach Big in Amsterdam, you’ve gone too far:

This Manchester blogmeet takes place next Tuesday, 10 March, 7-9pm. If those hours are adhered to, I’ll eat my blog. Leave a comment on the Manchizzle if you fancy attending.

[Photo by Flickr user conspicuous ID]

Since Metro dropped its daily listings section a couple of months back it’s been a struggle for those wanting to keep up to date with music events in the rainy city. CityLife’s print version is handy but is limited by space and frequency, and its digital version is too generic (‘live music at Lime/Dry Bar/the Thirsty Scholar/Night & Day’ anyone?).

Northernights, meanwhile, does a great job of informing us about Manchester’s clubbing scene, and I’m now doing a weekly roundup of folk/Americana/alternative gigs at my new Hey! Manchester music blog – but there’s also a new dedicated events listing site: theshippingforecast.eu.

It’s a pretty minimal service, featuring the name, type of music, venue, time and price for each event – and sometimes just two or three of those. They’re obviously anticipating that anyone who’s interested in seeing Fight Like Apes at the Roadhouse, for example, has the common sense to google it for more information.

The Shipping Forecast is also available around town – at ‘common, the skate shop opposite, abode, fuel, saki bar, ram and shackle’ for starters – as a fold-out print version on nice card. It’s what the Alive guide, which seems to have all but vanished lately, did well a few years ago – but more personable and alternative.

If you have a music event, email listings@theshippingforecast.eu. They promise to include everything received, ‘no music snobbery at all’.