Coventry

Coventry is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands, England.

Historically part of Warwickshire, Coventry is the 9th largest city in England and the 12th largest in the United Kingdom. It is the second largest city in the West Midlands region, after Birmingham.

Coventry is 19 miles (31 km) east-southeast of Birmingham, 24 miles (39 km) southwest of Leicester, 11 miles (18 km) north of Warwick and 95 miles (153 km) northwest of London.

The current Coventry Cathedral was built after the majority of the 14th century cathedral church of Saint Michael was destroyed by the Luftwaffe in the Coventry Blitz of 14 November 1940. Coventry motor companies have contributed significantly to the British motor industry. The city has two universities, Coventry University in the city centre and the University of Warwick on the southern outskirts.

On 7 December 2017, the city won the title of UK City of Culture 2021, after beating Paisley, Stoke-on-Trent, Swansea and Sunderland to the title. They will be the third title holder, of the quadrennial award which began in 2013.(Read more at Wikipedia)

Links to Peel
Peel didn't seem to have any family or personal connections with Coventry, and isn't known to have visited the city in his youth. But after returning from the United States and making his name on Radio London and at the BBC, he would visit Coventry to host gigs, especially at Lanchester Polytechnic. Later in the 1970s he encouraged the Two-Tone movement, which remains the city's main claim to fame in the national music scene, booking the Specials and the Selecter for sessions early in their careers.

Coventry boomed from the end of World War 2 until the end of the 1960s, with a growing population which included a large percentage of young people. Nevertheless, it didn't produce a music scene to rival those of Liverpool, Manchester and Birmingham. In the early 1960s the best-known Coventry artists were middle-of-the-road singers Frank Ifield and Vince Hill, while the Coventry-born DJ Brian Matthew hosted Saturday Club on the BBC Light Programme and ITV's Thank Your Lucky Stars. Another DJ (and later record producer), Pete Waterman, was starting his career with a residency at one of the city's ballrooms.

The best-known Coventry bands of the 1960s were the Sorrows and the Mighty Avengers. Although the latter band only had minor chart success, their single "So Much In Love" became a lasting Peel favourite and was included in his Record Box.

Coventry was dominated by the disco and ballroom scene until the end of the 1960s, when Lanchester Polytechnic (now Coventry University) and Warwick University began to attract increasing numbers of students to the city. They provided an audience for the music Peel was playing on his ahows and a number of progressive bands emerged. The one Peel had most connections with was Asgard, whom he wanted to sign to his Dandelion label, but because of financial problems the deal fell through and they signed for the Moody Blues' Threshold label instead. Other Coventry bands to attract the DJ's attention included the Bulgarian-influenced psychedelic folk band Dando Shaft and the soul-influenced Moon, both of whom did sessions for his shows in the 1970s. Lanchester Poly was also the venue of a 1972 Chuck Berry concert which produced the hit single "My Ding-A-Ling", while Tangerine Dream played a concert in Coventry Cathedral.

As a predominantly industrial city, Coventry wasn't a fashionable place in the 1960s, but the city's boom years were succeeded by a period of economic decline and high unemployment in the mid-1970s. This led to a change in the city's music scene and to the rise of Two-Tone; the Specials' hit "Ghost Town" was interpreted by many as describing Coventry, although the band themselves said it was about the mood of violence and despair among young people in many British cities at that time. However it did influence people's image of the city, giving it a reputation as a hard, violent place - much to the displeasure of local politicians.

Peel favourites from towns near Coventry include the Edgar Broughton Band and June Tabor, both from Warwick.

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