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24 | www.westendermagazine.comSchool of Art when I first moved here,staying initially in a flat on Dumbarton Road.At around the age of 19 I started to get veryinterested in food, along with a group offriends. There were five of us, a good littlegroup and we decided we wanted to learnto cook. So every second Saturday wouldrevolve around a meal at one of our homes,and we’d teach ourselves to cook properly –bechamel sauce, curry, and so on.‘With good food goes good wine, and Igradually became the one of us who wasmost interested in the wine choice – so eachtime we met for a meal, I’d choose what wewere going to drink with whatever we weremaking that week.’After graduating he became a teacher,and then he switched to work in the newMOD centre that opened in Kentigern Housein Glasgow in 1986. ‘It meant I got a newtraining in computers, and in the 1990sI moved to Glasgow University where Ilectured in computing until 2000,’ he says.Alongside his day job, he had started towrite about wine; he landed a wine column inthe Sunday Post, and then a gig on the HomeShow on STV. And then, in the mid 1990s,he had a breakthrough idea. ‘There was thisnew thing called theinternet, and itmade sensewhile I wasfinding myway aroundit to startsomethingthere aroundwine.So I started what was possibly the first winewebsite in the world – wine-pages.com –and it really took off. Wine retailers startedcoming to find me, and suddenly I realised Icould make this my entire career, so I quit theday job.’H e’s n eve r l o o ke d b a c k ; a n d i n 2018 ,he was named International WineCommunicator of the Year, the first Scotto ever net the title. Turning his passioninto his work has, he agrees, been one ofhis finest achievements; though there aremany others, not least his long relationship.He and his partner, Alan, have been togetherfor 34 years, and married for the last two.‘We wanted to be absolutely sure first,’he jokes.The couple have another home inSt Andrews, which is another reason why theWest End’s proximity to the motorway worksso well for them. But it’s Glasgow he feelshe’ll never leave, especially after an attemptsome years back to recreate the life they havehere in the south east. ‘We moved to live inSouth Kensington, but being in London didn’tgive us any of the advantages of the WestEnd of Glasgow,’ he remembers.The other major news in his life is thatRestricted Code got back together in 2018.All four original members are on board: aswell as Cannavan there’s his songwritingpartner Frank Quadrelli, who was his friend atschool in Easterhouse, Kenny Blythe on bassand Robert Mccormick on keyboards, andold friend Les Gaft joins them on drums.The band recently finished recordinga new CD, out last January, on Spotify.Cannavan gave me a sneak preview of one ofthe tracks, Lost, and it’s tremendous – andthough I’m the right sort of vintage forthe band, my 21-year-old daughterthought it was ace as well. All thoseyears ago, NME (New MusicalExpress) called their output ‘a fluidcollision of the trite, the enigmatic,the familiar and the unclassified’,and said Cannavan’s voice‘implores with an unscientificelegance’. The band, said NME,had ‘packs of possibility’: threedecades on, that possibility isback, and I’m raising my glassof Chardonnay to what I hopewill be their new-foundsuccess.
TOM CANNAVAN’Swest end…www.westendermagazine.com | 25Cail Bruich on Great Western Road ismy favourite restaurant; it’s family-run,and they’ve got an extremely goodwine list as well as very good foodNo. Sixteen Restaurant Byres Road’swine list is short, but it’s very wellchosen, and the food there is greatThe Ubiquitous Chip still has a verygood wine listBrett, a spin-off from Cail Bruich andalso on Great Western Road, has thesame excellent range of wines and food:their ever-changing wine list is mostlymade up of artisan-produced naturalwines. Natural wines are organic butthey go beyond that – there’s minimaluse of sulphur, and they taste great.Ian Mellis on Great Western Road andGeorge Mewes on Byres Road are myfavourite cheesemongersValhalla’s Goat on Great Western Roadhas an amazing range of drinks
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