Around the world in 10 unique music venues

Alternative City Guide Music Travel No Comments

In my last post, I waxed lyrical about Jamboree; a unique venue that started life in the Cable Street Studios complex in Limehouse and has recently announced its return to the Kings Cross area of London.

“Every now and then, you find a music venue that has a certain special aura and is simply unlike any other you’ve been to before.  Sometimes it’s unique in its interior or location, sometimes it’s the warmth and generosity of the people running the place and other times it’s the programming of the events and the venue’s cultural or historical significance. Jamboree in Limehouse was one of those.”

‘The return of Jamboree’ (Set Your Own Scene, 22nd February 2021)

I want to now shine a spotlight on some of the other special venues that have particularly stood out to me over the years, either from playing gigs at them myself or watching as a punter.  Here is a snapshot of ten that immediately spring to mind from Bari to Bedford, via LA and Pune, Maharashtra. 

I’ve included links wherever possible to the venues in question – please do take a look and find out more about them!  They need all the support they can get after this pandemic year.

On stage at Clwb Ifor Bach with The Screenbeats. May 2007 (photo: Ed Salter).

Clwb Ifor Bach – Cardiff

I had been reading about Cardiff’s legendary ‘Clwb’ (also affectionately known locally as ‘The Welsh Club’) for years prior to going to university in the city and it lived up to expectations as the beating heart of the city’s alternative music scene.  For at least the first year of university, the highlight of my week was going to The Dudes Abide night on Fridays where the DJ was usually Gary Anderson who also ran the hallowed Cardiff indie-pop night Twisted by Design at the nearby Dempsey’s (now bizarrely Gareth Bale’s sports bar Elevens) on Saturdays and Cardiff’s famous rugby pub the City Arms on Thursdays.  Through regularly going to these nights as an 18-year-old I discovered Belle & Sebastian’s back catalogue, became obsessed with The Supremes and tracks like ‘The Rat’ by The Walkmen, ‘Happy Together’ by The Turtles and ‘The Skin of My Yellow Country Teeth’ by Clap Your Hands Say Yeah became as ubiquitous to my ears as commercial radio’s airplay of Kelly Clarkson’s ‘Since U Been Gone’ around that same time. 

The Welsh Club spanned three floors catering to pretty much every genre possible on various nights of the week.  I spent on average six hours a week here between 2005 and 2008 and even met Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr there in 2008 after one of his first gigs as a new member of The Cribs at the nearby Student’s Union.  I was a little tongue-tied to really say much to him other than ask for a photo but I had a better chat with Ryan Jarman from The Cribs a year earlier when we were both watching Everett True (the journalist who introduced Kurt Cobain to Courtney Love) and Manics biographer Simon Price DJ in the downstairs room.  Ryan remembered an early regional newspaper interview I did with them at the Reading Fez Club back in 2004 and the main topic of conversation was how passé and just plain wrong the current Sex Pistols reunion was (The Cribs had recently supported them at Brixton Academy). 

Now Clwb is the subject of some exciting new expansion plans involving the venue taking over the derelict building next door.  Hopefully these plans will cement Womanby Street’s position as Cardiff’s cultural quarter (as well as the longstanding hub of the annual Sŵn Festival) for many decades to come.

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) Clwb Ifor Bach, Womanby Street, Cardiff. 2) The downstairs floor during Swn Festival 2012. 3.) Telegram getting ready to play a Jack Rocks show at Clwb for Swn Festival 2015.

Shisha Jazz Café – Pune, India

I stumbled upon the Shisha Jazz Café whilst staying in Pune, Maharashtra for a few days in November 2019.  Part of the ABC Farms complex in the hip Koregaon Park district of the city that actually contains a couple of live music venues, the café was one of my favourite hangouts from my trip to India and provided some much-needed calm after a week of rushing around hectic Mumbai.  Part-jazz café, part-jungle treehouse; there were several huge trees growing through its floor, rustic tapestries and kitsch lanterns hanging from the rafters and its wooden walls were adorned with pictures of the likes of Chick Corea, Dizzy Gillespie, Bill Evans and Sun Ra.  It is also home to the Pune International Jazz Festival.  It’ll be one of the first places I head to when I visit Pune again.  

The one-of-a-kind Shisha Jazz Cafe. Pune, India.

Band On The Wall – Manchester 

A national institution as far as independent music venues go, Band On The Wall on Swan Street in Manchester’s Northern Quarter has been hosting live music since at least the 1930s.  The venue got its name from the fact that the musicians originally played on a raised stage halfway up the pub’s wall!  The venue has had a long association with jazz, blues, folk and punk and today prides itself on hosting an eclectic array of artists from a wide range of genres.  I saw tabla player Saleel Tembe perform there in 2018 and before the concert he hosted an interactive workshop with the audience – that’s just the kind of place Band On The Wall is.  Now a registered charity, the venue was awarded £3.2 million in 2007 by Arts Council England and the Heritage Lottery Fund to transform into a music venue for the 21st century. 

Saleel Tembe at Band on The Wall, August 2018 and a band quite literally playing on the wall at the venue circa 1946 (photo: The Band On The Wall archive).

Passing Clouds – Dalston, London

Forever immortalised on screen as the location for the filming of Super Hans’ notorious “juice cleanse stag do” scene in the cult British comedy series Peep Show, Passing Clouds was a community-run arts venue off the Kingsland Road in Dalston, East London.  

Opened in 2006; the venue hosted musical nights, as well as community-led initiatives including the ‘Permaculture Picturehouse’, healing and self-development workshops and swing dancing and instrument lessons.  Housed in the former printworks of the Hackney Gazette, two notable gigs at Passing Clouds for me were Sun Ra’s Arkestra led by the then 91-year-old saxophonist Marshall Allen and the Brixton-based Effra Hall Jazz Band.  There was a blizzard during the latter gig and a subsequent snow fight ensued afterwards, culminating with my friends and I being branded “bumbaclarts” by an angry Rastafarian gentleman who was accidentally hit by a stray snowball whilst enjoying a smoke outside.

Passing Clouds was sadly closed down and boarded up in 2016 and is now The Jago. 

  • Passing Clouds, just before its closure.
  • The upstairs level at Passing Clouds, 2016.

Ex Caserma Liberata – Bari, Italy 

In a way, Bari’s equivalent of London’s former Passing Clouds venue, Ex Caserma Liberata is a squatted space located in the city’s former Rossani Barracks.  Whatever your political persuasion is regarding people squatting in derelict buildings, it’s difficult to argue that Ex Caserma Liberata isn’t a hive of creativity and home to a friendly and welcoming community.  In non-Covid times; the space consists of a music venue that hosts both bands and DJs, a permaculture garden, impressive sculptures and street art, workshop spaces and even an indoor skate ramp.  It hosts everything from punk festivals to dub nights to poetry readings and political meetings.  The site is set to be transformed by the authorities into an urban park and public library in the not-too-distant future at a reputed cost of €450 million so the Barese need to make the most of this unique space whilst they still can.

Ex Caserma Liberata and one of Bari’s most interesting emerging bands Strebla performing there in 2019.

Hootananny – Brixton, London

In 2007, a huge Victorian pub on the corner of Effra Road and Brixton Water Lane which had previously been known as The George Canning and then The Hobgoblin became Hootananny.  Now run by a Scottish family, ‘Hoots’ dedicated itself to live music, particularly (but definitely not limited to) the world music side of things.  You never know quite what you’ll see when you go to Hootannany but on a Friday or Saturday night it’s guaranteed to be lively.  Boasting a large hostel on the upper floors (what a great idea if you were a music-loving traveller) and a huge garden out the front, you can choose between whether you soak up the music indoors or sit and enjoy a cold beer and some excellent Caribbean food on the benches outside.  I’ve had some of my best nights out in London here and it was also a packed place to watch the England football team’s unexpected run to the semi-finals World Cup 2018.  

Hootannany, Effra Road, Brixton, London.

Sound Department – Taranto, Italy

I’ve written about seeing Berlin’s Ellen Allien at the Sound Department Club just outside Taranto before, but this is a truly unique place.  Located about five miles outside of the city near to the Italian naval docks and hidden out-of-sight amongst olive groves and Mediterranean scrubland, the venue appears to be entirely made from shipping containers.  There were two separate live rooms; one that was low-lit and a distinctly industrial affair and the other which was brighter and more house-flavoured.  At about 3am, the club’s security staff winched up the metal sides of the venue to transform it into an open-air space and an hour later, the roof slid back to let in the early morning Pugliese sunlight.

Tbilisi DJ Newa’s Boiler Room set live from Sound Department, Taranto. December 2019.

The Satellite – Silver Lake, Los Angeles, USA

Located in LA’s at-times, self-consciously hip Silver Lake neighbourhood, The Satellite made its name in the 1990s as the famed Spaceland venue.  Its first ever gig in 1995 featured The Foo Fighters and Beck, it hosted early shows by The White Stripes and The Silversun Pickups and it was the venue choice for Arthur Lee & Love’s comeback show after Lee’s release from prison in 2001.  It also starred in the Jim Carey film ‘Yes Man’ as the venue where Zooey Deschanel’s character’s band played their live shows.  We saw The Bulls there who played a bemusing shoegaze cover of ‘Alright’ by Supergrass – I think we were in the minority in the audience by actually being familiar with the original version. 

The Satellite was quite similar to many British venues of a similar size but everything was just nicer, albeit in a slightly sanitised, yet typically Los Angelan way.  The toilets were clean and didn’t smell, the floor wasn’t sticky and awash with stale beer and there was even a pool table at the back of the room for in-between bands.  Instead of a greasy burger van being stationed outside, there was of course, a converted silver Airstream caravan serving up delicious tacos. Once the epicentre of Silver Lake’s alternative music scene, there are now plans afoot to transform The Satellite into a restaurant.

  • The Satellite’s entrance.
  • The Bulls live at The Satellite. August 2015.

The Angel – Bedford

From sunny LA to Bedford.  My old band The Shake was offered a show at The Angel back in summer 2006.  The venue on Bedford Broadway had hosted Oasis back in 1994 (it was still extremely proud of this) and was enjoying a new lease of life after a refurbishment and recently hosting Razorlight whilst they were still on their ascendency (and still credible).  We had been due to support The Heights, a former Guardian New Band of the Week and Best Before Records signing.  However, they had pulled out a couple of weeks before and we were moved up the bill to become the impromptu headliner.  

Despite most of the audience originally buying their tickets to see The Heights, it was one of the best shows we ever did and we played to a packed and receptive room.  Despite Bedford not exactly being a hotbed for rock and roll, the venue was clearly a labour of love and had a great soundsystem.  We got paid, given free beer and even got a cheery hug from the promoter after the show!  Sadly, The Angel shut down a few years later (it had stiff competition from the long-established Esquires venue around the corner in the town) and is now Doorstep Dolci, a café specialising in “American-Belgian Waffles, oven-baked cookie dough, artisan gelato and milkshakes.” 

The former location of The Angel music venue, Bedford.

The Troubadour – Earl’s Court, London

The Troubadour on Old Brompton Road, West London is best-known in music circles as being the venue for Bob Dylan’s first ever UK gig in 1962.  Opened in 1954 as a coffee house, it was one of the city’s prominent folk venues of the time hosting performances from Joni Mitchell, Bert Jansch, Davey Graham and Sandy Denny, as well as the more raucous Jimi Hendrix, Charlie Watts, Sammy Davis Jr (slightly more raucous) and Led Zeppelin – the latter would jam at the club after shows at the nearby Earls Court Arena.  Today, it retains many of its original features and décor but has been expanded to include a restaurant / café, outdoor dining space, small art gallery as well as the 135-capacity downstairs venue.  I played here in 2010 and contemporary artists to come through its doors in recent years include Florence Welch, Ellie Goulding, Adele, Jamie T and Ed Sheeran, with its small size making it ideal for showcases.  The Troubadour was also the inspiration for the Los Angeles venue of the same name, with it even copying the distinctive typeface above the door.  Time to put its London counterpart on the musical map again. 

The Trobadour’s interior, virtually untouched since 1954 and Ronnie Wood and Mick Taylor playing the club in 2013.

The return of Jamboree

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Encouraging signs for live music’s rebirth

Every now and then, you find a music venue that has a certain special aura and is simply unlike any other you’ve been to before.  Sometimes it’s unique in its interior or location, sometimes it’s the warmth and generosity of the people running the place and other times it’s the programming of the events and the venue’s cultural or historical significance.

Jamboree in Limehouse was one of those.  It was the live music venue for the Cable Street Studios complex; an 88,000-square foot former sweet factory that was built by Batgers Confectionery in the 1860s.  Despite the site being worth a small fortune to potential developers, its owner was a keen believer in the power of the arts and culture and by 2011 it had become a thriving artistic community consisting of over 200 individual artists’ studios, a mosque and a transgender nightclub, happily co-existing side-by-side and the Jamboree venue.  

The old Jamboree venue, Limehouse, London.

Many of the artist studios also doubled up as residential dwellings; the workspace and the kitchenette area on the ground level and then a wooden mezzanine above housing the sleeping quarters.  My old school friend Charlie spent a couple of years there and it was always fascinating to go and see him and meet the various characters who also called the studios home.  

On one occasion Charlie organised for the Imam of Cable Street’s mosque to give a talk to the other residents about the customs of Islam and there would also be frequent ‘Open Studio’ days where the complex would open its doors to the public.  The artists would welcome you into their studios to view their latest work and there were also many performance art spectacles.  One performance that stands out in my mind was an artist dropping pieces of broken glass down a stone staircase on piece at a time.  Remarkably, he had worked out that each piece had a different pitch and the result was surprisingly musical. 

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) Cable Street Studios, Limehouse (photo: Ewan Munro). 2.) The old entrance to Jamboree (photo: Ewan Munro). 3.) My friends Roger and Hanna outside Jamboree, December 2013. 4.) Another view of the live room at Jamboree.

Charlie and I had become good mates around the age of 14 when we formed a four-piece guitar band called Felix Mandelson.  We covered The Vines and Red Hot Chili Peppers and our own songs were a perfect blend of naivety and well-meaning pretention.  “New Era” (written by moi and our rhythm guitarist Mike) paid homage to Che Guevara and contained the chorus line; “It’s the beginning of a new era for us // We’ve got to stop the pigs from exploiting what we’ve got”. On the other hand, one of Charlie’s songs “Enemies to the Peace” quoted verse from Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet.  Charlie has since gone on to be a successful actor on both stage and screen and the last time I caught up with him, he had been touring Europe in Dracula playing Jonathan Harker.  

Anyway, the evening I discovered Jamboree, I had taken the DLR over to Limehouse after work (I was living and working in Islington at the time) to catch up with Charlie over a couple of beers and we had decided to check out what was going on across the courtyard.  We lucked out that night as it turned out that Simo Lagnawi was performing – one of the main proponents of traditional Gnawa music in London.  Simo, originally of Amazigh (Berber) origin had spent several years travelling around Morocco studying Gnawa music, as well as Ahwash chanting before relocating to London.  He has since set up the London School of Gnawa in the city’s East End. 

Simo Lagnawi performing at Jamboree.

It was a captivating concert with Lagnawi being joined onstage by two other Moroccan musicians whilst accompanying himself on the guimbri, a three-stringed instrument made from stretched camel skin and goat gut.  The music was strangely hypnotic with complex polyrhythms and syncopated, repeating riffs and chants.  Everything was kept in time by one of the musicians frantically playing the qraqeb ­– iron castanet-like finger cymbals. There were only around 50 people present in Jamboree that evening but everyone was silent whilst the band was playing; fully absorbed in their music.

Simo Lagnawi performing at the V&A Museum, London in 2013 – around the time we also saw him play at Jamboree.

Jamboree was a unique venue too; a cross between a bohemian café and Tony Hornecker’s pop-up restaurant-cum-art installation The Pale Blue Door.  The stage and the venue’s windows were surrounded by velvet drapes, comfortable sofas and arm chairs were dotted around the room and there was art from some of Cable Street’s artists adorning every wall.  The venue took a chance on booking artists not usually looked at by more mainstream music venues too – Eastern European folk, calypso and zouk performances, Celtic roots music and gypsy jazz.  Charlie mentioned that Jonathan Richman of The Modern Lovers fame had even performed a secret acoustic gig there too.  

Unfortunately, in 2018 just shy of its tenth anniversary Jamboree was forced to close its doors after being served notice by Cable Street Studios’ new landlord Sudbury Properties.  After a temporary stay on Three Colt Street, also in Limehouse, it shut its doors at the beginning of 2020, potentially for good.

I was overjoyed, however, to receive an email last week announcing that Jamboree would be returning in 2021 with a new home in Kings Cross, North London.  Kings Cross – as recently as a decade ago, one of the last undeveloped parts of Central London and a quasi-red light district – is fast becoming the destination of choice for the creative industries.  As well as behemoth companies such as Google, Facebook, communications group Havas, PRS for Music and Universal Music now calling the area home, there are some much more interesting developments happening just beneath the surface.  

For example, the music start-up incubator community Tileyard is home to several emerging challengers in the music and tech space and the likes of Mark Ronson and Sir Antony Gormley even have studios there.  The Spiritland audiophile bar opened a few years ago on Stable Street and boasts that its huge, bespoke soundsystem is “the best in London” (I’ve been there a few times and it is pretty special – as are the huge speakers inside each individual bathroom cubicle).  The team behind Omeara in Flat Iron Square (led by Mumford & Sons musician Ben Lovett) opened the 600-capacity Lafayette venue in February 2020 and although its launch has been disrupted by the pandemic, it’s set to reopen later this year.  Although one night there will set you back around £200, the newly-opened Standard Hotel just off Euston Road and owned by the same group behind LA’s notorious den of iniquity the Chateau Marmont, contains its very own venue and has promised regular music events and “cultural happenings”. 

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) Tileyard, Kings Cross. 2.) Inside the newly-opened Lafayette. 3.) Inside The Standard hotel. 4.) The prized sound system at Spiritland, Stable Street.

These new venues join the already well-established bastions of live music in Kings Cross such as The Scala (where the iconic cover to Iggy & The Stooges’ Raw Power album was shot), the famous grassroots venue Water Rats, arts café Drink Shop Do and electronic music club The Egg.  The Guardian and The Observer newspapers have, of course also been based on York Way, Kings Cross since 2008 too. 

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) The Egg, York Way. 2.) The Water Rats, Grays Inn Road (photo: Adam Bruderer). 3.) The iconic sign outside The Scala (photo: Ian Muttoo). 4.) The front cover of Iggy & The Stooges’ ‘Raw Power’ (taken at The Scala) 5.) Drink Shop Do, Caledonian Road.

Whilst there’s no denying that 2020 has been the toughest year on record for the performing arts, there are also some encouraging signs outside of the Kings Cross bubble.  The Music Venue Trust confirmed at the beginning of February that 13 venues on its ‘danger list’ had already been saved from imminent closure.  Only last week, the creation of the first-ever trade body for the live music industry LIVE was announced to widespread support.  Many venues such as Band on The Wall in Manchester and The Wedgewood Rooms in Portsmouth have used this time to carry out essential repairs to their venues with The Wedge relaying the wooden floor in its main room.  

Repairs taking place at The Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth. October 2020.

Even closer to (my adopted) home in Bari in Puglia, there are some green shoots of recovery appearing too.  The 1920s Art Deco venue Kursaal Santa Lucia on the city’s Lungomare (‘seafront’ to you and I) is set to reopen in spring this year after a lengthy refurbishment and shows are already starting to be tentatively booked again in venues such as Teatro Petruzzelli and Teatro Kismet. 

The soon-to-be-reopened Kursaal Santa Lucia, Bari.

Hopefully the post-Covid age will see a Belle Époque-style resurgence for the live music sector and a surge in creative pursuits in general.  Watch this space.  

An ode to the London live music venues of yesteryear

Alternative City Guide London Music No Comments

The story of The Middle Earth; London’s radical first underground club 

Pre-Covid (will we refer to this time as ‘P.C.’ in years to come?), I lived for going to gigs and I’ve always found live music venues and their history fascinating.  My sister Rachel helped kick-start this obsession as a teenager when she bought me the book ‘Rock and Roll London’ by Max Wooldridge – containing a foreword by the provocative Sex Pistols and New York Dolls impresario Malcolm McLaren. 

I spent two weeks staying with her in Bermondsey, South London in 2002 and again in 2004 whilst doing work experience at NME magazine, then based in King’s Reach Tower, Waterloo.  At NME, the workies would be allowed to leave the office at 4.30pm but my sister wouldn’t finish work in Covent Garden until nearer 6pm so I’d use this hour and a half to wander around Central London with the ‘Rock and Roll London’ book in hand tracking down the city’s various musical landmarks.  

  • ‘Rock and Roll London’ by Max Wooldridge
  • King’s Reach Tower, the former home of NME. Now refurbished and known as ‘South Bank Tower’

From the Sex Pistols’ notorious squat at 6 Denmark Street to Syd Barrett’s former pad on Earlham Street to the site of Trident Studios (where Bowie recorded ‘Ziggy Stardust’, amongst countless others) on St Anne’s Court in Soho, making a pilgrimage to these hallowed haunts was a fun way to pass the time and it helped me to become familiar with the more obscure streets of Soho, Fitzrovia, Mayfair and Covent Garden.  Ironically, these areas would be where I would spend much of my PR career ten years later. 

I secretly hoped that some of the musical magic of the city would rub off on me and I began spending increasing amounts of time on Denmark Street (London’s Tin Pan Alley) after finishing work at NME, trying out various guitars that I had no intention (or financial means, being only 15 at the time) of buying.  The assistants in shops like Andy’s Guitars, Macari’s and Wunjo, many of them aspiring musicians themselves, didn’t seem to mind though and were very accommodating; courteously getting down the vintage Fender Jaguar or rare Gibson Melody Maker that I’d asked to test out from the display wall.  One evening after work, I spotted Coldplay guitarist Jonny Buckland out shopping for guitars on Denmark Street.  Although personally not a huge fan, in 2002 they had just released their 10 x platinum album ‘A Rush Of Blood To The Head’ and were fast on their way to becoming the stadium band we all know today so I figured out that I was in the right place.

  • Denmark Street today looking towards St Giles High Street and the Google offices.
  • One of the many guitar emporiums on the street.

I was also fascinated by former punk clubs The Roxy on Neal Street, The Vortex on Wardour Street and Louise’s on Poland Street, as well as the early folk and skiffle venues Les Cousins on Greek Street and the 2i’s Coffee Bar on Old Compton Street.  On Wardour Street, I tracked down both the influential jazz, R&B and calypso club The Flamingo and the radical, unofficial HQ of the New Romantic movement The WAG Club, as well as the three incarnations of the world-famous Marquee Club on Oxford Street, Wardour Street and finally Charing Cross Road. 

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) Dave Vanian of The Damned onstage at The Roxy (photo: Derek Ridgers). 2.) The queue outside The Roxy on Neal Street. 3.) Siouxsie & The Banshees at The Vortex (photo: Ray Stevenson) 4.) The Sex Pistols outside their Denmark Street squat 5.) A flyer for The Vortex featuring The Buzzcocks, The Fall and John Cooper Clarke 6.) Malcom McLaren, Steve Jones, Glen Matlock, Marco Pirroni and pals get the drinks in at Louise’s, Poland Street.

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) Kids in mod attire outside The Flamingo on Wardour Street 2.) The entrance to The WAG Club 3.) Bill Kent at the 2i’s Coffee Bar, Old Compton Street 4.) The Marquee on Wardour Street, Soho in 1975 5.) and 6.) Donovan and a young Paul Simon perform at Les Cousins on Greek Street (photo: Ian Anderson).

Then there was The Middle Earth at 43 King Street in Covent Garden – London’s first ‘underground’ venue and prior to that, England’s first-ever boxing club, before closing its doors in 1936.  Housed in the large basement of the palatial 18th century Baroque mansion Russell House, the oldest remaining building in Covent Garden Piazza (built in 1717 for Admiral Russell, the First Earl of Orford), The Middle Earth for a short period in the mid-late 1960s was the most exciting hippie club in London. The direct successor to the UFO Club (“U-Fo”, to those in the know) on Tottenham Court Road, the club’s Saturday night house DJ was future Radio 1 broadcaster John Peel and it hosted shows by illuminati such as Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, David Bowie, The Electric Prunes, Ike & Tina Turner, Marc Bolan’s Tyrannosaurus Rex, Soft Machine, Tim Buckley, The Who, The Byrds (featuring Gram Parsons), Jefferson Airplane, Fairport Convention, Zoot Money and Captain Beefheart.  

A selection of line-up posters for The Middle Earth including The Doors at its later home of The Roundhouse in Camden Town.

During the day, the cellar that played host to The Middle Earth doubled up as a storage space used by the nearby fruit and vegetable market.  By evening, the stench of rotting fruit and veg, combined with the fumes from the club’s numerous incense burners was said to be somewhat intoxicating.  Bizarrely, the venue’s ‘bar’ sold mainly apples, rather than alcoholic drinks.  The club was famous for its floor-to-ceiling film projections, liquid slides and light shows, and hosted poetry and plays, as well as live music.  One notable production was by The Tribe of the Psychedelic Mushroom who performed a play based on The Tibetan Book of the Dead.  Far out, man. 

John Peel introducing Marc Bolan’s Tyrannosaurus Rex (a nascent version of T. Rex) onstage at The Middle Earth.  ‘Sarah Crazy Child’.  November 1967.

As with the UFO, The Middle Earth’s lifespan was a brief one.  Its doors usually opened at around 10pm with revellers finally emerging into the Covent Garden daylight around 8am and the police were highly suspicious of these bleary-eyed hippies who had been spending all night down in Russell House’s basement.  The psychedelic club was finally closed down in 1968 after a police drugs raid, during which a curious device known as ‘The Trip Machine’ was dismantled and then confiscated.  The team behind The Middle Earth went on to host events in a former Victorian railway turning shed, The Roundhouse in Camden Town.  Acts to perform at these events would include The Doors, playing their only non-festival UK shows and the first gig by Led Zeppelin in 1968.  

When I first visited 43 King Street in 2002, the building was still empty and in a semi-derelict state, but it has now been restored to its former glory and the upper ground floor has been taken over by the flagship store of high-end Brazilian shoe brand Melissa.  Its four-bedroom penthouse flat occupying the top two floors was recently listed for £7.75 million.  

  • Russell House, 43 King Street, Covent Garden. Home to ‘The Middle Earth until 1968.
  • The former entrance to The Middle Earth.

The Roxy on Neal Street, once the stamping ground of The Clash, Siouxsie & The Banshees and renegade film-makers Don Letts and Julien Temple is now the flagship London branch of Speedo swimwear.  The Vortex at 203 Wardour Street is part of the Simmons Bar chain.  Louise’s is the site of bougie private members club and cocktail bar Milk & Honey.  The location of The Flamingo and in later years, The WAG Club is now home to Irish pub chain O’Neill’s (although its upstairs function room is called ‘The Flamingo Room’ in a nod to the building’s history).  Only the 2i’s Coffee Bar has stayed vaguely connected to its musical roots.  In 2021, it is the retro-themed Poppie’s Fish & Chips restaurant (I spent some time freelancing in an office opposite) but as you head down to its basement-level dining room, a bright neon sign declares; ‘The 2i’s Coffee Bar; Home to the Stars’.  

  • Poppies’ Fish & Chip Shop on the site of the former 2i’s Coffee Bar on Old Compton Street.
  • 90 Wardour Street, the location of the Marquee Club’s soho incarnation (now a high-end restaurant and luxury loft apartments).

However, cities are constantly changing and evolving and different areas and movements will pick up the mantle when it comes to clubs, the arts and creative industries.  As Kierkegaard once noted;

“Life can only be understood backwards; but it must be lived forwards.”  

Soren Kierkegaard

We can take great inspiration from places like The Middle Earth and The WAG Club and the counterculture scenes they spawned but can only learn and build from them as we look towards future generations.

In my next post, I’ll be looking at why despite the huge economic hardship caused by the pandemic, it’s not all doom and gloom for London’s live music circuit.  

The WAG Club on Wardour Street became one of London’s coolest nightspots in the 1980s and was a fixture of the city’s alternative nightlife until finally closing its doors in 2001. The club was the brainchild of Chris Sullivan, a dandily-dressed Welshman and soul music obsessive and a genuine community formed around the club. In 2008 and 2009 my old band The Screenbeats played a couple of shows at Chris’ stylish new Cardiff venue Tabu. The most memorable gig was a Primal Scream aftershow party; we didn’t go onstage until 1am and playing to an audience including Bobby Gillespie, Andrew Innes, Barrie Cadogan and bizarrely Kermit from Black Grape was surreal to say the least.

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) The WAG Club community celebrating its 10th anniversary 2.) The WAG’s patrons included David Bowie, Naomi Campbell, Boy George, KRS-One and Neneh Cherry (pictured) 3.) and 4.) Photos of some of The WAG’s regulars 5.) – 7.) The club’s distinctive interior .

Tomato, lentil, courgette and chicken curry

Food Recipe 1 Comment

In my last post, I shared some musings about ‘curry’; touching upon its origins and how its popularity increased in Britain during the Victorian era and then more rapidly in the mid-20th century.  I also talked about how food is so often tied-up with memories and recalled some stories involving friends and family, as well as some of the more interesting Indian restaurants I’ve had the pleasure of visiting. 

I wrote previously about how the process of making a curry is one that I find incredibly satisfying and therapeutic.  Coming up with my own variations is also a lot of fun too and below is a recipe I recently came up with for a fresh-tasting, zingy and healthy curry.  Perfect for a cold winter evening and even tastier heated up the next day!  

Tomato, lentil, courgette and shredded chicken curry // Turmeric rice with peas 

4 x servings 

What you need

For the curry

  • 4 x medium chicken breasts
  • 1 x white onion, finely chopped
  • 4 x garlic cloves, crushed and finely chopped
  • 1 x 500g canned tomatoes (I used Mutti tomatoes but any brand will do) 
  • 1 x 500g canned lentils, drained 
  • 2 x medium courgettes, halved and then cut into 1 cm cubes 
  • 4 x dried red chillis, chopped (fresh chillis are fine but the curry will be more fiery)
  • 1 x cinnamon stick
  • 1 x whole nutmeg
  • 1 x teaspoon cayenne chilli powder
  • 1 x teaspoon ground turmeric 
  • 1 x teaspoon fennel seeds
  • 1 x teaspoon cumin seeds
  • 1 x teaspoon ground ginger
  • 1/2 x teaspoon coriander 
  • 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
  • Sea salt and black pepper, to taste

For the rice

  • 360g of basmati or pilau rice (enough for 4 x servings so adjust your portion sizes depending on how much you usually eat!)
  • 3-4 tablespoons of peas (I use jarred peas but frozen would be ok)
  • 1 x vegetable stock cube
  • 1 x teaspoon of turmeric
  • Sea salt and black pepper, to taste

Steps 

The curry

1.)  Add the chopped chillis, cayenne powder, fennel seeds, cumin seeds, turmeric, ginger and coriander to a pestle and mortar. Grind to release the flavour and crush the fennel and cumin seeds. Set aside.

2.)  Finely chop the onions.  Crush the garlic with the back of a large knife and then also chop.

3.)  Cut the chicken into large chunks and brown in a large saucepan with a small amount of oil over a medium-high heat until sealed.  

4.)  Transfer the chicken to a plate and ‘shred’ with a knife and fork.  Cover with foil and set to one side.

4.)  Heat a tablespoon of oil in the saucepan over a medium heat and add the onion and garlic.  Cook for 4-5 minutes until softened and golden.

5.)  Add the ground spice mixture to the pan and combine with the onion and garlic, stir constantly, not allowing it to burn.

6.)  Add the drained lentils and cubed courgette to the pan.  Stir occasionally and cook for a further 5 minutes.  

7.)  Add the canned tomatoes to the pan, as well as the cinnamon stick and nutmeg.  Add a little water if the mixture appears too dry.  Bring to the boil.

8.)  Once the mixture in the pan has boiled, reduce to a low heat, return the shredded chicken to the pan and gently simmer for 40 minutes.  Stir occasionally.

9.)  Taste the curry mixture after 30 minutes and add a tablespoon of white wine vinegar to bring out the acidity in the dish.  Add extra salt and pepper, according to your own personal taste.

10.)  Serve alongside the turmeric rice and vegetables of your choice.

Rice

1.)  Cook the rice, according to the instructions on the packet.  Add the vegetable stock cube to the pan and the turmeric.

2.)  Halfway through cooking, add the peas.

3.)  Drain well and season with salt and pepper, to taste.  Serve with the curry. 

Serving suggestion 


I found this dish works very well served in bowls.  You can serve the curry on a bed of rice in a bowl or alternatively, alongside it on a plate.  The vegetable accompaniments are up to you but on this occasion, I roasted some chickpeas and spinach in the oven for 15 minutes with some olive oil, thyme and salt and pepper. 

The ongoing search for the perfect ‘curry’

Food London Travel 2 Comments

‘Curry‘

Noun: “A dish of meat, vegetables, etc., cooked in an Indian-style sauce of hot-tasting spices and typically served with rice.”

Verb: “To prepare or flavour (food) with a sauce of hot-tasting spices.”

(definition from Oxford Languages)

Origins: “Curry is an anglicised form of the Tamil word ‘kari’ meaning ‘sauce’ or ‘relish for rice’ that uses the leaves of the curry tree (Murraya koenigii).  The word kari is also used in other Dravidian languages, namely in Malayalam, Kannada and Kodava with the meaning of ‘vegetables (or meat) of any kind (raw or boiled), curry’”.

(A Dravidian Etymological Dictionary)
Chicken patiala at the Dakshin Bar & Grill, Mumbai. Contender for the perfect curry? I think so…

As with so many other things in modern popular culture, the word ‘curry’ is a bastardised English umbrella term.  One that was created to describe all manner of distinctly different types of cuisine from the Indian subcontinent.  Or to quote food historian Lizzie Collingham and the author of the definitive tome ‘Curry: A Tale of Cooks and Conquerors’; “most likely an English bastardisation of a Portuguese bastardisation of the Tamil world ‘kari’ – which was used to describe spices or seasoning.”  So, there you go.

In Britain, ‘curry’ grew vastly in popularity during the Victorian era and Queen Victoria was said to be a great lover of spiced dishes.  In fact, she even employed two Indian chefs to prepare her curried lunches especially.  The ‘classic’ British buffet dish and sandwich-filler; Coronation Chicken stems from this royal association after it was created for Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation banquet in 1953.  It is thought that it was directly inspired by the Jubilee Chicken dish which was created for George V’s silver jubilee in 1935 and also contained cold cuts of chicken, curry powder and mayonnaise.  Creative cookery at its most innovative. 

The number of ‘curry houses’ or more upmarket ‘Indian restaurants‘ started to increase in the 1950s and 1960s before reaching a peak in the 1970s.  Part of the success of these new curry houses was down to the fact that they still served alcohol well into the early hours of the morning at a time when most pubs would stop serving at 11pm.  In 1983, there were over 3,500 Indian restaurants open in the UK and today Bangladeshis still run approximately 85-90 percent of these eateries.  

The famous ‘Curry Mile’ of Indian restaurants. Rusholme, Manchester.

However, the food in the majority of Indian restaurants has been anglicised and tailored for British palates and you would struggle to find a lot of the dishes on the menu in India.  For example, Chicken Tikka Masala is thought to have been invented in Britain and directly derived from the Northern Indian dish Butter Chicken, whilst the British Indian variation of Vindaloo is much spicier than the original which was a key component of Goan cuisine and was created especially for curry houses, with the addition of potatoes and chilli peppers.  The Balti on the other hand makes no secret of its humble origins, being introduced to menus in Birmingham in the early 1970s (although it may have been inspired by Northern Pakistani cuisine). 

I’m going to contradict myself now and will talk about ‘curry’ or ‘curries’ for the rest of this article.  I personally find that there is nothing more satisfying to cook than a curry.  From softening the onions and garlic and then adding the spices to form the base, to browning the meat or adding vegetarian substitutes such as chickpeas or lentils, to adding tomatoes or stock and gently simmering the stew, the whole process is incredibly therapeutic.

The food we eat is intrinsically tied up with memories too.  Whenever we would visit my paternal grandmother who was half-Indian and raised in Meghalaya, a curry or dhal would inevitably be on the stove and the fragrant smell would hit you as soon as you walked into the house.  My dad was delighted when I started cooking and bringing home curries in Food Technology classes at school and we discovered that cardamom pods were a fine addition to a Chicken Madras – although there is some dispute about whether the dish actually originated in Madras (now Chennai) or once again, in the British curry houses of the 1960s.  My dad had rarely eaten cardamom pods as a youngster because it turned out that Grandma didn’t like them!  Although initially wary of hot food, my mum also became partial to milder curries after meeting my dad and she would often make tasty meals for us like the sweet and sour Hawaiian Chicken on a Friday or Saturday night – learning many of the recipes from her Indian mother-in-law. 

I remember experiencing a proper high-end Indian restaurant for the first time whilst studying in Cardiff too.  My sister Rachel and brother-in-law Stuart had visited me for the weekend in March 2006 and after a day of sinking pints and watching the Six Nations rugby in various pubs on the side roads off St Mary’s Street, they treated me to a slap-up meal at the city’s Spice Quarter, located on the site of the former Brain’s Brewery.  The uber-attentive service and having the table tended to by three or four waiters at any one time gave me an idea of what to expect when I eventually visited India some 13 years later.

Talking of university, there was also the much-loved but at times slightly questionable Kismet.  Located on the rough and ready Cardiff thoroughfare City Road, Kismet became the venue of choice for various friends’ birthday celebrations each year.  Unbelievably cheap even for a student’s budget, a main course would set you back in the region of £3.50, plus a pound for a naan or rice.  Once my friend Emily and I ordered a bottle of red wine to share and two arrived on our table.  We apologised and sent one back, only to be told that it was buy one, get one free on bottles of wine that evening.  Of course.  At £5 per bottle, we were not complaining.  Kismet also specialised in takeaway ‘doggy bags’ as their portions were rather on the large side.  I can still visualise my old housemate Rhys running into the restaurant’s kitchen after a poor waiter, convinced that he was about to throw his leftover food away and not into the prerequisite doggy bag.  How the bars or clubs we went to afterwards felt about having to contend with a cloakroom full of takeaway curry bags remains uncertain.  Kismet has since closed and is no longer a fixture of student life in Cardiff. 

The much-missed Kismet restaurant. City Road, Cardiff.

During the London years, going ‘for a curry’ became a regular part of post-work socialising.  I was once chuffed to find myself dining next to former Yardbirds guitarist and ‘Hi Ho Silver Lining’ singer Jeff Beck at the famous Gaylord Restaurant on Mortimer Street.  The restaurant opened its doors in 1966, was a one-time favourite of The Beatles and even in 2015 it was old-school in every detail – the food and service was excellent though.  Sadly Gaylord shut its doors in 2019 after 53 years of serving “upscale Mughlai cuisine” originating from North India.  

The former Gaylord Restaurant, Fitzrovia, London. A one-time favourite of The Beatles (and Jeff Beck).

Other notable London curry houses included the huge, raucous and noisy Pakistani eatery Tayyabs in Whitechapel; a place that was as much renowned for its beer as its food (you could order it by the crate if you were celebrating) and the quaint, charming Agra Restaurant on Whitfield Street in Fitzrovia.  Opened in 1954, the place is like stepping back in time and is still run by members of the same family today.  The Indian Veg (or Indian Veg Bhelpoori House in full) on Chapel Market in Islington specialised in no-frills, yet tasty all-you-can-eat vegetarian fare for £6.50 – its walls covered with pro-vegetarianism slogans and propaganda posters.  Its proximity to The Lexington venue made it an ideal pre-gig fuelling station of choice. 

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) The queue for Tayyabs in Whitechapel. 2.) The Agra Restaurant on Whitfield Street, London. 3.) The one-in-a-kind Indian Veg, Islington, London. 4.) The Indian Veg’s propaganda-laden interior.

Then there were the two restaurants that also offered rooms for the night as well; the Indian YMCA on Fitzroy Square (I worked around the corner from here for a couple of years so it became a favourite spot for lunch) and The India Club on The Strand.  Both are long-standing London institutions serving hearty and wallet-friendly Indian food.  Situated up an unassuming staircase at 143 Strand, the latter was launched in 1951 by The Indo League with the aim of “furthering Indo-British friendship in the post-independence era” and as with the Agra Restaurant, it is like stepping into a time capsule.  Given its history, I have often found myself wondering if my grandparents would have visited The India Club in the 1950s.  Let’s hope that all of these well-loved London institutions can survive the current hospitality industry crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Clockwise (from top left); 1.) The bar at The India Club, 143 Strand, London. 2.) The India Club’s dining room – practically unchanged since 1951. 3.) The canteen at The Indian YMCA, Fitzroy Square, Central London.

On my trip to India at the end of 2019, it would be an understatement to say that I ate well.  However, I often didn’t eat at fancy places, instead preferring local recommendations or low-key, hidden-away gems.  The food I ate with my relatives in Shillong was delicious and included regional specialities such as Doh khleh (a sort-of salad made with parts of the pig’s head) and Doh sniang nei iong – pork cooked with sesame.  However, the food in Meghalaya was actually milder and not as spicy as in the rest of India.  In Kerala in the south, a lot of the dishes were lighter and more fragrant, perhaps as a result of using coconut oil rather than ghee, whereas in Goa fish and more Portuguese-influenced fare reigned supreme.  Mumbai and Pune were culinary melting pots, as with any other metropolis, whilst in Chennai there were numerous options when it came to street food, as well as fiery appetisers like the city’s signature Chicken 65 (invented by the Head Chef at the Buhari Hotel and allegedly containing 65 chillis per kilogramme of chicken).

Just a snapshot of some of the dishes I had the privilege of trying during my visit to India.

However, the distinction of being the tastiest dish I sampled was reserved for the Dakshin Bar & Kitchen; a simple Punjabi restaurant off a busy main road in the Fort district of Mumbai that had the Indian Super League playing on big screens on the wall.  I ordered Chicken Patiala one evening without thinking too much about it and it was one of the best things I ate during my time in India.  It was unusual too; a thin egg omelette prepared and then cooked in the highly-spiced rich, creamy chicken curry.  All washed down with an ice-cold Kingfisher, of course.  

  • The Dakshin Bar & Grill, Fort, Mumbai.
  • Chicken Patiala at Dakshin Bar & Grill, Mumbai.

Over these past 18 months both in India and now in Italy, some of my favourite discoveries have been places that I’ve stumbled upon by chance or that have been a word-of-mouth recommendation from a local.  The delicious Chicken Patiala at Dakshin was no exception.

To find out how to make the dish, check out the short video below courtesy of Chef Smita at Get Curried.  In my next post, I’ll be sharing a recipe of my own! 

All written copy and materials are the intellectual property of Clive Drew. 2024 ©

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