Features
Two London Clubs To Reopen
Two of the better known names on London’s live music club circuit are about to return, as
The Garage, an Islington venue that’s part of the new joint venture between Mama Group and HMV, is due to reopen June 26.
It’s been closed since summer 2006 and turned in to what Mama live music director Steve Forster has described as a “21st century, multi-room operation that works as both a live and club space.”
“With the addition of a new seated format we can really stretch the scope of the venue’s capability to offer and deliver a real alternative to venues such as Bush Hall [in Shepherds Bush],” he explained.
The refurbished Garage will have three rooms with a 600-capacity main venue, which is up from the 350 capacity the main room used to have. It will be managed by Stuart Strong, who runs Mama Group’s Camden Barfly.
Former Borderline and Mean Fiddler Music Group promoter Barry Marshall-Everitt’s company House Of Mercy has been retained to book live acts at The Fridge, in Brixton, which is reopening after 15 years.
The 1,100-capacity venue is a theatre cinema with a full-sized performance stage, proscenium arch, and acoustics and sightlines that mean the show can be enjoyed throughout the room. It will also have an 80-capacity VIP bar that can double as an acoustic room or be hired for after-show parties and album launches.
Andrew Czezowski and Susan Carrington, who will be running the new Fridge, have forged an innovative new partnership with the prestigious Alchemea College of Audio Engineering to re-launch the venue as a world-class live music room that can host courses for would-be sound engineers.
Head of sound is Alan “Nobby” Hopkinson, who has worked with Tool, Rage Against The Machine and Joan Armatrading. This year he was one of five engineers nominated for the TEC award for Outstanding Creative Achievement for 2008.
The other nominees had mixed for Bruce Springsteen, The Police, Justin Timberlake and Roger Waters.