Author: jimmyc1968

Preston Venues 28 and 29 – Strettles/Bitter Suite

Down an alley on the left-hand side of the entrance to the Mad Ferret pub on Fylde Road lies the Strettles Bar. That was the original name when the bar first came into existence around the turn of the century.

I think it was linked to the Strettles Property Letting company which was located in Lancaster Road in the old Coconut Grove pub building. The Coconut Grove was a short-lived surreal attempt at a beach bar that endeavoured to resemble Club Tropicana, somewhat unsurprisingly it was massively under populated and subsequently closed. Opposite in the early 90’s was the Spindlemakers Arms which I recall had a commendable three pool tables located within.        

Strettles changed to a new moniker of Bitter Suite in February 2006 and was run by the former landladies of the New Britannia pub on Heatley Street. It quickly became a haven for real ale drinkers with a plethora of handpumps available. It was formally recognised by CAMRA and was twice a winner of the prestigious George Lee Memorial Trophy award. On 31/01/14 it became the Ale Emporium and was run by the previous landlords of the Sun Hotel on Friargate. It then became Speakeasy but unfortunately, the latest update I can find displays this venue now as permanently closed.

Strettles in its final incarnation as the Speakeasy. Image Credit blogpreston.co.uk

Throughout this twenty-year period the bar remained unchanged and always resembled to me a slightly spruced up social club. You could always obtain some fine ale in the downstairs area which stretched round to a decent pool table at the back of the bar, I also watched a couple of football matches in there. It was a regular venue for a break between bands when attending the adjoining Ferret.

My first musical outing there was in Strettles Upstairs Bar which was more of a function room that could be hired out for private events. In July 2002 I saw two local bands called Head2Wall and Freak Jesus.

In the Strettles Downstairs Bar I attended six gigs in total. The stage was immediately to the right as you entered the venue. It was mainly a blues-based venue and my first foray there was to see a band called Silvertones on 25/09/10.  

In Feb 2013 and July 2014, I saw the Band with No Name there. On the second visit, I witnessed our neighbours Jean and Bill Hunt jigging away at the front and discovered that their attendance was for a very justifiable reason as their son was in the band. They were an older couple who lived a couple of houses away at our last Preston house in the Withytrees area of the city and they were very accommodating when we moved by storing boxes for us. Bill was a real character and had a laudable musical heritage as he had been a member of many folk bands over the years.

The Band With No Name
Band with No Name on stage at Bitter Suite. Image Credit blogpreston.co.uk

Around the time was also saw Route 66, a five piece covers band from Barrow in Cumbria and Ramshackle, a four-piece blues band. I additionally saw a combo called Frayed at the Edges there.

My final gig I am covering from 2013 was a special one as it was to celebrate local musician and friend Jez Catlow’s 50th birthday. It was very well attended and what Jez had decided to undertake was sets by all three bands he had been part of. The first was Last Orders which I don’t think had played together for an age.

The other two were more instantly recognisable as Pike and Deadwood Dog. Jez played for about 2.5 hours that night but took a well-deserved rest as Dan Donnelly topped off the night.     

Nottingham Venues 39 to 42

On a heady weekend at the end of June 2014 I completed a flurry of 4 gigs in the city of Nottingham. On the Friday night, we headed over to the Guitar Bar on Clumber Avenue, sometimes also known as Hotel Deux. I recall it as a two roomed venue with a stage in the left-hand room and was an intimate venue and very sparsely attended on the night of our visit.

Massey Ferguson were an alt country bar band from Seattle led by the distinctive vocals of Ethan Anderson named after a farm equipment company. They sit in the Springsteen/Tom Petty Americana fold, they were highly accomplished musicians and their songcraft was very evident and were very enjoyable, though I was slightly embarrassed on their behalf by the low turnout.

See the source image
Massey Ferguson. Image Credit glidemagazine.com

After watching Brazil beat Chile on penalties in the World Cup, the Saturday night musical entertainment commenced with a trip to the Forresters Inn, a traditional boozer located on Huntingdon Street behind the Victoria Shopping Centre. It is a Victorian corner pub established in 1868 and is currently independently owned. There was particularly limp act playing in the corner with perhaps their most interesting element being their stage name of Pegefoe and Maria Metalie.

En route to the second venue we discovered that Columbia had eliminated Uruguay 2-0 with a wonder strike from James Rodriguez. Delving deep back into my memory I recall that the first ever two pubs I visited in central Nottingham were the famous Ye Olde trip to Jerusalem, with the other being the nearby Ye Olde Salutation Inn located on Hounds Gate. It is a Grade II listed public house with components of it allegedly dating back to 1240 and it is built above Anglo-Saxon caves dating from the 9th century which was at one-point home to a colony of lepers. It is also noted as one of the most haunted pubs in the whole country, with reports of 89 separate apparitions.

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Ye Olde Saluation Inn. Image Credit tripadvisor.co.uk

It is an archetypal heavy rock biker pub and reminds me of the Dog and Partridge pub in Preston where on any given Friday night in the 1980’s there would be a plethora of bikes located outside. Upstairs they have a stage and there was a heavy metal act called Enormity Falls playing that night.

They were already underway and as we traversed up the steps, I could hear an unmistakeable cover version being played, though as I processed it, I was very surprised by their choice. The record itself was a noisy doom-laden version of Electric Six’s ‘Gay Bar’, and it went down a storm with the audience. They were a home-town band who had just released their debut EP ‘Voices’.

We then searched out a pub for a final beverage or should it perhaps be better quantified as the fateful ‘one for the ditch’! As we passed a hostelry we have never previously visited, we could hear the strains of a vibrant noisy local band called Misspent Youth throwing out some decent indie and punk covers.

The pub in question was the Royal Children on Castle Gate, another old pub dating back to the 17th century and is reputedly named after Princess Anne, daughter of King James II who took refuge there in 1688. It appeared everyone in the venue was pie-eyed, including us, but this only served to create a terrific bouncing atmosphere!