Clubs (Dance Music) and Music Bars in Edinburgh, City of Edinburgh*

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Clubs (Dance Music) and Music Bars

• Mood beside the Omni centre is lovely.
• The stafford centre never will never turn youse away. The men are always very welcome at the laughing duck!
• espionage on victoria st is the best - its on about 4 or 5 floors and is laid out like a maze with staircases in corners, is highly confusing when youre tipsy! but it's ace, they do party bowl cocktails which are so yummy, and theres loads of little intimate booths, as well as big tables....basically if you cant decide between a pub or club, go to espionage because its both, more clubby on weekends. q bar at the top of leith walk also deserves a mention, dont be put off by the scary bouncers - if you go downstairs theres usually some cool event going on, and its decorated really nicely. the best kept secret in edinburgh though has got to be the citrus club - if you like indie/rock etc then go!!!!
• ReVoLuTiOn is absolutely brilliant. its the only club in Edinburgh where fashionable young ordinary-working-class people go for a good night out. Brilliant!! Good looking down to earth guys and gurls. A HUGE dancefloor and excellent music. Unlike the other clubs in Edinburgh which are housed in tiny converted buildings and full of "cultural" types.
• Good D n B Clubs are - Manga, Obscene, React. Sugar Beat at Cabaret Volitaire is also sweet as is Techno night- Jackin!
• before going to many of the clubs in fountainbridge/grindly street you could do worse than go to the footlights bar in spittal street. pretty trendy place, video jukebox/pool/food till 9pm. mix mash of patrons, staff a laugh and a good atmosphere. get merry there before paying citrus club prices!
• The Honeycomb on Niddry street (just off the royal mile) holds a monthly event called 'Access' (next one friday 17th december). Five wicked resident DJs known as the 'drop put boys' spin their housey tunes on the main dance floor, while the room next door's dancefloor dedicates itself so some of the best hip hop around - run by locally known DJ who this year played his hip hop tunes on the newcomer stage at T in the park. A great atmosphere, definately worth a visit. Me and my chums go every month. Pictures available at http://www.the-honeycomb.com

• luvely(liquid rooms) - as the name suggests, just brilliant majestica (bruno - you are just pure genious)@ the Venue avoid at all cost: 3 sisters (arghhh), s(cr)ubway (both of them), Revolution (unless you enjoy fights with bottles and 'young patrons' as you put it nicely
• Wilkie House - semi destroyed in a fire about a year and a half ago. The remnants have been rechristined 'Faith' and hosts r&b pub discos. Studio 24 - Nowt but poor house clubs, Dogma (quality techno club) and the mission offshoots. Studio 24 is dank, dirty, grotty and can be quite fun, but not much recently. Ego, Picardy Place (the roundabout down from Warner Village complex) hosts a number of clubs and also hosts an underage clubnight, which is kind of disturbing when you go past at 7.30 and theres 400 teenies dressed like slappers already pissed. The Venue, Cabaret Voltaire (Blair Street ?) and the LIquid Rooms host most of the good clubs. Avoid the Honeycomb unless you like paying over the odds for old shite and watered down drinks. If you've more money than sense have a night out in George Street, doesn't matter where, all the pubs are trendy overpriced places filled with randy executives, wanker Edinburgh Uni Students and more people without chins than you thought could fit in one place.
• TECHNO?? studio 24 does dogma [www.clubdogma.com] which fukin rocks. Everybody is always fuked and totally up for it!! ive seen DJ rush, Surgeon, Henrik b, Subhead, Jerome hill, Speedy J, Ignition Technician to name but a few! But Chris liebing, Ben Sims, Glen Wilson, and Gayle San have also played there... UTI held there is good too -some say better... but there is never a friday when there isn't good techno on at the studios. MANGA [www.basstrap.com/manga/]is one of the best D'n'B nights around- (like around scotland/britian...) and is HIGHLY recommended.
• City nightclub in Market Street has Shark on Wednesday nights which is brillant. The atmosphere was amazing. We had a great night and the drinks were cheap too which can't be bad!
• Eros/Elite is SHUT! Unbeknownst to many many locals. So please, don't go out in the, ahem, lovely Scottish weather trying to find it.
• eh a hates to tell u this but eros and elite dont exist any more its now called the edinburgh arena
• establishment - cheap drinks on mondays and thursdays i think, but quite small. city is good if you want a huge club and the vip bit is nice.

• The liquid room. Victoria st. Colours, progression, Luvely. All Excellent house nights. Progression is shit hot. All on alternating saturdays. bring your own glow sticks.
• If you want to be guaranteed a great night out with plenty of cheap drink and cheesy pop music then look no further than the Subway Cowgate. It is possibly the darkest club in the world which is good news for your really ugly mate (every group has one), at least until the lights go on bang on 3am and the steroid fuelled bouncers begin literally throwing out the largely first year student clientele. One last thing though, don't wear your best gear as it will get ruined, especially if your necking some bird against the sweat covered walls. Quality!!!
• The Venue can be great on a Friday nite, just down behind the St James centre. And a new club Igntiton on King Stables road is also gd for hip hop, r nb. The Mission on Saturday nites for death metal and other goth stuff
• there is a under 18's called the mission which is in studio 24 on calton road on a saturday night from 7pm till 10pm then there is the over 18's mission which is 11pm till 3pm. nexus is in studio 24 on a thursday from 11pm till3pm
• the wee red bar!! and caberet voltaire!! both places where you wont find the testerone fueled stoopid club nights that go on elsewhere
• The Venue on Carlton road is totally bouncing, forget the "The Rev" and 'Eros". It plays hip beats and funky tunes. Friday nights the venue even hold an under 18's night. Full of good lookin australian guys, so take a visit. And for the wannabe ganasta's this si the place for you!!!!
• Across the nightclubs in Edinburgh, we have a local hero. Almost every night, a wee asian guy drives (he doesn't drink) to a club of his choice - Revolution, Eros, Espionage, you name it. To him, all these places are likened to the bar in Cheers - because EVERYONE knows his name.... His name... VIETNAMESE MICHAEL. Okay, if you didn't know his name, you will definately recognise him as the little oriental guy with the gravity-defying dance/breakdance moves he uses to burn up every dancefloor in the city. Every night, some local punter will challenge Michael to a dance-off, but it is our asian friend who wins every time... to the sound of rapturous applause. Michael, the clubbers of Edinburgh salute you.
• Boo, hiss! The mission used to play the best metal, have the best crowd and the best reputation. Now its clientele have become remarkably youthful to the point where they are all under 5ft2" and incapable of stomaching anything heavier than a little lite nu-metal. No wonder loyal patrons are deserting the club in droves - all traces of originality and individuality are under threat as the minimosher herds stampede across the dance floor. And please, no more girls in fishnet catsuits with drooping breasts and strategically placed crosses of duct-tape. If your breasts send men screaming towards the exits, you should PUT THEM AWAY.
• ayyye...revolution and eros!
• Erm, I thought that the Wilkie House was closed down by the police circa Dec 2001? If it wasn't, why is it always shut??? Pure at The Honeycomb on a Sunday night is reckoned to be the best of Edinburgh these days.
• not many good ones but the bongo club and the ark have the right tunes and lapse door staff
• -the mission in STUDIO 24. every other sat. under 18s between 7&10 and over 18s from 11till?. plays metal, punk , ska etc. a must for all goths/ moshers.
• If clubbing in Edinburgh, the Eros Elite club definitely isn't recommended. It's a busy, thriving, smart looking club for sure, but I can assure you it's a very dangerous place to go.
• messenger sound system @ the bongo club in new street for all your dub/reggae needs Absolutely fantastic
• The Cavendish is a good laugh full of students bit of a meat market dance/chart witha thick slice of cheese!!
• Gaia is good, used to be the jaffacake and i was there every thursday...... 50p a tequila and 20p a vodka! not any more though but still a good atmosphere. music not bad. Espionage is one of my favourites - 5 floors, 4 bars(pravda, kasbar, mata hari and lizard lounge, personally prefer the lizard lounge) but get their early cos it gets sooo busy. Also best to enter via the back door which is up a lane in the cowgate, just up from the 3 sisters. pretty dark lane, but does have bouncers at the top and its not dodgy!
• Club 30 , I found hard to find an entry on the internet for Edinburgh, but its here in Fredrick Street .Open thursday, friday, saturday and new night tuesday the club takes its name from playing three decades off music and is over 21's friday,over 25 saturday and over 18 tuesday. Entry is £5.00(friday),£6.00(saturday)and £3.00(thursday) Over six footers watch that head room ! the ceiling is low. The bar prices are a bit high ,have a wee starter in the house first. You will find lots of hen parties there ,singles and unsatisfied and satiisfied married women .
• There's the Mission at Studio 21 on the Calton Road, for those of you who like to have a bit of TALENT and FEELING in your music i.e. you like goth, rock, metal. On the other hand if you are shallow, braindead, and have no life at all you'll be freesing your arse off wearing a skimpy wee rag standing outside Revolution in a blizzard. Have fun!
• What about Espionage!!!!! I spent many a drunken night in there, bit expensive thought. 5 floors of James Bond wannabies :-) a lot of fun if you're on the pull though.
• Noone has mentioned Wilkie House yet. Great venue with lots of different clubs using it. The best has to be Luvely, it is a mixed/gay night and the crowd are really up for it. If you dont have a membership you can wait for a lifetime in the queue which isn't great on a cold December night ( I waited for 2 hours at Christmas but it was worth it when i got the feeling back in my feet.)DJ's are excellent especially Rich B who plays Hard House. Excellent night out!!! PS great excuse for OTT dressing up
• boo hiss for the demise of Cafe Graffitti.....mind you, the clientele was verging rather on the OLD side for the last year or so. not like when us young scamps used to quaff ridiculous quantities of budvar and ponder the feasibility of nicking one of those nice lamps...why are edinburgh clubs so fucking expensive anyway? you can get the same music for a fiver (and cheap drink) at say, the art school in glesgae on a friday night, as you can in manga for at least a tenner.
• Apex, The Pill Box, for all you ravers out there!!
• Eros/Elite just opened on Fountainbridge. Cool place with excellent lighting and sounds
• I don't know if it is still under the same management but Berties in the Cowgate was always good if you fancied seeing hundreds of 15 year old Mary Erskine and Heriots girls falling over in stilletos, the music was crap and the drinks were overpriced but they would let anyone in. If you were a bit more sophisticated (or you had nicked your sisters fake ID) The tilted wig (now Bar Down Under or some other stupid Antippodian name .. what is the Aussie obsession at the moment anyway)was always a good laugh.
• The Honeycomb can be very good. But for a better night out, make the effort to travel through to Bathgate and got to Room At The Top. Its worth it believe me. Edinburgh is full of crappy converted churches clubs.
• MANGA! Edinburgh's first drum'n'bass club now sadly dwindling. Excellent music if they could only shoot the MC.
• Most definitely: Dub Department on Wednesday nights at Negotiants, free entry good vibes but expensive beer (as usual for a trendy pub these days).
• The people who ran Iniquity now run Tushratta at the Rocking Horse on Victoria Street. Still Thursdays but from about 10.00 onwards. You can get flyers on other nights worth 50p. Interested in talking to people who might be going? Try the Boasters' Board.
• Edinburgh dropped gabba a while ago and has almost got rid of that crap Scottish-hardcore stuff like QFX, The Time Frequency etc. We want our own scene, and we're beginning to get it together... Oh, Claude Young moved here from Detroit recently (but your guess is as good as mine as to his address :)
  Clubs that play techno (and its musical relatives):
  • Sativa at the New Calton Club, Calton Road. (Fortnightly, but currently on holiday.) Probably the best regular acid/techno/trance night out in Scotland (but not as good as it used to be... mostly the fault of the new venue). Be ready for totally insane (but not neccessarily hard) music upstairs in the chill-out room... Big rival of Pure, the other big night out of the week...
  • LIS:EN at the Venue, Calton Road (fortnightly) plays a full range of bleeps from fairly hard house, through trance to full-on mental bangy/acid stuff. Resident live set too... I like it, but then I'm biased 'cos my friends run it :)
  • Pure at the Venue. Pure is Pure is Pure... THE famous techno club which gets the big names on a regular basis. DJs Twitch and Brainstorm spin vinyl and keep the punters happy. Slightly over fashion-conscious apparently, but that depends on who you listen to. Pure regulars who were at Sativa when Dave Clarke a while ago said it was much better than Pure. And Mr. Carke was playing some dodgy tunes! Pure is traditionally the home of the fashion-concious, Sativa was the Friendly-Techno-Crusty Club (but isn't really anymore). You practically need to be/be with a member to get into Pure.
• Gabba is way to underground to support a club at Edinburgh's inflated club prices. BUT, the jungle scene is finally starting up here with Street Knowledge nights at the same place as PURE is held although they are infrequent. Another techno club is LIFT which runs on thursday nights at the Attic on the Cowgate, behind legends which also happens to be a well cool pub. LIFT plays techno of all non-cheesy varieties. Long live the techno scene.
• Also: A local pirate radio station playing hip-hop, funk, jazz, jungle etc. On in the evenings, Healthy 96.5 , a must in the city.
• Joy at the Calton on Saturdays, Gay/Mixed, but it's now homeless [Oct 96]
• Two new [96] clubs - the plush Honeycomb off Hunter Square and Club Mercado in Market Street.
• Eden is Edinburgh's only true night of folk/world/roots music with live bands, drummers, belly dancers and the finest of dance tracks.
• Space Safari Off-world Lounge Music, Bachelor Pad Bongos and Toe-Tapping Exotica from Dimension X!
• Everyone has to go to Sublime once in their lifetime. It plays acidic trance and hard house kindov' music and the atmosphere on the dance floor is totally amazing. Take drugs or not, the majority are up for it and loving it. The DJs are totally amazing and if you like that kind of thing get there on Friday nights.
• I was in town the weekend of April 12, and caught a great hadrcore-techno show at a spot called Studio 24, on Calton Road. I think it may be a new name for one of the clubs you've already listed, so you may want to update. The show was called Underground Response Unit. Cool spot - very underground/warehousey type venue with blistering light show.
• Pure at the Venue - the only club in town....
• The Honeycomb is Edinburgh's premier underground dance venue. This 450 capacity, ultra-cool club plays host to the following club nights: Fridays rotate between Higher Ground (Garage n House), Seen (hip-hop) and Triptonite (pumpin UK house) Saturdays feature Substance with Craig Smith and Mikey Stirton & guests playing underground garage and deep funky houyse while Atomic Baby is on every other week featuring the harder pumping sound of Michael Kilkie and Zammo & the occassional guest. In the back room Gareth Somerville goes for a more soulful vibe. Sunday is Taste night. Taste is inexplicably rammed and rocking each and every time it's on. The mixed crowd lap up the hard house and nu-nrg rhythms served up by Fisher and Price. For further info on The Honeycomb email indemand.co.uk or telephone +44(0)131 225 5644.

Parts of this information have been supplied by: Elliee, Ian Cheetham, Tini, random mosher gal, Charlie Small, Harvey Nicholl, Geoff, r.young, Ursula Connelly, Kiri Tan, Joe, Claire, hazel larsson, cat parnell, melissa barclay, Johnnyboy, brian, AJ, Leighlou, kurt, Donald, Johnny, cazza, Joe Naiff, Helli, big nova twat, Martin Kelly, sarah, andrew senter, Mel, rachel, The Beer and Curry Monster, BEN, Ruaraidh Wishart, Trish, Aiden Derry, Lorz, sean mcneill, beatith the bastardiths, The Cosmic Crofter, Ailbhe, Jonathan, simon friend, the bad dog, STEVE, freewheelin cycles, Gary, Lachie Maxtone-Graham, charlies barker, Andrew Horne, kat, TIM, A Hamilton, Sime, Daniel Davis, Jonny, Mark Neal, 0, Angela, Alistair Hackett, Gabriel Radford, maggie quilietti, jenny green, Susanne McConnell, Andrew Campbell-Edie, SJP, Dave Sowerby, Lyssa, Suzanne Boobis, Andy, paul, Big dougs, Zoe, Laura Hird, scott walker, Scott Watson, mark, Niall, Ken Weller, lb, rosie, Sibs, ken, kevin, jimmybob, Mags, Alex Brown, James, hailey gibbons, Neil Nicolson, kipstar, Jamie Buchan, bascule, cazman, Craig Bryceland, Kristen Moore, Kenny Gray, Daisy Demore, Blue boy, Jonas Chau, Liz, Graham, Javier Saviola, Stuart Forsyth, Neil Morrison, jones, Norrie, Fiona Merrick, Mike C, brett, Jennyfur, Graeme Stewart, Craig Wood, Niamh Simms, Leona Kinloch, fiona raggatt, mib, Ryan, generic, Merk, Tommy Robertson, Gemma Smith, Angel_Of_Death, Fraser Riddell, nat stewart, S Murphy, Joanna, Lozz, Lee, Michael Lavoy, Paddy Marr, Hannah, lisa, callum johnston, zak, Ian Wilson, Stuart, Sarah Broz, callum