Viaduct Showbar

Fun gay bar with a large outdoor area. It was a mixed crowd and a good vibe generally. Unfortunately, its resident DJ is one of those old school gay bar DJs who thinks they’re hilarious and cut across the music to do some ‘audience work’ every 20 seconds. I don’t think I laughed at a single ‘joke’ and they certainly didn’t read the room as the night went on - even with a full dancefloor, they were making very predictable bad jokes about patrons, rather than just letting people dance. I guess it’s an interesting thing to see, as a relic of how people used to think they should host at a gay bar, but the DJ was much, much less funny than they thought they were. You could see other people eyerolling over their drinks and eventually shouting from the dancefloor for him to stop, due to the constantly unfunny interruptions.

We paid £10 for booth seating thinking it would be near the stage. It couldn’t have been further from the stage! We had to ask three members about our seats which were behind a hen night as far as you could get from the stage. The ticket included queue jump, there was no queue. In short save yourself the tenner and spend it at the bar!

I genuinely don’t understand how this venue justifies charging an entry fee for the experience it provides. I’ve visited on several Saturdays, hoping things would improve, but unfortunately they’ve only been consistently disappointing. The biggest issue is the DJ Max. The music selection is completely out of touch with the crowd. On every visit, the venue has been full of people in their 20s, yet the music played for hours was better suited to a much older audience. The result of this was a half-empty dance floor, with large groups of people standing outside waiting for something worth coming back in for. Despite multiple requests from customers which i witnessed , the DJ ignored them and came across as rude and dismissive and straight up mouthed NO and laughed , making no effort to read the room or engage with the crowd. A nightclub should be somewhere people want to stay, dance, and enjoy themselves. Instead, people were leaving the dance floor, standing outside and leaving , and talking about how crap the music and vibe was. Management seriously needs to review the DJ if they want people to return. I won’t be coming back until significant changes are made i’d HIGHLY recommend backrooms if you want a night out which actually has good music.

Love it in here. Came during the day and it was as lively as if it was in the evening. The staff were all very polite. They have their own bar just for cocktails and these were delicious and good value for money. It is £8.50 for 1 cocktail or 2 for £15 and they have a variety. The music was good and there was also a drag queen. Would definitely come back

Absolutely love this place. But the new toilets renovation has really bothered me. When I first started to come here there were just toilets. Not labelled with genders but just toilets everyone could go in. I admit they were a bit sketchy and this renovation is nice, but now the toilets are gendered. In the future I wouldn’t like to see gendered toilets at an LGBT nightclub. Maybe change it to be rooms for urinals and stalls. Because as I am a very feminine man who likes to dress up as a female I don’t feel comfortable in gendered bathrooms. Overall it’s a really nice place and I recommend it.