please note - reviews on this site are purely the opinion of site visitors, so don't take them too seriously.
pretty well empty on my last visit. the refurb seems to have attracted no one much.
i know they rely on their rep as a late opener status, but i'd suspect they are struggling.
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as reported, reopened as 'manbar'. walls covered in painted murals which presumably derive from gay porn films or skin mags. quite artistic in its way.
it's an improvement although its former, seedy era came with its compensations too.
beer *just* as expensive as before. in fact. it had gone up. no ales on.
not much atmosphere despite the revamp. it was pretty empty when i went in, about 7pm, and it is one of those places that needs to be heaving, to have any atmosphere at all. i imagine late at night when it comes into its own.
the new owners have plans to do things with it, or at least one has, as he was talking loudly about this at a table upstairs when i visited.
this is big place and the rent, you may assume, reflects that. with the price of the drinks and the place's reputation as the last pub you go to of an evening, i think they are in for a struggle.
i wish them luck, but i can't honestly rate it much as an experience.
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Now changed it's name to Manbar. Went Sasturday for the first time since the change, it's a massive improvement. Music is at least halfway decent compared to before, drinks reasonably priced much better atmosphere and a larger and better looking crowd. Will be back
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closed down.
no surprises there but i guess a lot of gay men will regret it for the charnel house atmosphere and that when you emigrated to london, CXR was probably first port of call.
a bit sad but it was a 'kangaroo in the headlights' as aussies say, frozen in time as it's end got closer and closer ... but after westminster council made them clean up their act in general and the cruisy toilets in particular, there wasn't much reason to go there.
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in recent weeks they've attempted to tart the place up with some red leather lounges and felt wallpaper that attempts to mitigate the empty and lost look of the upstairs area. i wonder whether it will work. the average beer is over �4. no ale, or anything decent to drink, really, and the place seems infested with pests of one sort or another, giving it the atmosphere of a psych ward or impromptu drop-in centre for the terminally bewildered.
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This used to be one of the best gay bars in London but it is now one of the worst. One of the barboys didn't know what a Pimms was until I said it's that bottle over there with Pimms written on it, the other gave me a lager bottom when I asked for a lager top (an absolute crime). The upstairs bar doesn't bother opening at all now giving a sense of either neglect or dereliction. The Christmas decorations last December consisted of a tree looking lost above the entrance door where no one could see it, and I believe it was �10 on the door on NYE with the cabaret coming on earlier than usual so everyone missed it. When I last checked the website to see what was on there seemed to be two, an old one that nobody had thought of closing down and a more recent one that hadn't been updated for about six weeks. All in all this place has gone down hill quicker than Compo's bath on the Yorkshire fells. The owner needs to take a hard and fast look at this place.
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En route to this bar on a crawl last night, a friend of mine exclamed, 'Oh GOD not that despair place!' I soon came to understand what he was talking about. I'm all for a cheap, unpretentious soho gay bar, but 79 CXR is just depressing. It made me think hard about the lengths I'll go to in order to buy a cheap double vodka and coke.
Apparently the men's toilet attendant was asleep.
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the toilets have been cleaned up but most of the punters have vanished ... the two are related as improptu cock was the reason the place was popular.
sorry to say that it's one on the way out, like a lot of gay pubs.
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Ugh... No matter how drunk you get, and how fogged up your beer goggles are, this place is not the nicest venue to find yourself in.
Its usually busy from 11pm (it has a 3am licence). But the venue needs so much work doing to it. It could be a much nicer place with a paint job and a bit of love and attention.
Don't bother to venture to the nasty toilets unless you are really desperate....
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Open till 3am (charged �3 after 10.30) its a somewhere to go when every where else is shut and your practically guaranteed to pull, which is fine. However some of the punters are objectionably drunk and the bar itself is a dark dingy affair.
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The later it gets the crusier it gets and the dearer the beer gets. Worst toilets of a gay bar in London - wake up Westminster Council Enviromental Health.
bob55 - 21 Dec 2007 12:51 |
If its gone midenight and you want to keep drinking, then this might be an option. It's �3 to get in and the place is open till 4am. Thats all I can say to recommend it.
This is a VERY VERY gay pub and not my cup of tea at all. The smell in the toilets defies description!
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Cruisy gay bar thats open late six days a week.
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