Cheap Drinks, Great Tunes (5th Avenue)

Member Name: topsyturvy

Product:	5th Avenue
Date:	29/06/07 (250 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: good music, cheap drinks, fun nights out

Disadvantages: -

I love a good night out and since becoming a student in the Manchester area I have had to start all over again by finding out what clubs and bars I should go to or where I will like. I don’t mind the music in most clubs as usually it’s just general chart music but I hate clubs which play a lot of dance music. So, after one disastrous night trying out the Print works I found myself a lot less poorer and not really having that much of a fun night so I’d suggest avoiding there because the clubs are over hyped and to be charged £6.80 for a double vodka and coke made me feel sick so I decided I would not let this disaster of a night get me down and decided to try again.

So, after hearing a lot of people recommending this club called 5th Avenue I had to give it a try as I needed a good night out. 5th Avenue is a club which has been around for a while but still has a reputation of being a great night out and having the cheapest drinks in town and of course it is mainly known for being one of the best indie clubs around and since my preferred musical taste is indie this sounded like heaven for me. I first went here on a Saturday night but the queue took about 40 minutes wait to get in but other than that it seemed to pass quick and moved along quite well. I like how security are always watching for people skipping the queue here because I can’t stand waiting for a while to see people pushing in but luckily this isn’t really an issue here.

So the cost to get in before 11 is £2 on a Saturday with a flyer or NUS card and £3 after 11pm with the NUS or a flyer which to me isn’t really expensive at all compared to what some clubs charge. You pay at the entrance then you go downstairs and the club is in here, the music is loud right away and this club gets very overcrowded and has a lot of pushy people but normally the wait at the bar isn’t long. The staff all serve quick enough and drinks are really cheap here. I can go out and spend about £10 and have a great night here. Alco pops are £2 here and they are not a special brand like VK or WKD but they are just as good, vodka and red bull is about £1.50 as are shots, all under the usual club prices.

The actual layout in the club is ok you walk in and the bar is on the left and goes around but the main dance floor is when you come in although if you walk along there are some booths to sit in but you have to get there early or they will be taken. There are stairs leading to the floor above but here is just more seats and I tend to prefer it downstairs as there is more atmosphere here. The dance floor is quite big here and it has a wind machine but a lot of posers tend to stand under here. I like it here also because they have security going through the dance floor a lot so it makes me feel safe in case a fight breaks out. Only once did someone violent try to start a fight with me for no reason but luckily security chucked him out as he had clearly had too much to drink and was getting violent.

The toilets in this club are in ok condition they are kept quite clean and usually some one is cleaning them all of the time. However, sometimes there can be queues to get in and this can get a bit annoying as people get pushy but there are lots of cubicles so the queue goes down relatively quickly.

So the music in here is quite varied although it is known to be an indie club it also plays more than just one genre. It has chart hits at the minute so it will play the likes of Kasabian, Kaiser Chiefs, Fall Out Boy, Klaxons, Muse, you name it but then they have a dance hour which plays things like The Prodigy and Faithless and Justice but then they also do some older hits as well so if you aren’t liking that music for one particular half hour then don’t worry because it will soon change again they just have to cater for everyone. Another good thing is there’s a number you can text to request songs I haven’t had my stuff played ever but people I know have you just have to text the number before 1am and then your song should get played.

The good thing about this club is that they do different things they do New Year’s parties, Halloween and also my favourite their foam parties. I have been going to these a lot lately but be warned these are probably the clubs busiest nights. If you go before the club opens at 8.30pm you are still guaranteed an hour and a half wait but it does go quick and they do want everyone to get in but if you want to get in within an hour I suggest going for 8pm or earlier. The queue goes all around the building and they have a 1000 capacity so sometimes the wait can be tedious if it turns into one out one in but also if they think it’s that bad they will tell people to not bother queuing up.

The foam parties are really good fun and everyone gets foam all over them but they stop it and start it a lot so it goes everywhere and although it gets slidy and people get pushy you just have to keep safe. It’s great here but I find it annoying if foam gets into your cups in here because the foam will be shooting out regularly. The club tends to stay open till 2am most nights except Saturdays when they stay open until 3am.

They seem to give you a lollipop when you leave and at the end of the night sometimes they will throw things into the crowd like Corona t-shirts etc. On Mondays, they do Monday Madness where drinks can be as ridiculously cheap as 80p. They are closed Tuesday nights and Wednesdays are called Wednesday Fusion, Thursday is called Back By Demand and Fridays are Friday Feeling, Saturday is Call It What You Want and Sundays the club is closed except for when a foam party is on. Also the first Friday of every month is an XFM night where XFM DJ’s do the music so it is usually really good.

The usual age group in here is teens to mid twenties, so it is quite a young age group. To get in cheaper you want to get yourself a flyer, I usually get these on Oxford Road at the HSBC bank on the corner where the people are always standing. The club is a great night out and I don’t know anyone who has criticised it, it’s cheap, plays great music and passes by too quickly. For more information or photos go to http://5thavenuemanchester.com

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