‘That’s where that gig was?!’
The question comes from a friend as we race past Metrocola on our way into the city, carried by the trademark city centre wind and betraying an air of total shock.
It was understandable. I’d been to the venue four or five times in quick succession, leaving the house saying I was off for some experimental jazz, some Scouse hip-hop, or some deep cut Cuban salsa. Looking in from street level (or bike-level as it were), it’s hard to reconcile what you see with such eclectic events.
As someone who has repeatedly said that Metrocola is one of the best contemporary venues in the city, I hope I’ll be forgiven for saying that it also looks like the kind of place that I personally would avoid like the plague if it were in London for fear of finding it infested with investment bankers drinking Camden Helles and thinking that a heavily curated selection of indoor plants is, in fact, the height of cool.
It’s difficult to reconcile the vibe Metrocola gives off from the outside with the sheer range of events going on inside. But what you can’t really tell from street level is that the upstairs features a small venue, regularly featuring grassroots music or carefully curated nights from local promoters.
‘It definitely makes for a unique atmosphere - you've got all the rap-jazz kids upstairs, and downstairs downstairs is like DJs on a whole different vibe,' Nattyhead, often found amongst said jazz-rap kids, reckons. ‘It’s two different scenes upstairs and downstairs - we don’t commonly cross paths like that. It makes for a unique atmosphere, you know?’
One person who definitely knows is James, co-founder of Otra and half of Dharma Collective, who regularly plays in the downstairs bar but who has also been on the bill for events in the upstairs space.
‘Yeah,’ he acknowledges, ‘there is a bit of a juxtaposition between upstairs and downstairs at times. It can be like being in two different places, even though we all share toilets.'
That can make for a particularly interesting experience playing in the venue, offering an opportunity to play to an audience that draws from numerous distinct scenes – something that allows for a playfulness with genre boundaries. There’s a strange subversiveness to turning up at midnight on a Thursday for futuristic jazz at a bar that could quite happily host a tech company’s Christmas party.
James views Metrocola’s shapeshifting partially as a consequence of its owner’s experience working with nightlife in Liverpool because, as we all know by now, Rob Gutmann ‘knows how to run a business in Liverpool.’
In this interpretation, the venue juggles numerous identities in line with the wider city's various identities: a sports bar downstairs, but one that aims for a more atmospheric environment by, for instance, avoiding commercial music by booking DJs who will push a little into alternative music, but not too far so as to alienate the broader clientele.
In this interpretation, the small venue safely ensconced upstairs gets to push that boundary further while the downstairs remains busy.
’I think he [Rob] is trying to juggle having an upstairs event space that can host emerging music while still being busy downstairs,’ James elaborates. Keeping what is fundamentally a pretty big bar buzzing and busy on the ground floor means playing the field a little and takes pressure off events programming – a luxury that straight-up clubs don’t have.
While the ownership might take credit for setting up the venue space, the (quote-unquote) ‘cool’-ness of the space has more to do with the use of that space and the programming.
Ross, co-founder of Otra, has a theory.
‘To be honest,’ he says, ‘I think that what’s happening at Metrocola is principally down to two individuals: Robbie Doyle and Ben Roberts.’
You’re never more than six minutes from a reference to Robbie and Ben, the duo behind You and I when discussing music at Metrocola. But for their part, they're pretty nonchalant about the whole thing.
‘I just used to go and hang out with Ben at work there sometimes,’ says Robbie when we spoke a few months back, 'and we just struck up a conversation. Everything was sort of there and ready. It was almost a crime not to try something.’
That 'something’ was an attempt to make use of the venue space with (to adopt their own words) ‘organic underground music.’ Their eclectic programming since the first event back in September 2022 has played a massive part in shaping the venues reputation.
You and I essentially had an almost unparalleled opportunity to take risks thanks to plenty of support for events from the company, but no heavy-handed direction.
‘We just sort of put on what we wanted really,’ Robbie explains, ‘there wasn’t any pressure from anyone to go in certain directions; we could just free-flow with it.’
That meant putting anyone they thought was doing something interesting, largely in the city but sometimes from beyond, and having availability. Jazz, grime, house, hip-hop, afrobeat, latin, broken beat, and from live acts to electronic and back.
Having the security of the venue space and the support of the company often translates to less worry about chasing ticket sales. The way You and I used that freedom helping set a reputation for Metrocola’s events that drew in people seeking out alternative music.
After all, You and I are, in the words of Tony of Soulfultiz, using that upstairs space and ‘pushing stuff’ – in which ‘stuff’ can be understood as fresh, exciting emerging music.
Robbie is well aware of how significant an opportunity that was and how it impacted decision-making.
‘Well,’ he says, ‘as with everything in life, you make more creative decisions; you’re more able to tap into your own taste, creativity, and fun, really, when you are relaxed - when there’s less pressure.’
Tickets for events often run at around £5, too, allowing people to really genuinely pass through for new music without deliberating too hard about the risk taken on the ticket - a vanishingly rare occurrence.
For others, including Tony, that have put on events at Metrocola, a particular importance is the liminal position the upstairs occupies between bar and club. With a license to 03:00, it’s firmly a late-night venue, but it doesn’t quite sit comfortably as a nightclub.
For instance, there feels like there’s an affinity between the music at Metrocola and the programming at 24 Kitchen Street. But only one could firmly be called a club. Both draw in audiences that are generally selective with their music, however the former has a bit more of laid-back feeling to it.
And certainly, if you’re in the loft at Metrocola you’ll not have got there by chasing a night out. That can be a positive and a negative for the people behind the events.
‘The classic thing with any space,’ says Ross, ‘is trying to get people to go upstairs, especially there you just wouldn’t know what was happening at street level.’
That somewhat hidden element of the space almost curates the crowd - if you are in Metrocola’s venue space, you probably left the house with the intention of ending up there. That’s ideal for some of the events now hosted there.
Afrosentrik, hosted by Tony and previously at Melodic Distraction’s venue, is one such example. After their closure, he was very deliberate in his hunt for a new space to host the event, a tough hunt because, after all, Afrosentrik itself ‘isn't club night - it’s a community space.’
As a result, Metrocola’s slightly obscured venue space was a particularly good option for those nights. Tony has hosted nights at other venues across the city and draws a comparison with places such as Kazimier Garden, where people are more likely to wander in with no expectations of the music that’s going on. If you have to be in the know to consider summiting Metrocola’s staircase, it half filters the people that make it there.
Ross aptly surmises that deliberation for the people hosting events there: ‘it’s that difficult thing; you don't want randoms wandering in, spoiling your event, but you also want it to be busy and to spread the word.’
And so, somehow, Metrocola has become something of an enclave for some of the city’s most exploratory music and a gathering space for communities around those sounds - the L1 epitome of not judging a book by its cover.
Get down on it:
02/07 –Showcase: Hazmat, Cothel, Three Stars (The Jac)
06/07 – Josh Rouse (St. Michael’s Church)
07/07 – Gig for Gaza (Rough Trade)
On repeat this week:
Tell Me Por Que (The Velvet Stripes)
Bons Momentos (Serginho Meriti)
Deja de Chingarme (Carín León)
Grown Man Sport (Pete Rock & InI)
surrealismo. (cKovi)