I used to live on St Vincent Street within about 2 minutes walk of the Avalon during my student days, but never actually went in once. Like many young moth-like students I favoured the bright lights of Sauchiehall for most of my imbibing.
A few weeks ago I broke my Avalon duck. We'd been on a recapture-our-youth pub crawl one Friday afternoon, taking a half day off in pursuit of fun and ribaldry. We'd been to a few places along the increasingly popular Finnieston strip. In one bar, upon hearing the relaxing tones of Roxy Music's "Avalon" we immediately decided to reroute along Kent Road to the eponymous bar. It's a curious wee place with a main room, and a large-ish side room with a wee hole in the wall providing access to the bar staff and their wares. In our lubricated state we noted with excitement the microphone and sound system being assembled in this room, and were already planning our karaoke selections.
Unfortunately though, the microphone and sound system would be used only by the chap setting them up; he was a pub singer, and proceeded to belt out big band standards, taking requests with zeal, one man accompanied by only a bontempi backing track and the occasional applause of a tiny but deferential crowd. It was actually excellent fun; other than us only a small group of old ladies on a bowling club night out were present. One of our number spent a far greater length of time slow dancing with them than is probably appropriate.
The pub is pretty unremarkable I suppose, but you know when you stumble across something a little unexpected and feel glad that you did? Well, this was one of those times, and needless to say, the Avalon provided the final destination for our pub crawl! (Also, please note there was no hanky-panky or anything between my friend and the old ladies, it was just good old fashioned fun). read more