This would be a solid 5 stars if I was only rating the show, sound and space (Fever Ray, 28/02/18). Unfortunately I feel pretty let down by some basic organisation issues at the venue.
All bags over A4 must be left in a separate cloakroom outside the venue, which is understaffed and costs €2 per item. Queues were huge, and poorly separated so some people waited twice. Because it was -8° (felt like -15°) we had to choose either to leave our coats in our bags outside and still have to queue in the freezing cold to get into the venue, or queue three times - once for the bag, once for entry, and again for the indoor "coats only" cloakroom.
Luckily one of our group decided put her coat inside, while we had ours in our bag, so she kindly collected our bag, however while waiting inside for her to finish we actually got kicked out by security who wanted to close up.
This is a seriously inneficient system, and nowhere on our tickets did it state that bags would have to be left outside the venue (photography and videos are explicitly forbidden on the ticket)
The second, more serious issue for me is that the clearly marked non-smoking policy does not seem to be enforced in any way. Continuous puffs of vape and smoke could be seen rising from the crowd. Other than the obvious health issues, I actively avoid smoky places due to asthma and allergies to e-cigs. Suffice to say I had to take my inhaler 4 times during the show, and all my clothes reek. Luckily my coat was outside getting frozen solid.
To round off this review I want to say a couple of positive things - the sound quality was good, venue layout was good, the upstairs area has really great views, and the bars are not massively overpriced.
And Fever Ray were awesome! read more