A love letter to the rooms upstairs in Yellow Arch, Sheffield
Let me tell you, as far as independent venues are concerned, you’ve never experienced anything like it.
The night started close to its end, around nine o’clock, certainly not late, but near enough that the idea of going to bed isn’t batted away quite as quickly as it was an hour ago. I won’t be seeing the sun again until tomorrow morning, and the only light in the room is provided by a cheap IKEA lamp, my TV, and now my phone. It’s a text from a friend, a talented drummer and at this point in his life, a budding promoter. “You live near Kelham Island, right?” he asks, “I’m putting on a gig at Yellow Arch tonight, you should come.”
Sure, it’s late, but I’m a young music lover at this point, as reckless in life as I am passionate about finding new bands to obsess over. Despite ending on a cliffhanger, I turn the program I’m watching off, take a swig of something or other that’s neither here nor there and head out. The walk is short, but long enough for the cold to blister, as I venture underneath that famous yellow arch and head into the courtyard.
There’s no bouncer on the door, and in fact, the whole place is pretty devoid of life, with the pub area to the side of the venue room plastered with Jimi Hendrix posters on the wall, tasselled lights and the lingering smell of incense… There are two strangers kissing on a bench, one man sits alone reading a book, and a bartender looks bored, and with a drink in hand, I ask if there’s a gig on, and she tells me I want a different room, “Up the stairs and then some, right, left, then up again, and you’ll find your way.”
I’m a walking drum kit with the bang I provide on those worn-down steps. I didn’t even know these upstairs rooms were open to the public; I always figured they were offices, staff rooms and storage spaces for what is no doubt a horrific mass of junk amassed in all venues. The building opens up into a hotel-like hallway, rooms on either side and a corridor that looks as though it only ends when you decide to stop walking down it.
Occasional hits of guitar and drums mumble their way past different doors until I finally see the silhouette of my friend. I’ll call him Connor, mainly because that’s his name. Flickers of light and blue sneak past his tall, shadowed outline, jet black in the presence of such blinding lights, so overpowering that his features only become clear when he reaches out to hug me. “I’m glad you could make it.”
The room was tiny, overflowing, built for 30 but stuffed with twice as many. It looked like a rehearsal space. It was a rehearsal space. God knows why Conor had opted for here. To look cool? To make the whole thing seem somewhat illicit? When I asked him, he said, “Sound and history, man.” And then, over the booming bass of the electronic punk band who stood and played on the slightly raised level of the floor, Connor gave me a history lesson.
“These rooms, man. These rooms have pockets of history sellotaped to their corners, you know what I mean? Every band whose worth their salt from Sheffield has played one of these backrooms before, some for small gigs, some just to fuck about, but the entire city is built into this fucking place, mate.
“Just above us, you’ve got where Pulp used to practice. Well, not Pulp, I don’t think, but Jarvis Cocker and Richard Hawley definitely did. My mate was looking for somewhere to rehearse once and bumped into those two downstairs, and they said he could use their room for a couple hours. Richard was dead cool apparently but Jarvis was like ‘Just don’t touch my shit’. This was during his solo phase, so his ‘shit’ was just his name in big neon lights.
“It was here Arctic Monkeys recorded their debut ‘n’ all, out this room and right. It was dodgy round here back then, the kind of dodgy where I bet one of them had to stay with the van while the rest loaded the gear up. Alex Turner has said ‘When The Sun Goes Down’ was written about this area, and that room looks out onto the street. Can you imagine him, looking out onto this rough part of Sheffield and conjuring lyrics about ladies of the night, scumbags and subtle propositions? All here. Those words, those fucking words, belted out by however many millions across the world, scribbled from pen to paper just across the hall, a corner of Sheffield that travels pretty well.
“And then you have the sound, man. These thin walls, they shake when sound bounces off them, have a feel. That’s what it’ll be like inside your ears right now. It’s like you’re trapped inside a beating heart. Fuck, you may as well be trapped inside of a beating heart, the beating of Sheffield music. I’m not sure if Def Leppard ever played here, like.”
Connor was right, the sound was better, and the history of the building only elevated it. Forget Spinal Tap, the ghosts of those who had played before were the added ones that these amplifiers were using, music dialled to 11, and being experienced by this haphazard mosaic of vagabonds who weren’t even in the right room.
I should tell you about the main venue, after all, this is a love letter to the whole space.
I should tell you about the courtyard, which doubles up as one of the best beer gardens in Sheffield, the benches and ashtrays which have eavesdropped on the conversations of every gig-goer in the city, the cobbled ground which the greatest musicians to pass through have scuttled across when moving equipment from van to stage.
I should tell you about the main gig room, a shotgun layout, a rectangle, nothing more, nothing less, the bar to the right with a surprisingly great beer selection for a dingy music venue, the lights which hang above the stage, the curtain which covers a makeshift green room, the step leading to a fire exit which photographers stand on to the get the best photos.
I should tell you about all that, but you know it already, or some variation of it. The truth is, the best parts of independent venues are the areas in the corner of your eye, and the real magic happens when no one’s looking.
That means drunken conversations beside broken hand dryers, first kisses in the freezing cold over a shared cigarette, bands splitting up by illegally parked vans after a shambolic show, and in Yellow Arch, there’s even more to it than that. While everything is happening, you have the remnants of rock history bleeding off the walls around you, in the rooms upstairs and down. Pockets of history all around for those with the eyes and ears to appreciate them. Thank the lord for punters like Conor.
I don’t even know if they allow gigs in those rehearsal rooms anymore, so at risk of repeating six dangerous words which seem to follow independent venues around like shadows – it was good while it lasted.
