The Refectory: The greasy canteen in Leeds with an illustrious rock history
For students at the University of Leeds, the Refectory has no more significance than any other greasy canteen. Before that hall was invaded by pre-packaged sandwiches and sneeze-guards, though, it was world-renowned as an altar for rock and roll revolution, frequented by everybody from Sabbath to Hendrix.
It was way back in 1937 that the University first decided to give its students a place to eat, with the union building – including the Refectory – finally arriving two years later. For multiple decades, then, the building’s prevailing purpose was to line the stomachs of hungry academics. However, when the 1960s rolled around, that all began to change. Somebody at the University decided that having this grand hall sitting empty outside of meal times was rather wasteful, and promptly realised they could make some extra cash by letting it out as a music venue.
After all, a new musical age was dawning during the mid-1960s, and spaced-out students were particularly infatuated with the bold sounds of counterculture hippiedom and all of its psychedelic harbingers. Reportedly, it was Fleetwood Mac – while the soon-legendary outfit were still under the blues-heavy leadership of Peter Green – that ushered in the Refectory’s reinvention, performing on the stage at the rear-end of the canteen in October 1969.
In the immediate aftermath of that first show, bands across the rock and roll spectrum came to realise that, in the days before purpose-built concert venues, playing to 2000 students was a lot more fulfilling than playing night after night in small clubs and local arts centres.
Pouring over the old Refectory listings from the early 1970s reads like a who’s-who of legendary rock outfits: Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Rod Stewart, The Kinks, Black Sabbath, and Paul McCartney all called into the canteen at one point or another, cementing its notoriety as a coveted rock venue.
Inarguably, though, the most iconic gig to ever take place at the venue arrived on Valentine’s Day, when The Who arrived in town. Off the back of their masterful entry into the landscape of rock opera with Tommy the year prior, Pete Townshend’s outfit were looking to release a live album, but the primitive recording technology of the day meant they struggled to make a decent recording of their infamously loud, anarchic live shows.
Originally, as the story goes, the album that eventually became Live at Leeds was first intended to contain recordings from the Refectory as well as their next scheduled tour date in Hull. However, their East Yorkshire date was plagued by technical difficulties when it came to the recording, so Leeds was able to take all the glory.
Little did the student audience on Valentine’s Day know, however, that the show they were witnessing would go on to define hard rock and metal for the foreseeable future.
Today, a blue plaque stands outside the Refectory citing it as the venue for that 1970 live album, and the importance that it had on the entire future of rock and roll. Although countless other artists have performed in the canteen over the years – Iron Maiden, Pink Floyd, Queen, and local heroes The Sisters of Mercy being a handful of examples that haven’t already been mentioned- it was The Who that gave the venue its rock legacy.
Concerts still take place at the Refectory to this day, albeit rather sporadically. Mitski and Father John Misty have been two more recent highlights of its musical legacy, but with the rival gig venue Stylus being housed in the same building, it seems more and more like the Refectory is returning to its original use of being a cheap canteen serving the needs of skint and starving students.
