Monday, June 06, 2005

The Fuel Bar, Covent Garden, London

DO NOT GO THERE! Here is the first review of a venue I will give on this blog, but I hope it will not be the last, or the flavour of things to come. However I feel I really must say something about just how bad this venue is. The Fuel Bar looks great on the internet, and on the phone the staff are friendly and helpful. However, I booked a room for 30 over the phone for my viva celebration party, and the staff indicated this was fine and they had just the room. A couple of days before we went the staff admitted over the phone that it was an "area" rather than a room, and that there was only seating for 18. This seemed fine, as I thought most people would be happy to stand, and the staff said there would be a DJ and dance floor after 9, for which we would not have to pay as long as we got in before that time.

On arrival we were greeted with a small alcove containing two tables and 8 chairs. There was standing area for approximately 2 people if they were happy to hug. When we complained the staff were dismissive and said we could spread out into the rest of the bar (which was full of people eating the average food). Although the drinks prices were average for this type of venue, we hit a problem at 9 when the DJ came on. He refused to play anything other than house music, and said the music would be more to our taste upstairs, however only half of our group made it upstairs before the bouncers started trying to charge us. Then the people upstairs were not allowed to come back down without paying. So we were stuck with half the group upstairs, and half down, and some people had coats and bags downstairs, while they were upstairs. The bouncers were all fools (no surprises there), and they proceeded to throw out 3 members of the party.

I've never had a great opinion of Covent Garden, or the bars there, but I had hoped the Fuel Bar would prove me wrong. It didn't. Do not go there.

No comments: