Loved Southampton music venue closes

The Talking Heads, a local venue in the City of Southampton, has closed over the weekend.

This has happened despite a local campaign, fuelled through social media, to keep the venue alive.  The campaign was supported by local MP John Denham, local Bestival promoter Rob Da Bank and BBC film critic Mark Kermode, and over 3,500 people on Facebook.

The 200 capacity venue has had problems financially and despite hundreds turning up for what is likely to be the venue’s last gig on Saturday, no angel investor turned up to save the venue which has been open as The Talking Heads since 1992.  

Today, in what seems a pretty final act, their Facebook page was today advertising free chairs, tables and other furniture.

The pub has a long history with music, prior to becoming the Talking Heads it was apparently called the Red Lion and hosted a range of musical acts.  The then key industry of shipping supported the venue in terms of performers and punters.  

A commentator on an online article shared some of the more unknown history of the venue, which has hosted live music since at least the 1950s:

The pub was originally the Red Lion – for many years prior to Talking heads it was an important part of the the Southampton music scene which had existed from 1950′s – 1980s when the City’s economy was based on Shipping and Industry rather than retail and education.

There were lots of working class pubs and working mens clubs that put on live bands and it was possible to eek out a living from playing these venues – plenty of local muso’s worked on the boats too.

The Red Lion used to have rowdy Sunday lunchtime sessions 12-2 – it would be absolutely rammed with local working musos fresh from their exertions on the preceding Friday and Saturday night the Buff club, Pier, Dockers club being typical (tough) venues.

A ‘scratch’ band would be playing and musos would be spotted in the crowd and called to the stage to do a turn. Plenty of tall tales, bitching and phone number swapping going on.

It was always 100% covers – but these guys could play any song, in any style, in any key you wanted.

But times change and as local industry died and the gigs in working clubs dried up as the working class died out, pubs either became student venues, featuring student bands or else they closed.

One great thing to have come out of the campaign is a pledge to continue to support live music in the Southampton area.  On the PledgeBank website a local music fan has pledged to go to a live gig a month to support the local scene, but will only do it if 200 other people do.  

This is a great commitment to live music and we’d urge any Southampton based music lovers reading this blog to do the same.  You can sign the pledge here.

Music Heritage UK exists to promote, protect and preserve our musical heritage partly for the benefit of small music venues.  We want to act as a fog-horn for future campaigns like this.   Find out more at our website here: www.musicheritageuk.org