DingWalls-Music Venue

Dingwalls has a curious layout with various teers of different heights descending from the door to the stage. This layout means that there are more places where you can see what’s going on than in other similarly sized venues, but it can cut up the atmosphere a bit with each section having its own ambience. I saw The Islands here a few weeks ago, and the sound engineer didn’t cope very well with the wildly varying instrumentation each of them was playing or swapping between, but by the end of the set it was pretty good.

If I don’t see live music regularly, the terrorists win. Therefore, it was my number one priority to check out some gigs as soon as I arrived in London. Dingwall’s certainly wasn’t the first venue I’ve ever been to in London, but it was the last place Be Your Own Pet ever played live. BYOP are (correction: WERE) a pretty rad band from the USA who liked to have a ridiculously fun time on stage and they shall be greatly missed (by me). This isn’t a review of the band, however. The venue was fantastic! I’ve seen my fair share of stages, and Dingwall’s certainly ranks high on my list of faves. Small enough to hear and see the band from the back of the room, prices at the bar didn’t knock me over, and in cool space near the Camden Lock. I would definitely like to check out other gigs here in the future.

Dingwalls (sometimes also called Lock 17) is a bar venue that does both comedy and music nights. It’s well-suited for both since it has several stepped levels of floor in front of the stage, ensuring decent views for a large area.

Entry is through one of the middle courtyards in Camden market. The bar is at the back with a large floor space in front of it, then the descending levels, some with tables, and with plenty of rails to lean on at the front of each.

Musical acts that come through are typically uni-student favourites like Metric and Buck 65.

Dingwalls ahs been at the cutting edge of the live music scene for over 30 years.Anybody who is famous be it a musician or an artist has played there some time.At present they have a lot of good gigs -worth checking out!