Brighton

Green Door Store

2-4 Trafalgar Arches, Lower Goods Yard, Brighton BN1 4FQ

Set into the Victorian railway arches beneath Brighton station, the Green Door Store occupies what was once a horse hospital in the station's lower goods yard. It opened in January 2011 and quickly became one of the city's best-loved grassroots hubs: a 170-capacity live room and a 300-capacity late-night club, with the bar always free to enter and a programme that can run to ten events a week. The brickwork and arches give it the slightly subterranean character that suits a venue built for new and emerging music. Programming leans hard towards the grassroots end of things, with cheap gigs and low-priced club nights through the week and a stated emphasis on inclusivity. Now past its fifteenth year, it remains a fixture of Brighton's small-venue circuit, the sort of room where touring bands and local acts share the same modest stage.

The Hope and Ruin

11-12 Queens Road, Brighton BN1 3WA

The Hope and Ruin sits on Queens Road in central Brighton, a pub and live music venue rolled into one. It is entirely plant-based, the bar stocking mostly local craft beer while the kitchen, run by Beelzebab, turns out seitan kebabs and loaded fries. The set-up is classic small-room Brighton: a friendly ground-floor bar, dogs and children welcome at the right hours, and a gig space upstairs that has become a dependable stop for new and underground acts. As one of the city's mainstay grassroots rooms, it trades on intimacy and a strong week-round programme rather than scale, the kind of venue where bands play early in their careers to a crowd packed close to the stage.

Chalk

11 Pool Valley, Brighton BN1 1NJ

Chalk is a multi-purpose independent venue in Brighton's coach station, directly opposite the pier; it operates on the site formerly known as The Haunt. The main room scales up and down to suit each event, with an additional bar on a mezzanine level and a Martin Audio system the venue rates among the best on the south coast. The split personality is the point: club nights one evening, touring bands the next. Club fixtures such as Fat Poppadaddys and Let's Kill Disco run alongside Chalk Live, which has welcomed established names like Tom Jones and Snow Patrol as well as risers including Little Simz, YUNGBLUD and Arlo Parks, plus Brighton's own The Big Push. It is a workhorse of the city's nightlife, equally at home with a sweaty gig or a late club crowd.

Concorde 2

Madeira Shelter Hall, Madeira Drive, Brighton BN2 1EN

Concorde 2 occupies a building on Madeira Drive, right on Brighton's seafront, and bills itself as the city's legendary live music venue and nightclub. The setting, hard against the beach, is part of its appeal, and the room works double duty as both a gig space and a club, with a terrace that comes into its own in the warmer months. Its programme runs across the spectrum, from touring rock and metal bands to dance and sound-system nights, the kind of broad booking policy that keeps a seaside venue busy year round. Recent listings have spanned heavier live acts and established club names alike, confirming its standing as one of Brighton's enduring mid-sized rooms.

Patterns

10 Marine Parade, Brighton BN2 1TL

Patterns has been part of Brighton's nightlife since 2015, occupying a spot on Marine Parade above the seafront with views across to the pier. Built on the site of a former art deco hotel that previously housed Ted Potter's Music Bar and the Escape Club, it spreads across a ground floor with a custom PA, a basement built purely for dancing and immersive gigs, and a south-facing terrace that has been singled out as one of the city's coolest outdoor spots. It pitches itself as a small live venue that punches above its weight and a safe space for underground club culture. The booking history bears that out: a deep run of electronic and club names including Bicep, Four Tet, Floating Points, Honey Dijon, Helena Hauff, Ben UFO and Jayda G, alongside live acts such as Ezra Collective, Hiatus Kaiyote and Rex Orange County. The basement's L'Acoustics rig is the venue's pride, the dancefloor its true purpose.

Prince Albert

48 Trafalgar Street, Brighton BN1 4ED

The Prince Albert is a pub and music venue on Trafalgar Street in Brighton, built in 1848 as a three-storey town house and converted to a pub in 1860. Its most famous feature is on the outside: the side wall once carried Banksy's Kissing Coppers, unveiled in 2004, before the original was removed to protect it from vandalism and sold at auction in 2014, with a replica left in its place. The wall now bears a sprawling mural of deceased musicians, from Amy Winehouse and Joe Strummer to David Bowie and Lemmy, painted and repeatedly expanded by local graffiti artists. Beyond the artwork, the Albert is a small, well-loved Brighton gig pub with an upstairs music room, the intimate end of the city's circuit. It is the sort of room where the walls themselves double as a roll-call of music history.

Brighton Centre

King's Road, Brighton BN1 2GR

The Brighton Centre is a seafront conference and exhibition centre on Kings Road, opened in 1977 and built in a Brutalist style of textured concrete. The largest venue of its kind in southern England, it doubles as the south coast's principal arena, with a standing capacity above 5,000, and is as well known for hosting the UK political party conferences as for music. Its position on the front, within easy reach of the city's hotels, has made it Brighton's default room for the big touring show. The concerts began almost immediately: Bing Crosby gave his final performance here in October 1977, days before his death, and the years since have brought Queen, The Who, The Jacksons and Bob Marley and the Wailers, among many others. For all the periodic talk of demolition and replacement, it endures as the largest live venue in the city.

Komedia

44-47 Gardner Street, Brighton BN1 1UN

Komedia in Brighton is a multi-room arts and entertainment venue in the North Laine area, on Gardner Street, opened by the Komedia company that began in the city in 1994 as a theatre and cabaret bar. Across its spaces it programmes a broad mix of comedy, music, cabaret, theatre and children's shows, with one room given a roughly 400-capacity live set-up, and operates a cinema within the building in partnership with Picturehouse. It is a mainstay of Brighton's cultural life and a regular presence at the city's festival fringe. Music shares the bill with comedy, and the venue has a long history of championing performers early: in its first years it gave stage time to comedians including Graham Norton, Jack Dee and Sacha Baron Cohen. The eclectic, multi-purpose model is the point, a single address where a gig, a stand-up set and a film screening can all share a weekend.

Brighton Dome Concert Hall

Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE

DUST

77 East Street, Brighton BN1 1NF

The Folklore Rooms

12 North St, Brighton and Hove BN1 3GJ, UK

WaterBear

169-170 Kings Road Arches, Brighton BN1 1NB

The Pipeline

6 Little East Street, Brighton BN1 1HT

The Volks

3 The Colonnade, Madeira Drive, Brighton BN2 1PS

Latest Music Bar

14-17 Manchester Street, Brighton BN2 1TF

Corn Exchange

Church Street, Brighton BN1 1UE, United Kingdom

Brighton Electric

Tramway House, 43-45 Coombe Terrace, Lewes Road, Brighton BN2 4AD, UK

Alphabet

11 Dyke Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 3FE, United Kingdom

Brighton Concorde 2

286A Madeira Dr, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN2 1EN, United Kingdom

Paganini Ballroom

11 Ship St, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1ND, United Kingdom

Volks Club

BBC Radio Sussex

40-42 Queens Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 3XB, United Kingdom

East Brighton Park

Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN2 5TS, United Kingdom

Bar Centro

100 Alexander St, Rochester, NY 14620

Brighthelm

North Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1YD, United Kingdom

Inn On The Square

11 Cranbourne St, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 2RD, United Kingdom

The Deep End

601 Riegelmann Boardwalk, Brooklyn, NY 11235

The Joker

2 Preston Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 4QF, United Kingdom

Audio

3016 Franklin Rd SW, Roanoke, VA 24014

The Black Lion

14 Black Lion St, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1ND, United Kingdom

Envy

1815 NE 123rd St, North Miami, FL 33181

The Grand Central

29-30 Surrey St, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 3PA, UK

Private Venue

301 S Main St, Brighton, CO 80601

The Western

153 Kingsway, Brighton and Hove, Hove BN3 4GR, United Kingdom

TGE Beach The Deep End

RV98+G3, Brighton BN2 1ET, United Kingdom

St George's Church

St George's Rd, Kemptown, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN2 1ED, United Kingdom

UnBarred Brewery & Taproom

19-23 Elder Pl, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 4GF, United Kingdom

Sticky Mike's Frog Bar

9-12 Middle St, Brighton BN1 1AL

Preston Park

Preston Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 6SD, United Kingdom

Horatio's Bar

Daltons Showrooms + Bar

Madeira Dr, Lower Promenade, Brighton BN2 1TB, United Kingdom

A L P H A B E T

Zahara

77 East St, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1NF, United Kingdom

Shipwright's Yard

88 Tooley St, London SE1 2TF, United Kingdom

Brighton Dome Studio Theatre

29 New Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1UG, United Kingdom

Family Store Record Shop

74 North Rd, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 1YD, United Kingdom

Shooshh

214 Kings Rd, Brighton BN1 1NB, United Kingdom

HMV

Unit MSU1A, Russell Pl, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 2RG, United Kingdom

Jubilee Square

99 Dundas St, London, ON N6A 6K1, Canada

Ironworks studios

30 Cheapside, Brighton and Hove, Brighton BN1 4GD, United Kingdom