Actress & Bishop, Birmingham

Smart bar just off St. Pauls square. We were the first customers in just after 12 - it is more of a night time place with regular live music etc.. Only Doom Bar on the beer front so we opted for a quick Madri and moved on.

Official site of Actress & Bishop - theactressandbishop.co.uk

Official site of Actress & Bishop - theactressandbishop.co.uk

No cask - some outdoor seating on the pavement. A downstairs modern bar, with some nice chesterfields. An upstairs rooms for bands.

The actress and the bishop went to this pub... and that's about as decent as this place gets. 3 handpumps dispensing just 1 which had Doom Bore. An upstairs bit seemed to be available. Wooden floored with a bit that looks like its for bands. A staircase is to your left as you enter with crap rubbish like Adele being blasted out upstairs. And this was a Thursday afternoon.

Large music pub, with sparse seating and rustic wood decor. Small stage to one side, with more space upstairs (not visited). Continental-style decking seating area out on the pavement at the front. Two of three handpumps had clips, but the Pedigree went off as it was being poured so just over-cold Doom Bar available.

Once inside there is a large oblong shaped room with the bar on the left side,the large main drinking area was bare boarded and seemed pretty bare with hardly any tables or chairs,there were a couple of tables and bucket chairs and one tall table with low backed stools,there was a small raised area to the right which had a dj rig on it. There was only one real ale on the bar which was Pedigree,this was decent enough. The bar was almost empty on my early evening visit. I thought this was a pretty poor bar compared to the other bars i went in on my tour of Hockley. Pub visited 17/8/2013

This is a plain Victorian terraced pub and music venue, with a front patio area. I seem to remember that it opened as a pub in the mid 1980s, when i worked around the corner, it was then called The Last Drop, as it is on the site of the last public hanging in Brum. The pub is in undressed brick with sash windows and a brick and black frontage to the pub part, with large windows. The interior has a music room upstairs but bands also play on a slightly raised stage area at the back of the pub. It is a square room, with the wood serving bar to the left as you go in. The decor is a mix of red, wood panel and exposed brick, with a white ceiling and wood floor. There are some booth areas and a few sofas as well. There are some art nouveau light fittings, else with no real pictures, just the odd mirror, it looks a little bare. There was a TV, but this was not on at my visit and the background music was general and at a decent level. The service was functional and the clientele younger based, but mixed. Beer; usual tap stuff, with Pedigree, England's Pride (couldn't see the brewery) and a decent enough Backyard Blonde. It is OK to pop into for one and if listening to a band at least there is real ale, but not somewhere i would stay for any length of time otherwise