Chemistry, Nottingham

Filthy's, or Filthy's Gypsy Lounge, to give it it's ridiculous full title, is a fairly new live music bar which was the only place I could find open late on a Wednesday evening. I may well have walked straight past this place without noticing it, had it not been for a speaker in the doorway pumping out the live music to catch the attention of passers-by like me. An entrance corridor leads into a bare boarded main bar area with the servery on the right hand wall. The bar has a dark wood counter, a strange tapestry covered bar back and a canopy decorated with 'Filthy's' artwork. A huge ceramic Alsatian dog stands guard at the end of the bar counter, looking a bit out of place. Some nice light fixtures over the counter provide muted lighting in keeping with the rest of the room, which offers long tables and standard chairs to the front and comfier seating options further back. An upper level to the rear has walls painted in dark shades with pictures of various movie and music icons such as Marilyn Monroe, Jim Morrison and John Lennon painted on them. Elsewhere there is a wall covered in old records and LP sleeves and some pillars with old adverts pasted onto them. A chap was sat in a corner to the rear, playing an acoustic set, with live music advertised seven days a week. It's difficult to see what the daytime appeal of such a bar might be, but I did notice various posters advertising Sky Sports programmes. I had no hope of finding any ale here, so was stunned to see two handpulls in operation, offering Castle Rock Harvest Pale and Shipstones Bitter. I gave the latter a try but as I might have guessed, it was a tired, sub-par pint, so I then switched to bottles and had a Monteith IPA which was much better. Keg options included the likes of Samuel Adams Boston Lager, Guinness, Kozel and Blue Moon. This place might be worth a look if you fancy taking in some local live music acts, but the quality of the beer may need some careful sampling. This visit just about worked for me but I'm not sure this is the sort of place that would normally hold my interest.

Filthy's is situated almost opposite the Pitcher and Piano. Once inside there is a single irregular shaped room,there is some seating to the front,the bar is to the front right,there normal tables and chairs to the front left,the rear area is larger and is slightly raised,there are tall tables ans chairs on the left side,the right side of this area seemed devoid of seating. To my surprise there were three pumps on the bar,two had their clips turned round,i had a drink of Belvoir Shipstones Bitter which went down very well. The room is dimly lit and has lots of records and posters on the walls,loud background music was playing on my Saturday afternoon visit,some which was good. The pub was empty but no doubt gets busy in the evenings. It was nice to see a real ale in a pub like this. Pub visited 7/2/2015