The world of pubs, as we know and have heard, grows ever more homogeneous over the years, as the big chains move in, so surely it’s hardly the time to be mourning the passing of one of them. Farewell then to Ben Crouch’s Tavern, just off Oxford Street, a stalwart of the Eerie Pubs stable.*
It was for the most part a horrible place, filled with ersatz gothick decoration (think thick cobwebs, chains, rusty steel cages, big fake spiders, book cases, and lab testing equipment), a meagre range of drinks and truly awful music played far too loudly which didn’t even conform to the rest of the pub’s decor theme (generally, it was bad AOR rock music).
And yet, and yet, a bit of nostalgia creeps in for the old place. It was like some branding consultant’s idea of the student drinking experience, all-caps and underlined, with bright ‘cocktails’ made from cheap vodka looking for all the world like a terrible Aftershock experiment. It was an oasis of dependability, for some value thereof, in a desert of despondency. It was certainly preferable to the Green Man across the other side of Oxford Street, itself every bit as loud and obnoxious. It made ridiculous claims about the quality of its food, “best in Soho” it said on multiple sandwich boards outside, cue derisory laughter: it was in Noho ahem, Fitzrovia.
And now it’s being converted by Geronimo Inns as The Adam & Eve (after the little alleyway that runs behind it). They run a few decent drinking places in Heathrow Airport, as well as the Betjeman Arms in St Pancras, locations which should suit them well to the transitory environment of Oxford Street. But it won’t be the same, really. It won’t be the same kind of naff that Oxford Street really deserves, that can stand proudly alongside the t-shirt sellers wedged into Adam & Eve Court and all the cut-price discount stores.
(* Eerie Pub fans in London can console themselves with the London Stone, opposite Cannon Street station.)