Gritty outdoor photo. Thanks, new phone camera!
Sandwiched between Mojo and The Reform, Verve is an established part of the Merrion Street set (it’s even owned by the same people as The Reform).
The bar area. It’s about as visible in real life.
The primary focus here is on the basement venue which is used for live music, comedy and dancing on different nights every week. This meant that when we visited on a sleepy January Tuesday it felt a bit like its soul had been stripped away. So please bear that in mind for this review.
This bull directs you to the downstairs venue.
The ground floor bar area is very dark and has a small number of tables, presumably because this is a standing-room-only venue when Merrion Street is in full swing. The music is excellent, with a mix of blues & rock from the 60s to the 90s.
The stage in the downstairs space. You get the idea.
It’s much more of a spirits venue than a beer venue, with the beer selection mostly being world lager (Krušovice and Cobra on tap; Quilmes, Cusqueña and Vedett in bottles) plus Duvel as a very welcome token ale.
There’s not much here for us to recommend. Verve is what it is — both an events space and a place to stop off when you’re doing a Merrion Street pub crawl — and it succeeds at that, but don’t bother coming for the beer.
Tags: beer garden, dance floor, live music
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Probably one of the more anonymous bars in the city. Just look at the name. Back of a fag packet uninspiring overflow car park. The crowd tends to be 30-somethings, some of whom are acting more dignified than others. The beer selection is actually appropriate for a bar of its kind, and there aren’t quite as many appalling cokeheads as there are next door in Reform.