Venue: The Falcon, Camden
Town: London, GB

The Falcon, later The Camden Falcon, was a pub and music venue located at 234 Royal College Street, in the London Borough of Camden, North London. The pub went from hosting low-key gigs in the late 1980s to becoming one of the most influential music venues of the 1990s, and a hub of London's Britpop and Shoegaze scenes. In November 1997 American music magazine Billboard referred to the pub as being one of a few in the area that can "arguably take some of the credit for the rebirth of British rock in the mid-'90s". A pub on that spot dates back to at least the late 19th century. In 1896 a pub by this name listed at 234 'Great College Street' (the former name of Royal College Street, prior to the Veterinary College there being awarded royal charter) had an accepted tender "for alterations" reported in the construction trade periodical The Builder. London's Lost Pubs by Sam Cullen states it opened as the Falcon in the mid-1850s. The pub went from hosting low-key gigs in the late 1980s to becoming one of the most influential music venues of the 1990s, and a hub of London's Britpop and Shoegaze scenes. During this time it was owned by Baxter Mitchell and Alexis Hunter. It was also a fringe theatre for a short period. Bands and musicians such as Blur (then named Seymour), Pulp, Lush, Slowdive, Inspiral Carpets, Suede, The Stereophonics, Feeder, Doves, PJ Harvey, Travis, Muse, Catatonia, Teenage Fanclub, and Coldplay all played there early in their careers. It was also a key venue for what journalists dubbed the Camden Lurch scene, a term they used to describe the preponderence of non-shoegaze or dance music indie bands that often played in the area, such as Silverfish and Th' Faith Healers. The Sundays and Lush played their first concerts there (on separate occasions) in 1988. In February 1990, Galaxie 500 played a hastily arranged gig at the pub after the London date of The Sundays' headline tour, on which they were support, had to be postponed. The Verve's second time p