MacSorley’s, on the corner of Jamaica Street and Ann Street, is one of Glasgow’s most iconic music pubs — a grand Edwardian bar of 1899 that has been a home for live music for well over a century, and that, remarkably, is still doing exactly that today. A short walk from Central Station, it is a family-run, award-winning music venue with performers on the stage six nights a week, its long and proud history as one of Glasgow’s finest hostelries worn lightly over a warm, noisy, welcoming room.
From the Clan Vaults
There have been licensed premises on the site since 1861, when it was known as the Clan Vaults — a pub with ten rooms for travellers, whose Perthshire licensee George McGregor blended his own whisky on the premises. The MacSorley’s that stands today was the creation of the spirit merchant Philip MacSorley, who took over the old premises in 1897 and built a new tenement with a grand pub on the ground floor, opening in 1899. It was a lavish thing for its day: a large mahogany oval bar counter with neat recesses that could hold parties of five or six, a snack bar and an oyster counter, electric lighting, a massive underground cellar and an extensive kitchen, and what were said to be the most up-to-date toilets in town. By 1904 it had a reputation as the quickest-service restaurant in the city, with a dining room, a grand smoking room, a room for the ladies and an American cocktail bar, serving champagne and MacSorley’s own ‘Peacemaker’ blend.
The Stornoway Connection
MacSorley’s carries a thread that ties it to another pub in this chapter. In 1910 the business passed to Malcolm McIntyre, who with his father had come to Glasgow from Stornoway, where they had run a successful hotel; on arriving in the city the family bought both MacSorley’s and Lauder’s on Sauchiehall Street, along with Archibald Lauder’s wholesale whisky business and its worldwide ‘Royal Northern Cream’ brand. It is a small illustration of the Highland-and-Islands presence in the Glasgow licensed trade that this chapter meets again and again — the Lewismen and Highlanders who came to the city and made its pubs their business. In the 1980s, in a very different spirit, MacSorley’s spent a spell rebranded as the Caribbean-themed Montego Bay, before its history reasserted itself.
The Bands Play On
The pub that survives is a genuine music venue rather than a bar with the occasional turn: bands play most nights across the weekend, and a mezzanine floor above the bar — added to squeeze more in when the room fills — gives a fine view down over the stage and the crowd. Much of the Edwardian craftsmanship the drinkers came for in 1899 is still there to enjoy: the richly carved exterior woodwork and glass of around 1900, and the interesting remains of an old mosaic floor underfoot. It is, in the phrase MacSorley’s likes for itself, a place for good food, good music and great vibes — a family-run, award-winning survivor that has kept the music playing on the same Jamaica Street corner, through closures and comebacks, for more than a hundred and twenty years.
A Century of Music
What has defined MacSorley’s across the generations is music. It has been a favourite of Glasgow music-lovers for over a hundred years, and after a brief closure it reopened to carry the tradition on — today a family-run, multi-award-winning venue offering live entertainment six nights a week, traditional Scottish fare, and a range of drinks from house ales to Caribbean rums. Much of its Edwardian fabric survives to be enjoyed alongside the bands: the exterior glass and woodwork date from around 1900, and there are the interesting remains of a mosaic floor. MacSorley’s earns its place in this chapter as the great survivor among Glasgow’s music pubs — an Edwardian gin-palace-turned-gig-venue that has kept the music playing on the same Jamaica Street corner for more than 120 years.