Night & Day Cafe is Manchester’s longest-running independent live music venue, opened in 1991 on Oldham Street in the Northern Quarter. The room is a long, high-ceilinged space with a properly sized stage at one end and a big bar running its length, and has been a launchpad for an extraordinary list of artists — Elbow, Arctic Monkeys, Kasabian, Johnny Marr, Frank Turner, Jessie J, Manic Street Preachers and Paolo Nutini all played here early in their careers.
Capacity is around 250, with a state-of-the-art PA, in-house sound engineers, and bands on most nights of the week plus DJ club programming on Fridays and Saturdays. The cafe operates by day, the venue by night, with food served alongside the gigs.
Night & Day is genre-open — indie, alternative, folk, electronic, hip-hop, jazz, world — and has a particular reputation for booking emerging local acts alongside touring names.