The room's sightlines are a factor to the Spice of Life, a basement room under a pub in Soho, close to Cambridge Circus and the Charing Cross Road, that is especially likeable. Do they matter? Yes, in some places like Ronnie's they come at a premium. When they are snuck in as standard that's even better. The place which puts on jazz a few times each week also sports the best neon stage-signage of any London club. It's a spot that also sounds very lived-in again the nearby Ronnie's springs to mind rather than new and sticky as fresh paint or worse clinical and as if a lot of music has been played here over the years. And a lot has. There's a surplus of character here and a certain bustle in the aura probably because it is located in an historic entertainment district. Inexpensive to get in, the bands however aren't always top quality here although all heard in the place over the years have been very decent. And you often get lucky having a punt at some band or other that may not have seemed the likeliest in the past but prove the mustard. Certainly it's also a good place to check out newcomers making their first steps on the live scene. Unusually the spot runs a gig on Monday lunchtimes tending to the swinging mainstream and even more daddio verging even positively antediluvian tradwise. Coming up next is the Simon Woolf Quintet on 6 December. Greg Abate above left at the Spice last month. Photo: marlbank. Info