Whilst we weren't able to bring you a fresh serving of Liverpool Beer Week in 2020 due to some very unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances (we had SO much planned for you too!), you may have heard that another week long beery event in Liverpool is due to happen!

#SIRENINLIVERPOOL is starting, 14th September online and carries on with some Tap Takeover events and other online goodness which includes interviews, competitions and giveaways.  Full details are over on Siren Craft's website, right here:
https://www.sirencraftbrew.com/stories-and-events/events/siren-in-liverpool 

Not only that, for that week only, you can take advantage of free delivery of their beers from their online store to your door, if you have a Liverpool postcode.

There is a photography competition taking place throughout the week, beginning on Monday 14th September.  The competition will close and the winner announced on the following Sunday, 20th September.  More details are below.

Stay tuned to our Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts and give Siren Craft Brewery a follow to keep up to date with details on the week, as we update them! 

The Competition: 
​
To enter: We want to see your best beer memories of Liverpool! Send your photos via twitter, tagging @sirencraftbrew and using #SirenInLiverpool hashtag.  To qualify, the photo must be Liverpool themed, so either in Liverpool, or drinking Liverpudlian beers! Good luck!

But now we're back!  Back with a fresh playlist, back with another quiz and our impeccable patter.  Most importantly, we are back with another superb co-host for the evening.

This iteration of the pub sees us joined by Manchester Union Brewery!  They are the only dedicated lager brewery in the region and are just fresh from running a successful crowdfunding exercise to get a big jolt and push their operations forward.

Part 12 of the #livebeerpub is incoming this Saturday evening; we also have some fantastic co-hosts lined up for you.  Get ready to rumble with the boys from Top Rope Brewing!

Lockdown has been a busy time for the Tag Team of Ben and Neil, with brewing, hosting numerous online interviews with other breweries and drinks makers (including Turncoat Gin, Neptune Brewery and Alpha Delta) and now they are looking forward to hosting a forthcoming Beer Festival that you won't need to leave home for - In Your House.

You can find out more about how they've been coping, what their plans are for going forward and what the 4th July festivities will entail by joining us and them (on Twitter - https://twitter.com/TopRopeBrewing) this coming Saturday.  If you need any beers from them to get in the mood; there are plenty of shops around that have stocked up, but they are also selling online right here: https://www.topropebrewing.com/shop. 

You can find the usual playlist for our weekly jukebox, which Top Rope have helped put together, here:  https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBvXyqmy0uv2Jj4d9mjzGWGQNn1spIVO6.

Remember, hit play at 7pm and you'll be synched up with the rest of the pub!

Now is the time to support independents.
​
A date has now been set, the 4th July, for bars and pubs to be allowed to re-open for business. For the leisure industry, this may come as welcome relief with punters having largely been away for over three months. Many punters too, aside from the odd bar and pub selling “takeaways”, will be relishing the prospect of a pint and a catch up with acquaintances, bar-staff, friends.
This doesn't necessarily mean that all businesses will reopen, however, nor does it mean that customers like us (yup, we're mostly on the customer side of the bar too!), like you and many others out there, will be going to a pub or bar either.  We have to accept we all feel differently, some may still be scared to venture into public spaces, some are still shielding (either themselves or those for whom they care) and others may simply feel it is not a risk they need to take. ​

​​From 4th July onward, things are going to be very unusual. There will need to be some readjustment not just in a business sense, but also in the sense of dealing with being around people again and still in the midst of a serious pandemic. It's not just going to be unusual, it's going to be downright difficult.  Some of us will likely get things wrong initially, but as long as lessons can be learned quickly and safe behaviours are observed, we would expect things to be okay in the medium-term.

Details and protocols are pretty scant from those leading the country, indeed the support from our government has been patchy at best, appallingly negligent at worst.  It is different and testing for all businesses, and it’s important – now more than ever that we try to remember to be kind to other people.  Try not to point the finger at those businesses that choose to open, nor at those that do not feel it is safe enough. We have seen some businesses we loved before lockdown fall by the wayside, we've seen others adapt and others just about cling on. 

The ones that are locally owned, small and are intrinsically into our city and wider area are the ones that have been hanging in there and really do need you right now; you can be sure they'll do their best to open in a manner that's as practical and safe for customers and staff.  Some of the bigger companies have not been so kind and reacted very badly to the lockdown with all its interwoven problems, laying off swathes of staff and not worrying about the effects of such behaviour on local communities and their people.  You must ask yourself, does that behaviour deserve to be rewarded with your support and custom?

The stark contrast is that these aforementioned smaller companies have adapted, bringing positivity and relief to people.  Making deliveries, working longer hours, changing their business practices in order to just keep moving forward.  These are the businesses that have made sacrifices, the ones that have helped each other, us, the NHS, the ones that are what give our community its character.  Now we need to give them some support too, if we can.

Now is the time to support independents.


Find some places you can support here: 
http://www.liverpoolbeercollective.com/beer-availability.html

We're staying down the M62 to enjoy the tantalising company of Manchester's Marble Brewery! 

Marble Brewery has been going for over 20 years now and is approaching it's 25th year in about 18 months, which is testament to the quality of what they do and how they do it.  Internationally respected and with a superb core and extended range, they have produced a number of exciting collaboration brews down the years too.  We are really pleased to have them join us for a few hours at our virtual pub and provide some tunes for our playlist!

To grab some beers from their webstore to make the evening that bit more special, just head over to this site for your goodies. 

As ever, for the #livebeerpub, give us at the Collective (@livbeerco) and Marble Brewery (@marblebrewers) a follow and be sure to use the hashtag "#livebeerpub" in every tweet you want us to see.

The playlist is right here and will be ready to go at 7pm promptly this coming Saturday.
​
Photos kindly provided by Marble via Mash Marketers.  You can follow them on Twitter, here: @WhatisMash.

The Salford-based Pomona Island Brewing company have not quite been in business for 3 years but are already making waves with their bold approach to packaging (see photos) and nostalgia and pop-culture beer name references.  The substance behind the style certainly stacks up too, with them making beers in styles that they themselves like to drink.

Do yourself a favour and grab a few beers from them; you can obtain them right here from their webstore if you need a bit of help.  You can then sup a few beers and enjoy some of their track choices on our playlist and find out a little bit more about them and their set up from 7pm on Twitter.  Head over, follow both the Liverpool Beer Collective and the fantastic Pomona Island to find out more! 

The all important playlist is right here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBvXyqmy0uv1x5RP3WVJF1oeiCCp7vkr1

As ever, hit play at 7pm to be synchronised!!

Keep an eye on the webshop over the course of the week, as the brewery are about to release a new coffee stout and Double IPA, which will be available for shipping around Thursday/Friday.

​Stay twitchy!!

Photographs used courtesy of Kevin Fenton.

This week, we are heading back locally and have the 2018 Ratebeer Best Merseyside brewery winning, nautically named Neptune Brewery ready to spread some joy and good vibes during our next session.  The Neptune gang are in the throes of celebrating their 5th year of operations and have just released four great collaboration brews to celebrate this milestone. 

​The Maghull based outfit have brewed with namesake Neptune's Brewery based across the pond, Marble Brewery, Anarchy Brew Co and brilliant previous hosts, Anspach & Hobday.  They have also been getting some great core range stuff back into cans and 5L mini-kegs over the lockdown, which have been flying out of their brewery tap.

​As ever, you can follow the chatter, good vibes and playlist of the #livebeerpub on the Liverpool Beer Collective and Neptune Brewery Twitter accounts.

You can also tune in at 7pm sharp on our playlist to which Neptune have contributed and is linked up right here.
Neptune Brewery have also dropped some of their choices onto a Spotify playlist which has most of the tunes from the playlist on: 
​https://open.spotify.com/playlist/20s8hzfre7FRIoZeVxQhru?si=cqD-3fD1SoCEbIwxE0Tqhg

As an added bonus, there will be a bit of a giveaway on the night too!  Neptune have very kindly offered to give away two 5-litre mini casks, one cask of the lovely Shifting Sands, their delicious Session IPA and one of Ezili, their amazing pale ale (UK delivery only we're afraid).  Details and competition information will be given out on the night!!

In other developing news from Neptune, you'll need to keep an eye on their website in the run up to this session of the #livebeerpub as they are getting a webstore up and running.  It is due for completion at some point this week (slated for 27th May 2020).  

Once the lockdown is ended too, they have a lovely new layout and finish on their Taproom based in Maghull's Sefton Meadows which is well worth a visit on any trip over to Liverpool!

That's right, part 8 sees the UK brewing titans that are Northern Monk joining us to provide you with some distractions, chatter and all round wholesome beery entertainment from 7pm onwards on Saturday 23rd May.

In terms of what's available for you in the run up to Saturday evening, Northern Monk's founder and director, Brian Dickson furnished us with some information: 

"There’s an offer on 6-packs of our new Great Northern Lager on the webshop currently and we’re doing some introductory mixed packs entitled ‘into the haze’ and ‘northern heroes’ made up of some of our core beers, which might be good introductions to NM for any newbies. The latest Patrons release is “Déjà vu”, a peach and apricot sour in the Lucy Ketchin series, which was brewed by distant collaboration with Garage (Barcelona), Frontaal (NL) and Pastore Brewing."

There will also be a launch the first couple of beers in the new OFS series - some unique, experimental beers brewed on Northern Monk's original Old Flax Store kit.  So far they have the following lined up; OFS 000 which is a coconut imperial stout and 001 which is a mango & cacao sour. 

For that ever important playlist, put together by the LBC Committee and a hefty slice from the Northern Monk crew, here is the link: Right Here!!

Buy Northern Monk gear here: https://northernmonkshop.com/
Follow Northern Monk's feed on Twitter here: https://twitter.com/NMBCo

Yup, it might have sneaked out at some point due to scurrilous rumours and veiled Twitter messages, but the latest #livebeerpub we do indeed have the mighty Thornbridge Brewery joining us on the 16th May!

I know, right? How exciting is that?

So, we'll be breaking out a few beers we've had squirrelled away at LBC HQ.  We have been big fans of their Great British Homebrew Competition winning brews; the likes of Raindrops on Roses, Vienna IPA, Rhubarbe De Saison and Mr Smith Gose To Market as well as massive beers like Serpent, Love Among the Ruins and Eldon.

As ever, we have a guest, as mentioned above.  This week it will be Sheffield outfit Hop Hideout that will be joining us for a bit of a Q&A session and they will be providing us with some choice selections for our new playlist, which will go live just before we get started. 

At the moment, Hop Hideout are back up and running and doing mail order deliveries of beer and local delivery, they have full details right here on their website: https://www.hophideout.co.uk/ - please do give it a read if you're looking to make an order!  For the actual shop, they have an extensive list of canned and bottled beers, as well as a selection of natural wine and glassware.  That's all right here: https://www.hophideout.co.uk/shop-home.

As part of the #livebeerpub fun, you can use this for a handy 10% discount on your order, expires on Monday: LIVEBEERPUB10.  Or Hope Hideout have a standard free postage over £50: FREEPOST50.   Please note, you can’t use both at same time though, only one code can be redeemed per order.  Mail orders are shipped every Friday at moment (with boxes received Mon/Tues), usually costing around £7.95 for a case of 24 beers.

For the playlist, hit play at 7pm promptly to sync up with the rest of the #livebeerpub! 

Here's the link for the playlist...
[https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLBvXyqmy0uv0p-Tf1F0ssPBXVsQrnuDD7]

Remember - no peeking before 7pm!!

ALSO....

As part of the #livebeerpub fun, we have a bit of a quiz for you to participate in.  Rules are very simple...

- There are 20 Questions
- After a given song on the playlist is announced via a tweet, we have questions related to the song, artist or title which we will tweet with immediately after the song is announced
- We will give the point from each question to the quickest person to answer (direct reply to the question) and keep a tally
- We're trusting you not to cheat and use search engines to answer!

There's no prizes per se, only the glory and spoils of pride to the quickest brain with the broadest knowledge.

Good luck!

​For those who've not joined us for a #livebeerpub before, here's what to do to get involved:

Have yourself a Twitter account ideally, sign in, make sure you’re following our account and look out for tweets using the hashtag ‘#livebeerpub’.  We’ll be around to have a chat about all things beery or otherwise, plenty of the LBC Committee will be around hopefully to have a chat.  We can provide information on what you can do to provide support to Merseyside (or other) breweries and pubs during this difficult time.  Get hold of some lovely beers (especially any from our Merseyside brewers!) from a local bottle shop, via delivery from a pub or brewery or take advantage of growler/package fills as appropriate. 

For nationwide, the teamwork from Art By Volume and #CraftBeerHour has given us these resources: List [https://www.craftbeerhour.com/where-to-buy-beer-remotely] and a handy UK Map [http://abvstudio.co.uk/beer-map].  The crew over at Brewer's Eye also have a handy map and handle on what is going on with their App.
 
Grab your beer, take a photo of it, talk about it and interact with like minded people in lieu of bumping into them in our pubs, bottle shops and brewery taps.  We will be kicking things off at 7pm if people want to join us (until 11pm or so).

​
See you all on Twitter at 7pm on Saturday 25th April.

The Committee x.