Kiss Bar in Park End Street sends RICHARD BELL down memory lane.

I remember the first time I kissed a girl. I was about ten years old and hadn’t the faintest idea how to do it, so I just went for it with gusto.

Her name was Teri, and I never saw her again.

Then in later years I managed to hone my skills a little and improved my approach somewhat to ensure that in my time I’ve kissed a few girls, occasionally even while sober.

Mostly though these kisses are lost in the inebriated fog of my memory and I’ll never know if I ever knew their names, which in truth makes me feel a little sad.

More recently however one kiss does in fact stick in my memory, but unfortunately there was no pretty girl on the wrong side of tipsy to realise that I’m not in her league, because in fact my most recent kiss was to be found on Park End Street in the form of Kiss Bar.

I’ve said before that Kiss Bar is essentially a very specific pre-clubbing venue for people who want to be in the vicinity of Lava Ignite but can’t quite bring themselves to indulge in a full night of wanton excess and fancy settling into the groove of a night out before going all out later in the night.

This is basically how the venue operates, and while ordinarily such a venue wouldn’t particularly hold any special interest for me there’s something about Kiss Bar that I find peculiarly charming.

Perhaps it’s an acceptance of this fundamental aspect to their business, embracing their underling status to the might and majesty of Lava Ignite next door and making the best of this that makes Kiss Bar such a fun place to visit.

In any case it is an awful lot of fun, and as such has a very particular personality that transforms it from a mere pre-clubbing destination into a rather excellent night out in itself.

Kiss Bar isn’t a big venue, it doesn’t have many rooms with varying musical styles to accommodate as many people as possible or cavernous halls in which hundreds of people share their drunken love of a particular Killers song, but it does have some good tunes, a dance floor and a wide selection of brilliantly made cocktails, which in all honesty is more than enough for me.

The nature of the business means that it is only open at the weekends, which I feel is something of a shame.

Given a couple of weekdays Kiss Bar could become very much its own bar without relying on the monster clubs around it to drive business, but as it is, it’s a thoroughly enjoyable way to get yourself in the mood for the bigger night to come.