Batchwood in St Albans is the worst club in the UK, but we just can’t stay away

Batchwood sells itself as a nightclub inside a classy manor house set on a golf course. From the outside, it’s exactly that. But when you step inside, it’s a different situation entirely.

It tries to keep up the act by placing a giant chandelier over the dance floor, but it’s not fooling anyone. On top of that the music is absolutely awful – so why can’t we keep away?

Partly, it’s because the format of a St Albans night out is pretty much set in stone. Everyone starts off in different places – some choose classy cocktails in Slug and Lettuce, some decide to get smashed on 2-for-1 pitchers in Waterend, and some just don’t care and go to the White Swan.

Wherever you begin, you know you’re all headed for the same destiny – the most tragic club in the UK. When you’ve got enough alcohol in your system to cope with the reality of what’s coming next, you and your mates hop on the Batch bus, and at this point you’re so drunk you’ve forgotten the harsh reality of what the rest of the night will consist of. The atmosphere builds up, singing and chanting all the way through St Albans, until you finally catch a glimpse of it – Batchwood.

After queuing in the idyllic grounds for twenty minutes, you’ll finally get in and be overwhelmed as you’re reminded of how shit it really is. First stop is the toilets to fix your make up and get a pic of you and the gals in the giant mirror, and then you’re ready for it all to go downhill.

Now it’s time to spend the next few hours of your life trying to get over how bad the music and atmosphere is by switching between the three rooms every ten minutes. The main floor is tired remixes of pop hits and full of creepy old men, the R&B room just isn’t big enough to be enjoyable, and the disco room plays the same throwback tunes that were played in exactly the same order last week, and the week before that.

When you’ve realised that nowhere inside is going to do the trick, you decide to head off outside to the smoking area. But this isn’t actually a bad part of the night – in fact it could easily be the best part of Batchwood, and one of the things that makes it so lovable. I mean, where else in the UK will you find a club smoking area made up of tiny sheds, containing astroturf, and selling burgers in the early hours of the morning? It’s amazing.

Even though you can’t find true happiness in any room in Batch, you continue to down overpriced doubles and dance the night away. When you finally cave at 3am and realise you can’t take anymore, you queue to get your coat for up to 90 minutes (yes, this did happen to me once – can they please sort out their cloakroom system?) and get on a much more solemn Batch bus home, wondering why you thought any of this was a good idea. And when you wake up, you cry over the state of yourself in the club pictures on Facebook, but plan to do it all over again next week.

After going to university and having a chance to leave Herts, most people realise that literally any club they set foot inside is going to be better than Batch, in almost every aspect. Yet, without hesitation, we come running back to the place we constantly slag off. The only good explanation for this is that through the weird and wonderful nights out it gives us, it has a deep love/hate connection with us that no other club could ever replace. We’ll never find anywhere quite like you, Batch.