The Back Page — Restaurant in Dublin

I would not recommend you waste your time or money at this place of “business”, especially if you are a person of colour.

Myself and my friends had booked their karaoke. From the moment we stepped foot into the bar, the person (large with facial piercings - photograph attached) was very unwelcoming, rude and hostile.

Before we could even get our sentence out, we were met with “it’s too late to do karaoke”. She didn’t even ask if we had a booking (which we did) or anything else before attempting to shut it down right away.

Once we clarified we had a booking we were told to wait for the host. After a couple minutes, we went back to her to ask where the host was and were met with her disgusting, no-broughtupsy attitude… mouthing “effin h €ll” at us. For asking a question?

I can see many others have also complained about this same person! Clearly a repeat-offender and all I can say is its attitude and demeanour certainly depicts that of the establishment itself ! Disgusting.

We complained to the supervisor (who had initially told us he was the manager) and there was little-to-no remorse or empathy shown. He couldn’t wait for us to shut up about it.

After karaoke, we headed downstairs and were halfway out the door when that SAME person began mouthing off and giving us attitude AGAIN… UNPROVOKED. I’m not sure if maybe there’s a mental defect it has that we’re not aware of but the person certainly isn’t of a sufficient mental capacity … and it showed.

It then proceeded to throw BOILING HOT water at myself and my friends, not once but TWICE - as well as attempting to throw other objects. Bar one, the remaining staff and management around did nothing until we tried to defend ourselves, rightfully so.

Needless to say, we CERTAINLY will not be returning to or recommending this “establishment” to a single soul- but going off their recent reviews, it seems they’re doing enough of a good job ruining their own reputation which is nice to see.

No apologies, sympathy or accountability from management and other staff members even joined in mouthing off! Absolutely disgusting. I do believe that the person behaves this way as it’s gotten away with that sort of behaviour for so long that it thought everyone else would just take it....

It's such a shame that a few things let this place down because as a concept it's great, especially the food, the quiz and the games room. Sadly, all that amounts to nothing due to the following:

Worst service I've experienced in a pub. Maybe it's because the staff are all inexperienced but ordering a pint and a bottle at the bar took 20 minutes at first It wasn't even that busy, there was no queue and there were four people working behind the bar. It took about 10 minutes for them to ask what I wanted and 10 to actual give me my drinks. I thought ordering online using the website after we got food but it took an hour and then they brought me the wrong order twice. Later on at the bar I was trying to get a water and a rum and coke and I was waiting 15 minutes after I ordered. There were only two other people at the bar.

The toilets are disgusting. Broken locks, not cleaned, broken hand dryers and no paper towels, no soap and they stink.

The Karaoke room is ages away from the toilet and the bar and it's up a dodgy stairway. Because the online service is terrible we had to take our own drinks on a tray this stairs that's basically a ladder, not very safe.

Karaoke itself is good craic but it's not worth what they charge. The room setup needs work. The microphones are faulty- the wires are lose, one is lower than the other and if you don't sing right into it you might as well just be having a sing song at home. there is no volume control plus they just use an app you get on your phone for 8 quid a month on a table, not a proper Karaoke system. Nothing like the quality you get in other places in town for more or less the same price (and those places have better service too)

The glasses were filthy or else they don't clean their dishwasher enough. Could taste aniseed in my pint of lager

Won't be going back and I'd recommend going somewhere else yourself as well. If they ironed out these things though it would be...

Total Disrespect. Terrible Place!

My experience at The Back Page was awful. It’s a place I had been to several times and often recommended to my friends, but this time it was a terrible experience.

Although this happened some time ago, I think it’s important to document my experience.

It was a very cold night when I had my reservation, and I contacted the venue in advance to make the booking. During the email exchanges, I was never informed of the location of my table, but I did specify the number of people, the reason for the reservation, etc.

When I arrived, my table had been set up in the outdoor smoking area, with terrible heaters that weren’t sufficient to keep anyone warm. None of my guests smoked, and we all ended up surrounded by cigarette smoke while wearing thick winter coats.

When I asked at reception, I was informed that the manager of the venue had made a note in the reservation saying that, on November 29th, they called me by phone and that I "agreed to have the reservation allocated in the outdoor area.” However, I was never contacted by phone by the venue, much less by the manager. All communication was done by email, and I have those records.

In the end, we had no option to use a table inside the venue as they were all reserved.

This was an absurd level of disrespect and disregard, compounded by the fact that they lied, claiming to have contacted me. At the very least, the manager did this because there was an overbooking or they wanted to benefit someone else who made their reservation after mine.

I will never return to this place and have stopped recommending it...