Normally when you see something about a new venue opening, it’s not really a new venue, it’s just an old one with a new name: Waterbear Music Bar is just Latest Music Bar with a new badge. Patterns used to be Audio but some older Brightonians remember it as the Escape, and even more people still talk about Quarters as The Zap. The Hope & Ruin used to be just The Hope (but it’ll always be the Pig in Paradise to me). Before it became Folklore Rooms the upstairs room at the Quadrant was a firm fixture for alternative escape gigs (even if for the rest of the year it just hosted comedy). Fifteen years ago this week though Brighton got a proper brand new venue, and it’s fair to say that the impact it made to the local music scene was massive, and almost definitely one of the reasons I started Brighton Music Blog later that year. On 7th January 2011 Cold Pumas played the launch party for Green Door Store, and since then they haven’t looked back.

To celebrate their fifteenth birthday, over the course of January they’re putting on a free gig every Saturday – on 10th January Silver Gore, Lemonsuckr and Lonnie Gunn play, on 17th there’s Thistle, Goodbye and Little Grandad, on 24th Hutch, Trip Westerns and Lelamb, and on 31st January Complete Snake, Tempers Fray and Landmine.

Here’s a big bunch of photos of Brighton bands at Green Door Store, from Brakes playing their second ever event in January 2011 (we weren’t there on the launch night) through to Kate Peaches in August last year. Happy Birthday Green Door Store!