The Gig Rat: Live Music in Manila, Planned Around a Set Time

For live music in Manila, go to a ticketed show at New Frontier Theater or Smart Araneta Coliseum in Cubao, or skip the ticket and run Cubao Expo: a taproom, takoyaki, a record shop and a dive bar. Either way, fix the set time first and hang dinner and the last bar on it.

How the quiz picks a Gig Rat

Two answers decide it. The pace is "Out out", and what makes a good night is "Something to see or hear". The second question and the room can go any way, from "The sure thing" to "The place nobody's posted yet" and from "A corner table for two" to "The loud table everyone wants to join". The drinks answer never changes the result.

Change either of the two and the result is something else. After "Out out", "Good food and a long talk" never leads here, and neither does "Something to do with our hands" (bowling, arcades, a mic), which makes a Game Night Menace, an Easygoing Regular or a Barkada Captain. In plain terms, the Gig Rat is a night out with something to see or hear in it. The Gig Rat page puts the night as a gig or a taproom, something cheap and good to eat, and one more bar. The full set is on the archetypes page.

What a gig-led night looks like in Cubao

Cubao has two big show venues and a handful of rooms for the nights between them.

• The big rooms. New Frontier Theater is a 2,325-seat theatre for concerts and fan meets on Gen. Aguinaldo Ave. Smart Araneta Coliseum is Araneta City's arena for concerts and PBA and UAAP games. Both open on event nights only, and ticket prices vary by show, so check the Araneta City shows page for what is on and when doors open.
• DJ sets. INT.Bar sits behind a photobooth door in Cubao Expo, takes reservations and has DJ sets on weekends. Tuesdays are movie nights.
• Vinyl. Good Vibrations Records is a record shop with a listening room and a small bar, open from 1 PM to 10:30 PM, Tuesday to Sunday.
• A dive bar. Fred's Revolucion pours craft beers and serves Ho Chi Wings. It is loud and closed on Mondays.
• A club by the pool. The 6th Manila is Novotel's pool bar, which turns into an evening club with music and dancing. Check its own page and the dive bar's for tonight's hours before heading out.

A show night in Cubao

Before the show, eat early. Most mall venues keep mall hours, which end at 9 PM from Monday to Thursday and on Sunday and at 10 PM on Friday and Saturday, so dinner comes first. Food Express on Level 3 of Gateway Mall 1 is a walk-in food court that costs under ₱500 a head. Palenque in Gateway Mall 2 is a regional Filipino food hall that also needs no booking.

The show. New Frontier Theater is about a 5-minute walk from Gateway Mall. Smart Araneta Coliseum sits inside Araneta City, in the same area as Gateway Mall.

After the show, walk to Cubao Expo. It is about 8 minutes from Gen. Aguinaldo Ave and 12 from Gateway Mall, both rough. Cubao X Brewery pours until midnight daily. It has no kitchen, so pick up takoyaki at Ichiban Takoyaki on the way in; the stall serves until midnight from Monday to Thursday, 1 AM on Friday and Saturday and 11 PM on Sunday.

If the group still has legs, Paeng's Gateway Bowl back at Gateway Mall 2 keeps its 24 lanes open until midnight.

A no-ticket night in Cubao Expo

On a night with nothing on, run the Expo in this order. Everything is inside one compound.

1. 6:00 PM: Cubao X Brewery, an open-air taproom on two floors. Start with the Kiamoy Sour.
2. 7:00 PM: a photo at the convex mirror by the entrance.
3. 7:15 PM: Ichiban Takoyaki for something cheap and quick, under ₱500 a head.
4. 7:35 PM: Good Vibrations Records to dig through vinyl.
5. 7:50 PM: Fred's Revolucion, a dive bar with craft beers and Ho Chi Wings. Rappler named it in its 2019 list of LGBTQ+ safe spaces.

The dive bar and the vinyl shop are both closed on Mondays, so go from Tuesday to Sunday. On Fridays and Saturdays, INT.Bar is the better last stop, because that is when it has DJ sets.

Stages in the other areas

Poblacion, Makati. OTO is a listening bar with vinyl, DJ sets and cocktails at 5883 Enriquez, open until 1 AM. Apotheka is a club with underground electronic nights and monthly drag balls, open until 4 AM.

Makati CBD. Ayala Triangle Gardens is a park with live performances, free to enter, and a lights show every December.

BGC. The stage here is comedy. Brick Wall Comedy Club at Uptown Parade is the home base of Comedy Manila, with stand-up, open mics and trivia nights.

Pasay Bay Area. This is the theatre end of town. Newport Performing Arts Theater has 1,710 seats and shows on Fridays and Saturdays at 8 PM and Sundays at 3 PM, with El Calle Food and Music Hall in the same resort. The Theatre at Solaire stages Broadway tours, concerts and ballet, and Cove Manila at Okada Manila is an indoor beach club that also hosts concerts; both of those are in Parañaque. It is a ride between the complexes, so choose one per night.

Plan the night around the set

The night-out planner covers Cubao now and will build the no-ticket night above around a different start time or swap any stop; the other areas are next.

For a ticketed night, read the night out built around the theatre on Gen. Aguinaldo Ave and the guide to before and after a show at the Coliseum. For the bars alone, there is a four-stop Cubao Expo bar crawl, and the Cubao date night guide covers the rest of the area. By the bay, start with a show night at Newport.