Rivers, Rhythm, and Resonance: Giant Steps in Hackney Wick

By Rafi Mercer

New Listing

Giant Steps is one of East London’s most celebrated listening sanctuaries — explore more in our London Music Venues guide.

Venue Name: Giant Steps
Address: 40–44 Fish Island, Hackney Wick, London E3 2NT, United Kingdom
Website: giantsteps.london
Phone: N/A
Spotify Profile: N/A

There are places in London where music seeps through the walls as a side note, an accessory to food or drink. And then there are those rare sites where the sound itself is the architecture, the foundation on which everything else is built. Giant Steps belongs firmly to the latter.

The story begins with the same visionaries behind Dalston’s Brilliant Corners, who looked east toward Hackney Wick and saw possibility. Fish Island was already alive with artists, warehouses, and the tidal push of the River Lea. Here they imagined a venue that wasn’t just a bar, or a restaurant, or a club, but a breathing organism devoted to the act of listening.

Walking through its doors, the first impression isn’t the bar or the tables. It’s the scale of the sound system. Speakers arranged with sculptural intent. Turntables poised like instruments in a symphony. Each piece is placed not to dominate but to tune the room. You don’t so much hear the music at Giant Steps as you inhabit it.

What plays is rarely predictable. The programming, often led by selectors who have spent decades in record shops and on dance floors, moves with fluidity. One night you might hear deep jazz fusion records spun alongside Ethiopian grooves; another, a tapestry of disco rarities and house that never once slips into cliché. The constant is vinyl, the rotation of wax against needle, and the unshakable fidelity of the system.

Unlike many London venues that chase volume, Giant Steps thrives on dynamics. The system can whisper as powerfully as it can roar. The quietest detail is as legible as the most thunderous drop. There are nights where the room leans in, hushed between notes, as though the audience and the system are conspiring to listen together.

The interior design makes space for that listening. Wide wooden floors, generous ceiling height, lighting that softens rather than blinds. Nothing is rushed. Even the drinks service moves at a measured pace, aligned to the idea that this is not a venue to be conquered but to be absorbed.

Outside, the riverside terrace expands the definition of what a listening bar can be. On summer days, music flows across the water, mingling with the scent of food vendors and the laughter of friends stretched out along benches. The river becomes part of the acoustic space, carrying sound in ripples rather than waves. In winter, the focus turns inward, the room gathering itself into an intimate cocoon.

Food is integral. Giant Steps partners with rotating chefs, each bringing new energy to the kitchen. But the food is never allowed to eclipse the music; it is there to sustain the body so that the ear can remain attentive. Curry, barbecue, vegan small plates — each season the offering changes, each time the intention remains constant.

The crowd reflects the breadth of the programming. Collectors with notebooks of catalogue numbers sit alongside dancers who never need to know a title to feel the groove. International guests who have read about Giant Steps in Resident Advisor or Vinyl Factory find themselves beside Hackney locals who have been walking the towpaths for years. What unites them is an understanding: this is not about background music. This is about presence.

There is an almost spiritual charge to certain evenings. A DJ lifts a record from its sleeve, holds it aloft for a moment, then lets the stylus touch down. The room stills, waits, and then unfolds into sound. These are not performances in the traditional sense — they are conversations between selector, system, and listener.

In the wider ecosystem of London’s listening bars, Giant Steps is a keystone. It shows what happens when fidelity is treated not as luxury but as necessity, when listening is elevated to the same cultural plane as dining, art, and community. Where Brilliant Corners compressed that ethos into an intimate Dalston room, Giant Steps allowed it to stretch, breathe, and resonate.

Its legacy is already clear. Newer listening bars in London often cite Giant Steps as a reference point, a proof of concept that sound-led venues can survive and thrive in a city that too often treats music as disposable. For those who care about records, acoustics, and the fragile act of collective listening, Giant Steps is pilgrimage.

Step outside afterward and the Lea reflects the lights, Hackney Wick hums with its warehouse afterparties, and you carry with you the memory of music not just heard but embodied. Giant Steps is not simply a venue. It is a reminder that when a city listens together, it breathes differently.

Rafi Mercer writes about the spaces where music matters. For more stories from Tracks & Tales, subscribe, or click here to read more.

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