Glass towers crowd the skyline in Manchester, encroaching a bit more each year on the legacy of this northern English city with a musical soul.

The sprawl is now creeping toward the Star & Garter pub, a slab of Victoriana built in 1877 with checkerboard turrets, fancy brickwork and scrolled pediments. It’s one of the first buildings new arrivals see when the airport train rolls into town, and it bills itself as “the last truly independent music venue you will ever know.”

The kernel of truth in that claim is cause for concern.

The pub, whose curious name is derived from a royal insignia, was once part of a national network of music venues sometimes called the “Toilet Circuit” — scruffy boozers with back rooms for gigs. Countless British bands sharpened their live acts in these pubs. Radiohead toured the circuit in the early 1990s, as did Oasis and PJ Harvey.

“I first saw Oasis play to 30 people, and when I say that, I’m not trying to boast,” said Dave Haslam, a Manchester-based author and D.J. “I’m underlining the fact that Manchester’s small venues are where those bands served their apprenticeship.”

In the decades since, Manchester has sacrificed many of its iconic music clubs at the altar of development. The Star & Garter has emerged as an exception — but, ironically, only because it was recently rescued by a developer. The £1.5 billion Mayfield development aims to transform a slab of dilapidated brick warehouse spaces and disused transit stations into a mixed-use wonderland with nearly 1,500 new homes, shops, restaurants and one of the biggest nightclubs in Europe. Some of that is already in place. The apartments are yet to be built — work is expected to begin imminently — but many will be covetable homes designed for the skilled professionals whom Manchester hopes to lure from London and beyond.