London Clubs: Another One Bites the Dust

London Clubs: Another One Bites the Dust

6 June, 2008 | 3.23PM

• Section: Music News Topics: Beatport Blog
• Written by: Mark Treadwell

As Johnny Vegas once said upon spilling a pint on Vic and Bob’s Shooting Stars, “Everything I love leaves me in the end”.

Before you stop reading, no, I haven’t split up with my girlfriend, so this is not some long, drawn-out lament upon the ending of a relationship, nor is it a tale of a broken heart and a disillusioned outlook on love. 

Recently, the bad news has filtered down that yet another secret(ish) venue has been stopped in its tracks by our friendly boys in blue. 

This post is not meant to be a dig at the 5-0—they do a tough job that personally I would never wish to do.

Chasing 16-year old scallies in tracksuits around Dalston housing estates in the middle of the night is not in anyway my idea of job satisfaction. 

But they do it. Yes, they make mistakes, but so do we all.

The latest place, then, that has just had its doors firmly slammed shut was in short a completely amazing intimate venue.

I can’t name it as hopefully after a few weeks or months on the down low it may be able to start once again hosting nights once more!

The venue in question was the host to two of the most exciting yet totally different nights currently plying their trade in East London

One of the nights, the now infamous Disco Bloodbath, managed to attract guests such as Lovefingers, Lee Douglas, Severino, and Padded Cell. 

With a perfect blend of music and a clued up, discerning crowd more worried about dancing than their hair and an ethos firmly based in music and not image, they had managed to turn a purple basement in Dalston into a modern day version of David Mancuso’s loft circa 1972. 

Living in a Disco moved to the same venue after briefly taking up residence in Spitalfields toilet-come-party haunt, Public Life. 

Whilst their post-Field Day party with Chromeo (widely regarded as better than the festival itself) was a road block, the promoters felt drawn to the same venue that the DBB team had just started using for its atmosphere and location. 

Since then appearances by the likes of Nightmoves and David E Sugar have meant that if you didn’t get in before 11, you didn’t get in!

These sort of venues have always existed throughout the Hackney area.

Historically, their moment of glory has been a short-lived but big bright shining star on the nightlife radar of the capital. 

One such venue was Hugo’s famous Speaker Palace. 

Sited above a cut-and-shut shop of Amhurst road, this venue (walls adorned with dozens of non-working speakers and run by taxi-driving eccentric[and absolute gent] Hugo) played host to everything from one-man soul/cabaret wonder boy Tim Ten Yen as part of a Brain Love records showcase, to Trash and Our Disco resident Rory Philips, and live sets from indie darlings Bricolage and Love is All.

Its location was about as far away from a residential location as you could get, tucked between railway arches and disused warehouses.

So, the question remains: Why are these places being closed down?

The beginning of the new year also spelled the end for Canvas, The Cross and The Key, and with them the yearly TDK festival that was run in conjunction with all three.

These were removed as part of a general regeneration of the Kings Cross goods yard area. 

This regeneration has as part of its remit to increase the cultural impact of the area. 

Part of this is the inclusion of a new campus and halls of residence for Central St Martin’s.

Undoubtedly the government should be applauded for this. 

Better this than more gentrified inclusions of chain pubs and restaurants, yet the argument remains: How does removing clubs increase cultural output?

Some could argue that clubs have no cultural value, that they are simply the dens of vice, drugs, alcohol consumption and are a playground for the folly of youth to enjoy before they “grow up”.

But to dismiss clubs and dance music as immature and unworthy of cultural respect is to forget that such landmark movements such as the gay rights cause were partly founded on the kinship that gay and black people found in clubs across America.

To remove institutions such as the Paradise Garage and The Loft in New York, and The Warehouse in Chicago from the equation is to ignore the impact these places had in giving these supposed minority groups a collective voice.

The closing of these venues around East London, then, have a greater impact than simply the need to find a new floor upon which to dance. 

Promoters will always find new venues, but as the hopefully only-hibernating “Did we mention our Disco” found, a new venue doesn’t mean you can simply recreate what you once had, regardless of the effort you put in or the guests you book.

Comparing these venues and the nights that are put on in them to the legendary clubs such as the Paradise Garage may seem hyperbolic, and I am not claiming that they will all be the breeding ground for the next generation of revolutionaries. 

Rather, the moral is to enjoy what you have while it lasts—unless you are big, gleaming super-duper mega club, and even if you are, you might just find your dance mat pulled from beneath your feet when you are not looking!

Disco Bloodbath

Saturday 7th June

Ben Rymer (DFA)
Nathan Gregory Wilkins
Disco Bloodbath Sound system

New Secret Venue
(check the normal sights of information dispersal)
Kingland Road
Dalston
London
E8

10 – 6am
Fiver before midnight, 7 quid after

Closest Station, Dalston Kingsland/Hackney Downs (London Overground

• (4) Comments
• (671) Views