Please Say It Isn't So!?

[Julie Moore]

Blimey what's wrong wi the okey cokey the past couple of years I've seen folk doing the mashed spud Harlem shuffle ,shingling walking the dog twist, swim, the duck funky chicken,slip n slide watusti I've even did a display of the Beatle myself at a recent weekender after a dozen bottles o grog but the best dancin display was couple o weeks ago when I was out wi PHIL T n Joan wow some guy was doing the SWAN now that's what I call dancing ! Now back to my wooly bully classes""""""

hope your well Ian

Regards

Julie xx

[Philt]

hope your well Ian

Regards

Julie xx

He's not Julie, ever!

[NEV]

Went to Blackpool weekender, had a great time! Couldn't dance much, put my back out while I was on the loo (honestly). They played the Carstairs few times over the weekend, I went home happy so up yours.

Cheers Billy

Billy ..you don't count mate..there's always an exception to the rule ....and you are it

P.s

Put your back out on the loo ..never strain old boy ,just let it ease it's way out naturally ( patience is a virtue)

[Irish Spinner]

hello my old sparing partner yeh i managed to visit blackpool weekender in 09 and i havent been back since.All i want is a line up of djs with an imagination-whats yours like irish spinner????

I have P.M you with some venues that should meet your requirements so not to go off the subject in hand.

[Billywhizz]

Billy ..you don't count mate..there's always an exception to the rule ....and you are it

P.s

Put your back out on the loo ..never strain old boy ,just let it ease it's way out naturally ( patience is a virtue)

[Billywhizz]

Billy ..you don't count mate..there's always an exception to the rule ....and you are it

P.s

Put your back out on the loo ..never strain old boy ,just let it ease it's way out naturally ( patience is a virtue)

Hey up Nev, it wasn't straining it was twisting to get on loo paper, sorry about that Mike off topic here.

Billy

[Mark Jones]

It's for the best you can't see...you know how the soul scene was (and still is in some instances) a cool, exciting and underground scene ever moving forward with the music,

Tell me where ..I'll travel!!

[Guest Johnny One Trout]

Alison on John's sign in here.

I've already had my knicker wetting moment looking at this clip and the 4 before 8 dance masterclass on Facebook, and I am as slack jawed as most of you at the spectacle, but don't pretend that silly frolics were never had in the past.

I remember indulging in Fancy Dress at Yate, backgammon tournaments at St Ives, playing 3 card brag in the backstage room at Wigan, DJ dance comps, musical chairs, fancy dress etc at Cleethorpes, donning kiss me quick hats at the Mecca, Pyramids at Caister (and Wigan apparently John tells me), Summer Nights getting played at the Locarno.

As far as I can tell from the clip (over dubbed music aside) Richard did not command the attendees to submit to the madness of crowds and partake in a communal comedy dance, so apart from some of us finding it very tacky and embarrassing, it really does not reflect badly on the event any more than the tomfoolery mentioned above.

Having said that I like rare shit and chin strokey stuff and probably wouldn't care if I ever danced again (dodgy hip) and am happy at one of those phone box events previously mentioned and there's no room in my phone box for the Okey Cokey.

Ali

Edited November 26, 2011 by Johnny One Trout

[Guest Marky Tee]

I don't go out anymore. No buts.

Wasnt referring to you Pete.

[Little-stevie]

Marky Tee, you is a busy on this topic

Always a subject to get the blood to boiling point for some, mine at one time but, fook it, lifes too short..

Different worlds indeed and something for everyone out there..

The weekend is here, get out on the floor folks but leave the f£cking handbags under the chair and go easy with the Hokey and maybe just a little cokey

Peace and love.. x

[Guest Marky Tee]

Marky Tee, you is a busy on this topic

Always a subject to get the blood to boiling point for some, mine at one time but, fook it, lifes too short..

Different worlds indeed and something for everyone out there..

The weekend is here, get out on the floor folks but leave the f£cking handbags under the chair and go easy with the Hokey and maybe just a little cokey

Peace and love.. x

Am plenty calm today and I got a teeny handbag I can wear while I'm a dancin. Dont drink coke its a little too gassy.

[Guest Matt Male]

At least the okey cokey clip is just a load of tired and emotional people at the end of a nighter, we all do funny things in that state, but the other link is the most bizarre thing i've ever seen.

[Wiggyflat]

I'm waiting for The Jewels b side to get spins

[Little-stevie]

At least the okey cokey clip is just a load of tired and emotional people at the end of a nighter, we all do funny things in that state, but the other link is the most bizarre thing i've ever seen.

Something for everyone indeed...

Still looking for that link to Northern soul dinner dance, the flyer with a chicken going round on the turntables, please please somone find that for me and send me a link, as i have said before, i keep thinking it was some freaky dream but had it confirmed that it was real...

Edited November 26, 2011 by little-stevie

[Supercorsa]

Something for everyone indeed...

Still looking for that link to Northern soul dinner dance, the flyer with a chicken going round on the turntables, please please somone find that for me and send me a link, as i have said before, i keep thinking it was some freaky dream but had it confirmed that it was real...

I seem to recollect something of this ilk being advertised, was it not in Leeds?

[Cunnie]

Think a few people on this thread might want to take a step back & remember that this Okey Cokey thing was first performed on the Soul scene (to my knowledge) a couple of decades ago at Pitches in Rotherham to Holland, Dozier Holland's Why Can't We Be Lovers when Pitches was ran by the Just Soul promoters.

It's also regularly done on the Modern scene to classic records like L J Reynolds Key To The World, Norman Hutchins I Really Love You & R Kelly's Up & Outta Here.

Myself personally find it quite cringeworthy & have done for years so let's hope that this bit of poaching by the Normans will put an end to it being performed in other rooms any more.

[Harry Crosby]

More like it

[Mace]

More like it

Now that is quality!

Looks like a young Roddy....

[Guest gordon russell]

A proper venue for me is one that keeps with the original ethos of the scene ie underground exclusivity, a rare soul scene NOT watering the whole thing down to the lowest common denominator to attract as many outsiders in as possible.

Anything else is just handbags.

Beam me up Scotty

luckily there ARE two scenes.....and happily they're miles apart from what we have just seen......the folk at the weekender were probably the same folk who went ta wigin and promptly feel asleep all night......not really real more a case of sureal......never mixed with these folk back in the day...and not today either............much prfer the nutters on the rare soul scene...kinda real people if ya get what l mean tezza

[Guest gordon russell]

Such people are found in all walks of life, however some venues seem to attract more than their fair share. If you don't mind rubbing shoulders with them then that's your choice. Just don't expect me to do the same.

And no, I have never been to Blackpool or Tenerife and I can't see myself making plans to do so anytime soon.

These are generally venues with no integrity

[Cunnie]

The South will rise....

Lambeth walk perhaps?

[pikeys dog]

Now that is quality!

Looks like a young Roddy....

Roddy was never young - he hatched from an egg fully formed.

[Guest]

The thing is many people want to be part of something elitist and ultra-cool when they are young and Northern Soul in the mid 70s fulfilled that desire perfectly...But what gets forgotten and unmentioned in these endless debates, is that there were many people saying NS had lost it's cool edge even way back then...For example there were people who loved the scene initially and who then later moved onto the funk or Jazz-Funk scene and I remember a quote from CHRIS HILL at the time of the Mod revival...He was running a Jazz Funk All-dayer in Brighton on a Bank Holiday in 1979 and was asked about the hordes of young bods (mods) keeling up and down the beach in parkas, pork pies and Tamla Motown T-Shirts...Exactly the type of people who ended up at Wigan at one point...HILL said 'The only modernists in Brighton today were at the Top Rank All-Dayer, dancing to the very latest Black music imports'....I recall clearly at the time thinking he had a very valid point, even though i most definetly never sported a wedge haircut and a sailor belt...

Pretty soon, relatively, Wigan closed and there were much hipper places to be, particularly on the South Coast where the club scene morphed into the vintage 50s style scene with a hybrid soundtrack comprising Jazz, Northern, Funk, blues and rockabilly...Personally I missed the solid Northern playlists but in terms of fashion, 'cool' and style, the hippest people were not on the Northern Soul scene anymore....I suppose all this was embodied by the appearance of TONY GORDON, well known dancer and cool dresser on the Soul scene, suddenly appearing as the sax player in BLUE RHONDO A LA TURK, the hip darlings of the London alternative club scene....

Then 6ts and then Stafford and a rump end of people formed around those scenes and Northern Soul had a collective identity again...But the point is that I believe that most of the people who go to Blackpool and to what have become known as 'handbagging' events never really got into those venues...They never continued with that original ethos, the one people on here cherish, the digging out of new sounds and their elevation to legendary status....Living for the moment that you hear a record which sends your head spinning in a dark corner of a dancefloor, in some godforsaken town or location...So it was good again in those years because the people who had helped ensure Northern Soul became a 'stiffs' night out in the mid to late 70s were virtually all gone...But it was in these years - decades - , not the 70s, that the real ethos of what the true scene represents became properly enshrined...ADY'S work with KENT was pivotal...Their continuing search for new discoveries, the appearance of artists who were formerly just mystic names from the past, all of this and other factors such as widening musical trends etc brought a preciously defined edge to the scene and for a long time, it was again in the hands of an 'elite'...And it felt as if it was some magical capsule that would last forever and be unspoilt...We grew up and for those of us who stayed with the music, we realised exactly what a rich, unique gift we were blessed with...NS became part of our adult Souls and intellects, in a way that never touched loads of those who'd been drawn in by the populist explosion of the 70s and departed relatively quickly afterwards...The whole vast treasure trove of American Soul from the 60s and 70s opened up in a way never imagined or envisaged by those who left the scene in the late 1970s...

The end result was that when they all returned, desperately looking for a re-connection with their youth - a natural thing and something we all go through, but being us, probably use different vehicles - it was bound to result in a head on collision with those who had by now dedicated their whole adult lives to the celebration of American Soul Music...The notorious 'impressarios' which is exactly what they are now, not DJ's, ensured a readily baked diet was ready for the 'stiffs' and suddenly the 'handbagging' culture was born...

I am not sure what really sparked the return of the hordes...A combination of things I suppose...A kind of synchronistic collision that sparked a re-ignition of the youthful attraction that brought so many of them onto the scene in the first place, back in the 70s...The horrendously sharp, contemporary multi-media focus which sniffs out anything supposedly 'cultural' certainly played it's part in the late 90s...A bloody myriad of articles about 'Northern Soul' again appeared in every magazine from GQ to TV Times, Radio 2 picked up on NS bigtime...Books and memoirs were being published everywhere...Every TV Magazine show did Northern Soul features, usually involving a predictable cast...Messrs ROBERTS, WINSTANLEY and SEARLING smelt the bucks and the imminent re-entry of the original 'stiffs' who were now into middle age and re-absorbing this second stage emergence of 'Northern Soul' as the flavour of the month (year etc...) ..Suddenly it was phase two of the same media frenzy that killed off the 'cool' in the scene first time around and the 'stiffs' came pouring back in their thousands...But the scene they had left behind was the one they'd known twenty five years earlier, it was never anything more than that to them so of course the TOP 500 was going to find it's niche...This simply was a true revivalist scene like the 70s Teddy Boy thing and various others since....No matter how much people go on about Wigan, Blackpool and Yate (on here) those of us who have retained a loyalty/affection/involvement in the scene have spent far more many years since defining and refining what Northern Soul really means than those people (or ourselves) did for a few brief years back in the 70s...'Our thing is a different thing'....It really is...

So WINNIE is right, it is very simple....we are talking about two completely different scenes and the only overlap is the Top 500 plus records, which as a musical entity play completely different roles in the lifetsyles and experiences of the two camps...For the long term afficiandos, those records are loved with deep affection as the 'root' of the scene but they are fully acknowledged as being just that, because we have all developed similar affections for hundreds, sometimes thousands of other records since those years and for us, that mountain of records represents the life tree of what we know and love as 'Northern Soul'....So although we still listen to records from the 60s and 70s, we are not revivalists by nature and still thirst to hear stuff we do not know...On the other hand, the 'handbaggers' do not need that and a lot of them have no true concept at all as to exactly how wide the encasing expression 'Northern Soul' really has stretched musically over the last 30 years...For them, it is just about turning up and feeling for a few hours, like they are back in 1975, pretty harmless in itself - if it were not for the offence and annoyance it causes to those who have spent a lifetime holding the torch...

Ultimately though, we are doing ourselves no favours by this continual haggling and thrashing about over this subject...It is truly pointless...It makes our comprehension of the Soul scene somewhat depressing and there are certainly far more important subjects to talk about...For me it is still much more about records and events, news, interesting Radio shows most often from local broadcast outlets and general discussion about related topics...Why do we spend so much time, arguing and dwelling on a scene which in reality is just a pale imitation of what the rest of us know to be the reality...Let the 'stiffs' have their revival nights, let them conga around Blackpool, let them talk about what they imagine to represent 'Northern Soul' until they once again decide they have become bored because that side of the scene will not last...Pure revivalist scenes never do, in any situation...By their very nature they are of limited lifespan, which is why the gentlemen mentioned know it is important that they squeeze the tarnished goose thoroughly whilst they can, because as sure as eggs are eggs, one day they'll wake up and the conga performing hordes will have departed again...

But it won't be the end of Northern Soul...

Edited November 26, 2011 by rich chorley

[KevH]

I'll tell you what sparked the return Rich.Stable finances in some cases,children flown the nest,mortgages paid.

What next? Friends Re-united and such like,putting people back together to relive school days.Its not that difficult to work out.

The problem is that many dont want to know any more than they remember from those days,and just after,in terms of soul music.

Nothing wrong with that.But it seems its become a mix of party/pub nite + soul music.Tagged as Northern Soul.

Now as much as i dont think the tag is that relevant nowadays,i still hold it will fondness.Dont want to see it ridiculed.

[Guest Bearsy]

Great post Rich

[Guest]

I'll tell you what sparked the return Rich.Stable finances in some cases,children flown the nest,mortgages paid.

What next? Friends Re-united and such like,putting people back together to relive school days.Its not that difficult to work out.

The problem is that many dont want to know any more than they remember from those days,and just after,in terms of soul music.

Nothing wrong with that.But it seems its become a mix of party/pub nite + soul music.Tagged as Northern Soul.

Now as much as i dont think the tag is that relevant nowadays,i still hold it will fondness.Dont want to see it ridiculed.

You know what mate, I don't actually think it is ridiculed by any significant number of people from outside of the scene, because they do not understand it and never have done, let alone all the factionalising...No, we beat ourselves up about all this with the endless agonising and analysing....

Much better to ignore the other side and celeberate 'our thing' whilst we all still can...

[Ernie Andrews]

So Rich? what about people like me! I was one of the Mecca Chelsea pensioners - Loved the scene in the 70s /early 80s but didnt live just on oldies and was one of the people who were looking for new even new releases at the time. I then get out to return just over a dozen years ago but then hooked up with the current developing scene rather than just looking at the revivalist aspect .

Their are people who will never accept the 1000s of records that have been found played since what was termed as the Golden days- have been on the scene constantly since the 70s and will only accept the Golden Oldies - How do you class those people as they would argue that was the only true Northern soul scene(I dont subscribe to that view by the way).

The only ones I have a gripe with are those who criticised certain promoters for straying into the " too many Newies / Crossover/Unknown" area and only wanted the Golden oldies who are now playing to the global audience that they have embraced the very thing that they were criticising only 5 years ago! I call them Hypocrites!

[Guest]

You always get 'Dinosaurs' mate, people who have been around any type of scene or institution for a lifetime but who for whatever reason, find change hard to accept...

I think they are the faction you are tallking about...The ones who have not been away but find it hard to move forward...

But, as you have rightly pointed out, sometimes when those type of people finally do get dragged round into embracing change, they then ironically become the biggest 'champions' of that supposed new direction....As the old saying goes mate....'There's nowt queerer than folks'....

[Ernie Andrews]

You always get 'Dinosaurs' mate, people who have been around any type of scene or institution for a lifetime but who for whatever reason, find change hard to accept...

I think they are the faction you are tallking about...The ones who have not been away but find it hard to move forward...

But, as you have rightly pointed out, sometimes when those type of people finally do get dragged round into embracing change, they then ironically become the biggest 'champions' of that supposed new direction....As the old saying goes mate....'There's nowt queerer than folks'....

An old saying given to me over 25 years ago!

" Some people think they are thinking changes when they are merely re-arranging their prejudices"

[Julie Moore]

The thing is many people want to be part of something elitist and ultra-cool when they are young and Northern Soul in the mid 70s fulfilled that desire perfectly...But what gets forgotten and unmentioned in these endless debates, is that there were many people saying NS had lost it's cool edge even way back then...For example there were people who loved the scene initially and who then later moved onto the funk or Jazz-Funk scene and I remember a quote from CHRIS HILL at the time of the Mod revival...He was running a Jazz Funk All-dayer in Brighton on a Bank Holiday in 1979 and was asked about the hordes of young bods (mods) keeling up and down the beach in parkas, pork pies and Tamla Motown T-Shirts...Exactly the type of people who ended up at Wigan at one point...HILL said 'The only modernists in Brighton today were at the Top Rank All-Dayer, dancing to the very latest Black music imports'....I recall clearly at the time thinking he had a very valid point, even though i most definetly never sported a wedge haircut and a sailor belt...

Pretty soon, relatively, Wigan closed and there were much hipper places to be, particularly on the South Coast where the club scene morphed into the vintage 50s style scene with a hybrid soundtrack comprising Jazz, Northern, Funk, blues and rockabilly...Personally I missed the solid Northern playlists but in terms of fashion, 'cool' and style, the hippest people were not on the Northern Soul scene anymore....I suppose all this was embodied by the appearance of TONY GORDON, well known dancer and cool dresser on the Soul scene, suddenly appearing as the sax player in BLUE RHONDO A LA TURK, the hip darlings of the London alternative club scene....

Then 6ts and then Stafford and a rump end of people formed around those scenes and Northern Soul had a collective identity again...But the point is that I believe that most of the people who go to Blackpool and to what have become known as 'handbagging' events never really got into those venues...They never continued with that original ethos, the one people on here cherish, the digging out of new sounds and their elevation to legendary status....Living for the moment that you hear a record which sends your head spinning in a dark corner of a dancefloor, in some godforsaken town or location...So it was good again in those years because the people who had helped ensure Northern Soul became a 'stiffs' night out in the mid to late 70s were virtually all gone...But it was in these years - decades - , not the 70s, that the real ethos of what the true scene represents became properly enshrined...ADY'S work with KENT was pivotal...Their continuing search for new discoveries, the appearance of artists who were formerly just mystic names from the past, all of this and other factors such as widening musical trends etc brought a preciously defined edge to the scene and for a long time, it was again in the hands of an 'elite'...And it felt as if it was some magical capsule that would last forever and be unspoilt...We grew up and for those of us who stayed with the music, we realised exactly what a rich, unique gift we were blessed with...NS became part of our adult Souls and intellects, in a way that never touched loads of those who'd been drawn in by the populist explosion of the 70s and departed relatively quickly afterwards...The whole vast treasure trove of American Soul from the 60s and 70s opened up in a way never imagined or envisaged by those who left the scene in the late 1970s...

The end result was that when they all returned, desperately looking for a re-connection with their youth - a natural thing and something we all go through, but being us, probably use different vehicles - it was bound to result in a head on collision with those who had by now dedicated their whole adult lives to the celebration of American Soul Music...The notorious 'impressarios' which is exactly what they are now, not DJ's, ensured a readily baked diet was ready for the 'stiffs' and suddenly the 'handbagging' culture was born...

I am not sure what really sparked the return of the hordes...A combination of things I suppose...A kind of synchronistic collision that sparked a re-ignition of the youthful attraction that brought so many of them onto the scene in the first place, back in the 70s...The horrendously sharp, contemporary multi-media focus which sniffs out anything supposedly 'cultural' certainly played it's part in the late 90s...A bloody myriad of articles about 'Northern Soul' again appeared in every magazine from GQ to TV Times, Radio 2 picked up on NS bigtime...Books and memoirs were being published everywhere...Every TV Magazine show did Northern Soul features, usually involving a predictable cast...Messrs ROBERTS, WINSTANLEY and SEARLING smelt the bucks and the imminent re-entry of the original 'stiffs' who were now into middle age and re-absorbing this second stage emergence of 'Northern Soul' as the flavour of the month (year etc...) ..Suddenly it was phase two of the same media frenzy that killed off the 'cool' in the scene first time around and the 'stiffs' came pouring back in their thousands...But the scene they had left behind was the one they'd known twenty five years earlier, it was never anything more than that to them so of course the TOP 500 was going to find it's niche...This simply was a true revivalist scene like the 70s Teddy Boy thing and various others since....No matter how much people go on about Wigan, Blackpool and Yate (on here) those of us who have retained a loyalty/affection/involvement in the scene have spent far more many years since defining and refining what Northern Soul really means than those people (or ourselves) did for a few brief years back in the 70s...'Our thing is a different thing'....It really is...

So WINNIE is right, it is very simple....we are talking about two completely different scenes and the only overlap is the Top 500 plus records, which as a musical entity play completely different roles in the lifetsyles and experiences of the two camps...For the long term afficiandos, those records are loved with deep affection as the 'root' of the scene but they are fully acknowledged as being just that, because we have all developed similar affections for hundreds, sometimes thousands of other records since those years and for us, that mountain of records represents the life tree of what we know and love as 'Northern Soul'....So although we still listen to records from the 60s and 70s, we are not revivalists by nature and still thirst to hear stuff we do not know...On the other hand, the 'handbaggers' do not need that and a lot of them have no true concept at all as to exactly how wide the encasing expression 'Northern Soul' really has stretched musically over the last 30 years...For them, it is just about turning up and feeling for a few hours, like they are back in 1975, pretty harmless in itself - if it were not for the offence and annoyance it causes to those who have spent a lifetime holding the torch...

Ultimately though, we are doing ourselves no favours by this continual haggling and thrashing about over this subject...It is truly pointless...It makes our comprehension of the Soul scene somewhat depressing and there are certainly far more important subjects to talk about...For me it is still much more about records and events, news, interesting Radio shows most often from local broadcast outlets and general discussion about related topics...Why do we spend so much time, arguing and dwelling on a scene which in reality is just a pale imitation of what the rest of us know to be the reality...Let the 'stiffs' have their revival nights, let them conga around Blackpool, let them talk about what they imagine to represent 'Northern Soul' until they once again decide they have become bored because that side of the scene will not last...Pure revivalist scenes never do, in any situation...By their very nature they are of limited lifespan, which is why the gentlemen mentioned know it is important that they squeeze the tarnished goose thoroughly whilst they can, because as sure as eggs are eggs, one day they'll wake up and the conga performing hordes will have departed again...

But it won't be the end of Northern Soul...

Didn`t think I would ever say this ......................But well said that man

[Guest]

Didn`t think I would ever say this ......................But well said that man

'History knows transformations of all kinds' KARL MARX

LOL! Thanks JULIE....

[Pete S]

I'll tell you what sparked the return Rich.Stable finances in some cases,children flown the nest,mortgages paid.

and the most decisive factor: the internet. The number of people who said "I just typed in the words Northern Soul and couldn't believe it was still around"

[macca]

The very same people who carp on about how 'crossover' has done 'untold damage' to what they see as 'Northern'. I can't help but think that these folk never really evolved beyond Lenis Guess, admittedly a great record in its day. To me, a person that would dismiss something like Chuck Cockerham as some sort of cancerous blight on the scene is worthy of derision, or perhaps pity on a good day. I'm using Lenis Guess and Chuck Cockerham as random examples, of course.

[Mark S]

Went out last night no hokey cokey so no injuries

[Harry Crosby]

and the most decisive factor: the internet. The number of people who said "I just typed in the words Northern Soul and couldn't believe it was still around"

Nail on the head, pete, to me the biggest factor of all

[Wiggyflat]

Massive in Erope apparently on the rare Okey scene

Okey Keep The Faith

[Andybellwood]

I seem to recollect something of this ilk being advertised, was it not in Leeds?

think the venue was The Room. Up market with nice but expensive food. Went a couple of times , Chris King DJ'd at one of them ,

[Russ Vickers]

think the venue was The Room. Up market with nice but expensive food. Went a couple of times , Chris King DJ'd at one of them ,

Right pisser if you'd just gobbed a handful of Chalkies........put you right off ya chicken in a basket that would.......

Russ

Edited November 27, 2011 by Russ Vickers

[Pete S]

The very same people who carp on about how 'crossover' has done 'untold damage' to what they see as 'Northern'. I can't help but think that these folk never really evolved beyond Lenis Guess, admittedly a great record in its day. To me, a person that would dismiss something like Chuck Cockerham as some sort of cancerous blight on the scene is worthy of derision, or perhaps pity on a good day. I'm using Lenis Guess and Chuck Cockerham as random examples, of course.

That's me then Macca. Thanks for your pity. Even though I've probably forgotten about more 'proper Northern Soul" records than many have actually heard over these last 38 years.

Can't stand the Chuck Cockerham record.

As a soul record - it's average I suppose.

As a 'Northern Soul' record, which crossover is apparently a sub-genre of, it does nothing for me at all. That's the way things are, people are different and hear things differently. Why can't you and others accept that instead of making yourselves out to be oh so superior to anyone who doesn't want or even need to venture out of their comfort zone. No offence intended to you personally Macca, I know you're alright, but you being so judgemental at least gives me a right to reply to you.

Edited November 27, 2011 by Pete S

[Pete S]

The thing is many people want to be part of something elitist and ultra-cool when they are young and Northern Soul in the mid 70s fulfilled that desire perfectly...But what gets forgotten and unmentioned in these endless debates, is that there were many people saying NS had lost it's cool edge even way back then...For example there were people who loved the scene initially and who then later moved onto the funk or Jazz-Funk scene and I remember a quote from CHRIS HILL at the time of the Mod revival...He was running a Jazz Funk All-dayer in Brighton on a Bank Holiday in 1979 and was asked about the hordes of young bods (mods) keeling up and down the beach in parkas, pork pies and Tamla Motown T-Shirts...Exactly the type of people who ended up at Wigan at one point...HILL said 'The only modernists in Brighton today were at the Top Rank All-Dayer, dancing to the very latest Black music imports'....I recall clearly at the time thinking he had a very valid point, even though i most definetly never sported a wedge haircut and a sailor belt...

Pretty soon, relatively, Wigan closed and there were much hipper places to be, particularly on the South Coast where the club scene morphed into the vintage 50s style scene with a hybrid soundtrack comprising Jazz, Northern, Funk, blues and rockabilly...Personally I missed the solid Northern playlists but in terms of fashion, 'cool' and style, the hippest people were not on the Northern Soul scene anymore....I suppose all this was embodied by the appearance of TONY GORDON, well known dancer and cool dresser on the Soul scene, suddenly appearing as the sax player in BLUE RHONDO A LA TURK, the hip darlings of the London alternative club scene....

Then 6ts and then Stafford and a rump end of people formed around those scenes and Northern Soul had a collective identity again...But the point is that I believe that most of the people who go to Blackpool and to what have become known as 'handbagging' events never really got into those venues...They never continued with that original ethos, the one people on here cherish, the digging out of new sounds and their elevation to legendary status....Living for the moment that you hear a record which sends your head spinning in a dark corner of a dancefloor, in some godforsaken town or location...So it was good again in those years because the people who had helped ensure Northern Soul became a 'stiffs' night out in the mid to late 70s were virtually all gone...But it was in these years - decades - , not the 70s, that the real ethos of what the true scene represents became properly enshrined...ADY'S work with KENT was pivotal...Their continuing search for new discoveries, the appearance of artists who were formerly just mystic names from the past, all of this and other factors such as widening musical trends etc brought a preciously defined edge to the scene and for a long time, it was again in the hands of an 'elite'...And it felt as if it was some magical capsule that would last forever and be unspoilt...We grew up and for those of us who stayed with the music, we realised exactly what a rich, unique gift we were blessed with...NS became part of our adult Souls and intellects, in a way that never touched loads of those who'd been drawn in by the populist explosion of the 70s and departed relatively quickly afterwards...The whole vast treasure trove of American Soul from the 60s and 70s opened up in a way never imagined or envisaged by those who left the scene in the late 1970s...

The end result was that when they all returned, desperately looking for a re-connection with their youth - a natural thing and something we all go through, but being us, probably use different vehicles - it was bound to result in a head on collision with those who had by now dedicated their whole adult lives to the celebration of American Soul Music...The notorious 'impressarios' which is exactly what they are now, not DJ's, ensured a readily baked diet was ready for the 'stiffs' and suddenly the 'handbagging' culture was born...

I am not sure what really sparked the return of the hordes...A combination of things I suppose...A kind of synchronistic collision that sparked a re-ignition of the youthful attraction that brought so many of them onto the scene in the first place, back in the 70s...The horrendously sharp, contemporary multi-media focus which sniffs out anything supposedly 'cultural' certainly played it's part in the late 90s...A bloody myriad of articles about 'Northern Soul' again appeared in every magazine from GQ to TV Times, Radio 2 picked up on NS bigtime...Books and memoirs were being published everywhere...Every TV Magazine show did Northern Soul features, usually involving a predictable cast...Messrs ROBERTS, WINSTANLEY and SEARLING smelt the bucks and the imminent re-entry of the original 'stiffs' who were now into middle age and re-absorbing this second stage emergence of 'Northern Soul' as the flavour of the month (year etc...) ..Suddenly it was phase two of the same media frenzy that killed off the 'cool' in the scene first time around and the 'stiffs' came pouring back in their thousands...But the scene they had left behind was the one they'd known twenty five years earlier, it was never anything more than that to them so of course the TOP 500 was going to find it's niche...This simply was a true revivalist scene like the 70s Teddy Boy thing and various others since....No matter how much people go on about Wigan, Blackpool and Yate (on here) those of us who have retained a loyalty/affection/involvement in the scene have spent far more many years since defining and refining what Northern Soul really means than those people (or ourselves) did for a few brief years back in the 70s...'Our thing is a different thing'....It really is...

So WINNIE is right, it is very simple....we are talking about two completely different scenes and the only overlap is the Top 500 plus records, which as a musical entity play completely different roles in the lifetsyles and experiences of the two camps...For the long term afficiandos, those records are loved with deep affection as the 'root' of the scene but they are fully acknowledged as being just that, because we have all developed similar affections for hundreds, sometimes thousands of other records since those years and for us, that mountain of records represents the life tree of what we know and love as 'Northern Soul'....So although we still listen to records from the 60s and 70s, we are not revivalists by nature and still thirst to hear stuff we do not know...On the other hand, the 'handbaggers' do not need that and a lot of them have no true concept at all as to exactly how wide the encasing expression 'Northern Soul' really has stretched musically over the last 30 years...For them, it is just about turning up and feeling for a few hours, like they are back in 1975, pretty harmless in itself - if it were not for the offence and annoyance it causes to those who have spent a lifetime holding the torch...

Ultimately though, we are doing ourselves no favours by this continual haggling and thrashing about over this subject...It is truly pointless...It makes our comprehension of the Soul scene somewhat depressing and there are certainly far more important subjects to talk about...For me it is still much more about records and events, news, interesting Radio shows most often from local broadcast outlets and general discussion about related topics...Why do we spend so much time, arguing and dwelling on a scene which in reality is just a pale imitation of what the rest of us know to be the reality...Let the 'stiffs' have their revival nights, let them conga around Blackpool, let them talk about what they imagine to represent 'Northern Soul' until they once again decide they have become bored because that side of the scene will not last...Pure revivalist scenes never do, in any situation...By their very nature they are of limited lifespan, which is why the gentlemen mentioned know it is important that they squeeze the tarnished goose thoroughly whilst they can, because as sure as eggs are eggs, one day they'll wake up and the conga performing hordes will have departed again...

But it won't be the end of Northern Soul...

I haven't read the above but it's rubbish...

Edited November 27, 2011 by Pete S

[Hornet]

we only talked b@llox at niters 30 years ago !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Guest]

we only talked b@llox at niters 30 years ago !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Yeah and I think that's what I was kind of previously trying to say in this sentence!!

'No matter how much people go on about Wigan, Blackpool and Yate (on here) those of us who have retained a loyalty/affection/involvement in the scene have spent far more many years since defining and refining what Northern Soul really means than those people (or ourselves) did for a few brief years back in the 70s..'

[Russ Vickers]

I haven't read the above but it's rubbish...

Thats just made my night out here mate, its a good post actually, but your reply has cracked me up...........

Russ

[Guest]

That's me then Macca. Thanks for your pity. Even though I've probably forgotten about more 'proper Northern Soul" records than many have actually heard over these last 38 years.

Can't stand the Chuck Cockerham record.

As a soul record - it's average I suppose.

As a 'Northern Soul' record, which crossover is apparently a sub-genre of, it does nothing for me at all. That's the way things are, people are different and hear things differently. Why can't you and others accept that instead of making yourselves out to be oh so superior to anyone who doesn't want or even need to venture out of their comfort zone. No offence intended to you personally Macca, I know you're alright, but you being so judgemental at least gives me a right to reply to you.

I am hoping to track him down in his 'comfort zone' in Barcelona next weekend PETE, so I'll let you know whether he's asking BUTCH to play proper 'Northern' or crossover!

[macca]

That's me then Macca. Thanks for your pity. Even though I've probably forgotten about more 'proper Northern Soul" records than many have actually heard over these last 38 years.

Can't stand the Chuck Cockerham record.

As a soul record - it's average I suppose.

As a 'Northern Soul' record, which crossover is apparently a sub-genre of, it does nothing for me at all. That's the way things are, people are different and hear things differently. Why can't you and others accept that instead of making yourselves out to be oh so superior to anyone who doesn't want or even need to venture out of their comfort zone. No offence intended to you personally Macca, I know you're alright, but you being so judgemental at least gives me a right to reply to you.

They were just two random examples Pete. It could have been any other 'representative pair'. Chuck Cockerham came to mind because it had an immediate impact on me when I first heard it (as did Lenis Guess!). I've no vested interest in Crossover or Modern, I've only been receptive to either in the last 3 or 4 years. I missed the Stafford era completely and was out of the UK by 1990. When I started collecting again in the late 80s, I bought 60s exclusively, well that's not true entirely, I sought out and bought stuff like Elouise Laws, James Fountain, Pointer Sisters, Len Jewell on Pzazz (Crossover tune?) and other 'massive at the Mecca and Cleethorpes tunes'. There's still a lot of it (Modern) that I baulk at, particularly Disco, but a good, angst ridden vocal these days floors me every time, regardless of the rythmn, production etc. This led me to seek out a copy of Garfield Fleming not long ago. Why wasn't I listening in 1981? Too sectarian back then, I guess. I wore my Levine must go badge with pride in 77 and chuntered like billy-o when Soul Sam embraced new releases. It's been a long walk here, I'll say that. I'll also withdraw the comments about derision and pity. Looking at my post again, it does seem a bit sectarian and holier than thou. Rich, the comfort zone thing in BCN will be weird, what with so many different genres under one roof. My partner loves it ALL though and never leaves the floor once out there. I'll just be ferrying beer, probably. I did shake an ambitious leg to Stevens & Foster 'I Wanna Be Loved' last year there. It had me smiling to myself and reflecting on more 'exalted' times,when I'd have been frothing at the mouth with righteous NS indignation at the mere thought. Paz se±ores!

Edited November 27, 2011 by macca

[Russ Vickers]

Stevens & Foster has always done it for me, back when it was first played (early 8ts ?), right up until this day, right propper tune IMHO.

Best Russ

[Goldsoul]

First played as a new release in 1975 by Colin Curtis at the Mecca. Regularly played at the Kings Hall Stoke by resident Mick H.

[Guest Marky Tee]

Just as a final comment to the people who have ridiculed Soul in the Sun, particularly the poster who said it was a venue without integrity. I cant even be bothered to look to see who you are mate. Eddy runs the events as a fun holiday with soul music, it is attended by "soulies" and "handbaggers" alike, whatever that means. This extract is taken from Eddy's thankyou email sent to all attendees. Chris is the venue manager by the way.

"Cancer Research

What a fantastic week we had fundraising, I will be making a good donation on behalf of the DJs (who don't get paid) and you may have noticed that I didn't pay for any of my drinks at Vivo. It was not my intention, but Chris is so appreciative of us going he won't take money off me.

So I will be donating an extra £500 to cover all the free drinks.

This makes our total for November just over £5000 our yearly total for 2011 at £18,587.00 and our overall total now stands at £107,582 of which over £100,000 went to Cancer Research (the rest for sponsoring children and buying specialist equipment for certain individuals)"

This is what I would call integrity. What do you say?

Edited November 28, 2011 by Marky Tee

[Goldsoul]

Why bother to explain? The thread is fuelled by mostly Failed DJ's desperate for a quality gig.

[Ernie Andrews]

I am hoping to track him down in his 'comfort zone' in Barcelona next weekend PETE, so I'll let you know whether he's asking BUTCH to play proper 'Northern' or crossover!

Wish I was going to Barcelona - Lovbe the Place - Tell EDU he still owes me a nice Bottle of Rioja