Looking back to clubs and nights in the South east of England (outside of London) in the late 70's. Here are a few I can recall, but would appreciate more details on some of them from people with better memories than I....I thought I better write some of it down though before I forget even more.....
We start off with Reading's Top Rank Suite - opposite the station. Home to several well attended all dayers in 1977-8 (they may have run some earlier ones as well). At least 600 soulheads attended these, and quite possibly a lot more. It was an easy location for the Kent crowd to get to, and these all dayers normally took place on bank holidays. They may from memory have been started earlier by the Inter City Soul Club. DJ's included Iain Stewart, Tony Dellar, Ian Clark, Tony Ellis I think and also Brian Rae etc.
Format main room - Northern - upstairs smaller room Jazz Funk. At one of them (Aug 77 I think) Chris Hill turned up with coach loads of Goldmine punters who rammed the upstairs room (this part has been well chronicalised, but often not too accurately). At the same time attendance was down in the main room - so Chris being Chris decided it was time to reunite the northern and Jazz funk scenes and got the upstairs room to come down and 'join' with their northern brothers and sisters. He took over the decs and played "Magic Fly" by Space :graynone: as his "unifying" record, while the Jazz Funk folks danced in a conga round the northern crowd on the floor. Obviously it didn't work, and very nearly ended in tears. After that the rooms were reversed and "northern" was sent upstairs while the JF crowd got the main room, and that was the last time we went, as the atmosphere wasn't the same upstairs. Billy Arnell was a big sound at the last one we went to. From there (as far as the Jazz funk scene was concerned) were born the Purley alldayers etc etc.
Egham - 1st April 1979 (?) allnighter - we went on the train, Kev Griffin was DJing along with Ian Clark. Good crowd and I vaguely recall discussing the merits or otherwise of a European copy of Lynne Randell "Caio baby" with one Col Smith. Also remember a long wait on the platform for a train in the morning.....Col can you fill in some gaps here. Seem to remember it was in a gym / basketball type set up, and there were several of them?
St Albans Fire Station. Not sure when this all nighter was held but it would have been late 70's, but it was a well attended "one room event". DJ's included Steve Jeffries (the Aldershot one), and it was about the time the dreadful "Love Hustle", and Ral Donner were popular. Don't know why they never did another one, but believe Mick from Past & Present Records in Watford was involved in it somehow. Notable for me because Kim Styles took a 600 single sales box which we had to take turns in lugging along the not insubstantial walk from St Albans station to the fire station, and back.
Further north - The Nite Spot Bedford. Run by Ken Cox of EASC fame - there were several all nighters here. The place was demolished years ago, but again this venue was well attended. Notable for several things: Got my copy of Ronnie McNeir "My class" for £10 here . Sam did a modern spot which got me back up to Wigan pretty pronto with cover ups such as "The Love Committee" etc. Most notable though we went to one of these nights with a 'first timer' from Southborough, but it was cancelled so about a dozen of us spent the night getting back from Bedford on a ghost train - what a let down that was, and don't think the first timer was much interested after that.
Then of course we ran a number of events in West Kent ourselves- starting off with St Easthwythes Hall in Tonbridge which Kim Styles started in 1977. It was just a Friday night 7.30 - 11 pm do (no booze, dusty dance floor church hall) where we could listen to and dance to sounds. At the end of the night our "Spencers bags" looked like they'd been through an asbestos mill - covered in dust - just right for Wigan on Saturday then....Got my first ever DJ spot here helping Kim, and these were once a month. Usually only about 20-30 of us in there, but we always turned up....
From there we ran a number of events - an all dayer at the DeLaRue School in Tonbridge - which Kev Griffin led the charge on. Can't remember much about it, except it wasn't well attended, and we kept waiting for more people to turn up.....a couple of do's in the Lyons Club in Lyons Crescent, and our most successful "northern" event at the Dancing School in Tonbridge High St (near the Crown). Again Kev and I ran this and guests included Cockney Mick Webb (who we could not get off of the decks "Just a few more mate - I've only been on for two hours"), Graham Constantine, Kim and a young Joanna Wallace (Jo also came to st Easthwyves). We did 3 or 4 there, and even made a £1.50 profit on one of the nights which for us was a real "first". We split the profits 50/50, Kev taking £1 and me 50p Big sound here for Kev was The Constellations which at the time was a £1.50 relatively "expensive" tune. After that we just became punters at places like 6T's which had by now become a regular haunt for us which didn't involve excessive travelling up north, lugging decks around etc.
At the end of the 70's we also had the mod revival and Kim and I guested at several do's run by Jo Wallace in Thanet - one on Broadstairs by the pier which was "rammed", and a couple in pubs in Ramsgate (I cannot remember names etc) - these were more mod / 60s soul events, but were both very well attended and I still have nightmares to this day about being driven around to one of these do's in the back of Jon Buck's car at breakneck speed.
So what else was around "northern wise" in the Home Counties in the late 70's?
