Tidy @SE1 Club, London Bridge, London

[James]

O... my... GOD - what an absolutely incredible night - I was really gonna try and play this down as I didnt want to upset SarahPVC too much for not being able to make it !!! hehehehehehe *evil laugh ...

 

Arrvied at All-Bar-One in London Bridge a bit late due to crossing over 3 different bridges across the Thames for some strange reason - some of the sign posting (or lack of it) is ridiculous - then again I should know better because I fecking work in London Bridge!!? Anyway, met up in All-Bar-One with, ermm - lets see - OddBall, Becky La La, Nice1Bruvva, Nice1Brivva's Lovely Mate (sorry Neil - can you remind me AGAIN what her name was - WHY am I so bad with names?!?), Rob "DJ" Freano, ClaireDC, Soph, Dakers, CreamyC, a friend of ClaireDC's, Mr Christian, BunnyKins, EllsBells, Wub Wub - I think that was it - apologies if I left anyone out. Had a few drinks, smokes in there which by the way was incredibly dead for 10pm on a Saturday night - I drink in there frequently on a Friday night and its packed - bizzare - must just be office workers. Anyway, made the short walk down to SE1 in the pouring rain - thank god it wasn't an outdoor event - without any tents or heating equipment - thats all I can say!! O yeah, whilst driving up I was trying to find somewhere to park and low-and-behold the only car park I knew of was right next to my office - went to park in there (in on of the tunnels under london bridge station) and found they had turned it into a nightclub! - the SE1 club!! Bizzare - I've been working here 4 years and only just realised - car park during the day, club at night - why cant they do this to all NEC car parks?! Anyway, evidentally the car park was shut but I found all these cars parked in the tunnel up the side and managed to park slap bang outside the club - nice1orWhat!?? My car then turned into a mobile cloak room which saved us a lot of time..

 

There were 2 queues - one for tickets and one for people wanting to buy tickets - as ever the shortest queue is the one for people without tickets so we queued there but were told that we wouldnt necessarily get in - I think every got in though and the queues did move pretty quickly considering the length of them. Myself and few others were even luckier as we had secured guest list and were eventually walked straight into the club. Searching was about right - i.e. they didnt go over the top, nice to see metal detectors on the way in also. Security staff and PR people were friendly - I dont know about you but it really puts me in a good & relaxed mood for the night when you get a few smiles off people who are running the show. Recognised a few people working there from the Sundissential tent last weekend at Global Gathering - which again just put me in one excellent mood - just felt "at home" so to speak. Anyway, we all got in fine no problems but had to wait in the main entrance area where the cloakroom is for a bit for the people without tickets. As people came in I suddenly realised - "WOW - HOW many people have we got here from the site!!?" - the group seemed larger than Global - probably because we were able to stick together easier as we were in a smaller area but regardless I must say for once I've finally realised that we CAN build up a good list of members in London.

 

O yeah, what really made my night on the way in was a couple of blokes in the queues who pulled their wallets out and showed me their clubtheworld cards - I hadnt met them before but evidentally some of the others had - at Global - I was so 'chuffed' that a) they took the trouble to speak to us and even more wow - they've liked kept the card in their wallet - superb - amazing feeling - better than cash or anything.

 

Anyway (sorry if I keep going off at a tangent - its just the way my brain works!), standing in the reception type area I could here 2 distinctive rooms banging out INCREDIBLE music - I suddenly got this overwhelming feeling of "my, god - WHY the [censored] didnt I find this genre and these types of clubs years ago" - a few years back I was mainly hanging out in clubs playing drum & bass and prog. techno house - like Fabric - which IS an amazing club but not 100% my music taste - I like it hard & fast and boy was it like that at the SE1 !!! I had this amazing 'relaxed' feeling come over me as I'd finally found a club near work playing the right kind of stuff!! What with SE1 and XLR8 playing at the Fridge in Brixton every couple of months I cant fail to have regular "BLINDERS" in London - if anyone else knows of any of clubs like these - LET ME KNOW!!!!

 

Then came the decision - which room do we go to first ? It was obvious - one room in particular - I think the 'main room' was banging out harder and louder than the rest and we all made the effort to go up together. Met up with PodiumGirl and some of her friends - must admit I wouldnt have recognised them if it wasnt for some of the others pointing them out - at least now I know who to look out for - was fantastic meeting you guys - really really nice bunch with the right attidude - fantastic.

 

After a while the group got somewhat splintered up as understandably people are into slightly different types of music and some just into Funky stuff which I must admit thought was a cool idea having a funky chill-out room as well - at first I was thinking "why???" but believe me it came into good use later on in the night!

 

I did my usual trick of going AWOL - basically because I love just walking round looking at the clubbers to see if I recognise anyone - I spend quite a lot of time going back through all my photo archives trying to memorise faces and which event I last saw them at - I can tell ya people are well chuffed when you remember them from an event - even though I can never seem to remember the names! I also found I kept changing rooms as soon as something slower / less harder came on - and I tell you what there was never a moment where I found myself without a room to go to playing the kind of stuff I like - more than enough on the menu.

 

I was VERY impressed with the layout - basically long rectangular rooms with the DJ setup at the far end as you walk in. I think I've just 'clicked' as to why the sound system in SE1 and other clubs like Fabric sound so bloody good - I reckon its the brick walls - the sound seems to travel further and is very very crisp and perfect - awesome - I'm not being funny but one of the things which really annoys me (and can ruin my night) is a bad sound setup. e.g. I used to love going Bagleys a few years ago but recently noticed a very poor sound setup - the sound was muffled and distorted and it would have actually been better if they'd turned it down a touch rather than having it loud for the sake of it - but yes I do like it a loud as possible. Other examples are at some of the huge outdoor events like Gatecrasher Summer Sound System where, for me at least, the spread of speakers was rather thin on ground and unless you were at the front of each tent it just wasnt loud enough. This is when I start thinking whether to bother going to these 'large for the sake of it' events. I mean I spend ALL my time in the hard house tents now so its basically one tent - so why spend £50 for one club - in effect. What HAS changed my mind recently though was the amazing night at Global Gathering the other weekend - the Sundissential people were so nice and friendly and the music ROCKED - top sound system, top people, top atmosphere - amazin' !! Sound system was perfect for me. Anyway (jeez I must stop doing this), suffice to say the SE1 setup was PERFECT, also nice to see an EXCELLENT laser setup - and what I did also notice was that they were used at the right times - i.e. not over used which meant when they did eventually come on after a huge building the whole roof LITERALLY felt like it was gonna blow - everybody stomping, everybody smiling - amazing - no wonder it was so fecking quick n easy to buy drinks at the bar - EVERYONE was dancing - it was even pretty 'dead' in the reception areas and toilets - superb - just goes to show EVERYONE was there to dance.

 

My only bad point of the entire night would be (and sorry to bring it up yet again) - but the bloody Smoke Machines - arrrggg!! Why do people insist on using these?! Ok - must admit they are really cool for the lasers etc... but when Lisa and Adam from Lab4 came on I was disappointed I could get any decent photos of them at all - even though I was at the front - all because every 2 minutes the smoke machines belted out yet more un-necessary white stuff - and as soon as the smoke cleared it belted out more !! Several people in the crowd were disappointed at this but at least it made us give up and just enjoy the superb set and not get pre-occupied with taking pics - so it had its good points I guess!

 

For some reason I think I missed Eddie Halliwell so I cant comment on his set but I heard it wasnt the most popular. I'm not big on names / DJ following - I just switch rooms until I find the best set - and that was certainly the Lisa & Adam set - su-fecking-perb - if you dont believe me time-warp back with me now and I'll show ya - I fecking wish!!!

 

Later on I decided I must actually spend some time with the CTW members - thank god this time I remembered to !! Went into the chillout-zone - the Funky Room and found 5 twatted people lying on the floor (only joking guys) - sat down and had various chats whilst every couple of minutes we had more & more people coming over to say hi - felt amazing - this feeling of being recognised and recognising others - THIS is what CTW is all about - it makes the night SO much more fun I cant tell ya - we have things to talk about - like some of the amusing posts, we have potential new nights to talk about, we take pics of people we actually KNOW rather than just random faces in the crowd - which is what I used to have to do when I was in my "clubbing partner begging phase" (honest). Also, its really cool knowing that there's always someone around you can scrounge a fag off!!! hehehe Or persuade some fool like Creamy to buy you a drink!!! hehehe (only joking! - or am I?!). Soph in her Nurses outfit was dancing all bloody night on natural energy - most refused to believe she wasnt on anything but I assure you she wasnt. Some girl in a red bikini caught everyones eyes also - I think she must have been a gymnast or something - amazingly supple. Was so cool speaking to this amazing girl mate of Nice1Bruvva's (please tell me the name!) - really nice and friendly and like-minded - superb- really hope you can come out to play again in the future with us?! Met dakers for the first time who I think spent the whole night in the original room we all went to - where PodiumGirl and Co. were - respect to you Dakers for never moving! Was cool to finally meet up with ya. OddBall - well what can I say about OddBall - always a pleasure mate and at 19 you've got TONS of clubbing nights ahead of you - I will be at every one until I die.

 

O yeah, that reminds me - 2 of the nicest people we all met that night were ? & ? (ooops, cant remember names, think I need my PA with me next time - 'C' - hehe). Anyway, they were slightly older so to speak and boy are they committed to clubbing - superb - really nice to see people like this out - obviously "in love" with clubbing like I now am. So now I dont want ANYONE telling me I should 'grow up' and 'give it up' because I'm 'past it' - I'm telling you now the last 3 months have just been a warm up - and with combinations like SE1 & Tidy around I'm afraid you aint gonna see me at Sunday roasts again with the family for a while - ooops - actually thats bad I DID miss one the other week after a BLINDER up in Liverpool and totally forgot to turn up to my dads birthday - sorry dad!!!! will 'try' and not let it happen again!?

 

God I so bad at writing this stuff I tend to just chuck out whatever is in my head at the time. I really do wish I could explain in holographic form to you what the club was like but I have no more words than "pure class" - I couldnt fault it at all. I KNOW that the atmosphere and the people you are going with can make a huge difference (and they did) but I swear on my life I would go to this club on my own - you are bound to meet really cool people within 10 minutes of entering the club - even at the end whilst we were waiting for a few people to get their coats I found myself getting trapped in yet more conversations and I just didnt want to leave the club - was nice to hear to final record slow down actually as I felt I was leaving at the right time and not missing anything! Took quite a long time walking out because of the narrow corridoors and the PRs with flyers but had so many people to speak to I didnt notice the wait too much. Me and Claire then hung around outside to say a quick hi to Lisa and Adam and then was well chuffed to see Lez (who wasnt playing this night) was Lab4 - who'd I'd met the previous week at Global and Claire has known for a while. Lez & Adam are so friendly its untrue - and they know what they are doing I can tell ya - heads firmly screwed on. I dont know about you - I'm not a particularly huge DJ follower - I think quite a few of them get far too much praise for kicking out tunes which at the end of the day they didnt write so I'm into the live sets - like Lab4 - amazing - they've really inspired me to pick up my music writing again. Thats not to say that there aren't some superb DJs out there - in fact I'd say I currently love almost all of the hard house DJs - I guess I'm talking about the airy fairy trance DJs - ok I'll sh*t up before I offend anyone by mentioning them! All I'm saying is that I want MORE acts like Lab4 around so if there are any please someone let me know!! I believe they are at Milton Keynes soon and Camden Palace so I'm really hoping I can get to these - more details on www.lab4.com !

 

Conclusion: I wish those of you who weren't there were - now that I know its un-missable I WILL FORCE you to come to the next one. SE1 rocks, Tidy rocks. THIS is what its all about - un-believable.

 

James

 

*o look, I think the pictures are nearly up!!!

 

[ 05 August 2002, 10:13: Message edited by: James ]