Category: Everything Else

Don’t Close Any More of London’s Nightclubs. #SaveFabric

In 2016 Islington Borough Council closed Fabric – one of London’s most famous and best clubs – indefinitely, pending a review of its licence.

*Update – the campaign to save Fabric was a success, and the club has now reopened. Here’s what happened when I went back.*

Even if you’ve never been to Fabric, and have no interest in staying out late dancing to loud fast music, or don’t know what Fabric is and what its closure might mean for London – then allow me to try and explain.

If you’re into dance music, you’ll probably have known about Fabric long before you were old enough to actually get in.

In fact, most of my memories involve spending four hours in a queue drinking pre-mixed booze out of an Evian bottle in the hope of getting into a True Playaz drum ‘n’ bass night, which, no matter how often we tried, by 11pm always had a huge queue snaking towards Cowcross Street, and was already one in, one out.

But if I wasn’t going to get into Fabric, I was going to listen to one of their resident DJ mix CDs instead.

The Never Ending Queue meant I was about 25 before I went to Fabric with any regularity. I was getting back into the London club scene after uni to find that Kings Cross was done, and Matter (now closed) and Fabric were the next logical choice.

Even if you had a ticket, it somehow always felt like you might not get in. But once inside, it was always packed. Lasers pinged across the main room. There was a warren of phone signal-less stairways. You’d invariably be there to see one of the world’s best DJs. When you lost whoever you were with in the crowd, you made friends in the outdoor courtyard.

The music was always, always good.

If Fabric closes, it’s more bad news for London’s nightlife.

And yeah, perhaps your clubbing days are over. Perhaps they never really got started. Perhaps you haven’t noticed the slow drop off in some of London’s biggest clubs and their associated nights – but it’s happening, bit by bit.

It’s the regeneration of huge former all-night party areas like Kings Cross, it’s councils trying to appease people who might move in next door to the Ministry of Sound and complain about the, er, sound.

In Fabric’s case, it’s an effort to stop people taking drugs – which frankly, ignores a much, much bigger issue, one that closing nightclubs isn’t going to solve. It’s borough councils imposing licencing restrictions that make it impossible to run regular, good late night venues.

It’s freeing up valuable space which could be used for something a bit more sanitary than a load of sweaty people having a good time. A Tesco, a soulless bar, luxury flats.

But it’s important that London has nightclubs.

If, like me, you grew up in London, listening to the sort of music that required a line-up of DJs, set times, massive sound systems, MCs, airhorns, a scanned copy of your passport with the dates changed, whistles, horns, trainers, and enough hours in the night for it all to play out, then you’ll know how these kind of places can shape your youth.

I was 16 when I first went to Bagleys for a night called One Love. I spent all night dancing with thousands of strangers in this huge warehouse in Kings Cross – big up anyone else who remembers *those* yellow railings at the front – and knew by the time I got home at 8am the next morning, that there weren’t many other places I’d rather spend a Saturday night.

This article in Dazed sums up why quite nicely:

Nightclubs are part of our culture. They’re spaces for communities to form that you may not even know you want to be a part of yet. They’re full of the friends you’ve yet to meet. They’re a space for you to develop your identity; to form nascent relationships (personal or otherwise) with sweaty strangers you shoulder barge at a bar or bond with over a 6AM fag, shivering as the sun comes up and the sweat dries over the back of your neck.

These clubs bring people to London, they make our city good. They support artists. They develop talent. They give someone who loves music a place to find, meet, and dance surrounded by like-minded people.

Put simply: it’s important that people who love music have a place to go out, stay out, dance, and hear it.

And the way things are going, night tube or no night tube – London’s supply of night life is running short.

There’s currently a petition running to #SaveFabric. You can sign it, download a campaign pack of images, tweet your support.

More info here: http://www.fabriclondon.com/save-fabric

18th August 2016
I Went To See Daughter at The Forum in Kentish Town and it was Really Good

Last week I went to see Daughter at the Kentish Town Forum.

They’re a band fronted by Elena Tonra, whose voice is the aural equivalent of securing a free seat on the tube during rush hour when you’re a bit hungover.

Yep: she’s that good.

I did my usual thing of buying two tickets without checking if anyone wanted to come first, because successfully getting tickets for gigs in London is stressful enough without the added suspense of waiting for a double blue tick to decide your fate, and because someone is bound to want to go and see some live music if you tell them it’s free, even if It’s Not Really Their Cup of Tea Or They Think They Might Have Something On That Night Not Sure Can I Let You Know.

And that person is usually Harriet.

Me and Harriet 40 years from now

Harriet and I have been gifting each other gig tickets for about two years.

Not only is giving and accepting free tickets with other people a good way to see live music that you otherwise wouldn’t, but it also ensures that your friends consider you a valuable addition to their social circle, a bit like if you’ve got a mate who also happens to be a lawyer, or has a dog, or works in McDonalds, or can swipe you freebies from the make up counter at Selfridges*.

*if you would like to be this friend, pls let me know

The gig also coincided with Harriet’s 30th birthday, and I knew her ideal way to celebrate would be an evening of gloomy, slightly depressing yet relatable music, accompanied by several hundred pints of beer and an ill-advised G&T nightcap in the only pub still open at 12am in Kentish Town on a Thursday.

And to be fair, I wasn’t wrong.

Once inside, we managed to find a spot 100% unhindered by tall people.

This area was also seemingly free of Annoying and / or Noisy Bastards, who often have a habit of positioning themselves near me at music events.

We also made friends with a girl who was either Finnish or Flemish, and was there on her own, and therefore had no choice but to listen to Harriet talk about her love of Copenhagen and save our space on trips to the loo.

And oh, the music was really good.

Daughter have that knack of making the entire audience do a collective happy sigh within the first few notes of each intro, and even though the new album is, well, new and unfamiliar – somehow it already seems like you know each song.

Plus, it’s always a good thing when everything performed live in front of you sounds exactly like it does when you listen to it in your room, in bed, gently weeping at the fragility and unfairness of life in between episodes of Making a Murderer.

There’s just something about her music that you can relate to.

It was later the next day on Wikipedia that I found out why.

The reason it all seems so real to me is that the lead singer Elena is from Northwood, which is just one tube stop from where I grew up in the suburbs of London.

So now I’m even more sure that when we eventually meet and become best mates, it won’t just be a shared passion for beautiful music that bond us, but also our painful experiences of a youth spent waiting unknown amounts of time on cold platforms for Metropolitan line trains in and around north west London.

Just another normal day

Ah, that familiar zone 5 existential crisis. It all makes so much sense.

2nd February 2016
What I Think About Taking Photos of People on the Tube

This week’s Problem On The Internet is all about stranger shaming.

At the centre of the debate is a Facebook group where users can post photos of women eating on the tube. It invites comments from the 19,000+ members as long as they “do not swear, do not abuse, affront, aggrieve, bad-mouth, blaspheme, call names, curse, disgrace, dishonour, disrespect, insult, mock, molest, offend, outrage, quip, ridicule, smear, sneer, taunt or tease.”

Google it if you like. I’ll wait here.

Ok?

And we’re back in the room.

Now, it’s long been noted that Facebook user comments are second only to YouTube user comments in their propensity to make you want to bang your face repeatedly into the nearest wall.

Numerous studies have shown that if you give people a Facebook profile, a keyboard and space to comment, generally even the most intelligent person will lose their ability to capitalise words, use spacing, master punctuation, utilise common sense, or check grammar without offending at least three people and writing the word “lol” in the process.

Myself included.

That’s just how Facebook rolls.

So no matter the original intentions behind your collection of publicly, surreptitiously taken images of women eating food on the tube – whether it’s merely observational, genuine curiosity, an “art movement”, your friends’ pub conversation gone mainstream, or an exercise in misogynistic stranger shaming – if you’re inviting comments, and those words make a person feel cowed, bullied or uncomfortable, then clearly there’s a problem.

And that problem will probably end up being discussed and argued about by the media.

Eventually, your “art movement” will be labelled a “bizarre craze” and reported in papers around the world, as if taking photos of women eating on the tube is something that People Do in London, instead of being something that 19,000 People Do on Facebook.

There are many blogs and feeds that document life on the tube without being creepy.

The brilliant People on the Tube, my long standing favourite Dogs on Trains, and of course Tube Crush to name but three.

And, yes this blog has, on occasion, featured people (but mostly dogs) that I’ve found amusing or interesting, even annoying on my commuting travels – the above image is taken from the She Loves London Facebook page – but usually without showing faces and only ever to demonstrate a wider point which, I hope, hasn’t to date offended, identified or pinpointed one individual person.

(That said, it’s something I’ll be even more conscious of in the future.)

But WWEOTT mainly makes me and a lot of other people uncomfortable for the same reason a female version of Tube Crush would – because reactions to photographs of women on the internet are generally laden with more sinister undertones than that of men.

Just ask the Mail Online.

That said…

…let’s also consider that just over the road in Tumblr-land there’s a blog entitled “Men Taking Up Too Much Room on the Train”, where, more often than not, the focus of the photo is a bloke’s crotch (yup, see above) – which, arguably, is just as weird as showing women’s faces, and often shows the mens’ faces too.

Anyway. Wherever you stand on the issue, next week two rebel Facebook groups (including the bluntly named, “Women who eat wherever the f*ck they want”) are hosting a lunch party on the Circle line to, err, encourage women to eat on the tube.

Or, if like me you just think that anyone eating on the tube – male or female – should be banished to the fiery pits of the Northern Line, then you might want to opt for the more gender neutral approach:

Either way, I think the last words on the subject should be given to this article on the Londonist – as I can think of no better way to say it, and I agree wholeheartedly with the final sentiment:

Amen. But photos of dogs. That’s ok, right?

8th April 2014