UFO Club, Pure and Tequila Twist tunes I was listening to 1988-1990 ish
The Future Sound of London — Papua New Guinea
A Guy Called Gerald - Voodoo Ray
Humanoid-Stakker - Humanoid
808 State - Cubik
Depth Charge - Depth Charge
Black Riot - A Day in the Life (todd terry)
KLF - What Time Is Love
Inner City - Good Life
Inner City - Big Fun
Lords Of Acid - I Sit On Acid
Tyree - Acid Over
Frankie Knuckles - Baby Wants To Ride
Jungle Brothers - I'll House You
Orbital – Chime
Ten City - That's The Way Love Is (Acieed Mix)
The Todd Terry Project - Bango (To The Batmobile)
Sterling Void - It's All Right
8 comments:
Hmmm.....as an old compadre of the author of this blog, I'm not so convinced he was groovin to this stuff as early as circa 1988. I recall him as being a bit more King Kurt and Wonder Stuff at the time.
I think your memory is doing you a disservice compadre.
I remember buying a copy of Inner City’s Big Fun when it came out and that was definitely 1988 - and the Fife lads were definitely going to the UFO club (the pre cursor of Pure) in 1989. Pure opened in August 90, most of the Fife lads were in attendance that night (if you look at the front cover of the original Pure compilation LP it lists everyone who was there on the first night including yours truly). The first Tequilla Twist was held in October ’89. So in terms of chronology I don’t think I am too far out.
I’m not sure about your mention of King Kurt, once again you have your dates a bit wrong. While I will freely admit to a bit of psychobilly dancing (at Dundee Art College disco) to Destination Zululand when it came out, this was in 1983/4 – some 5 years prior to the period in question.
As for your reference to The Wonder Stuff, I am frankly bemused. Even with my near-encyclopaedic knowledge of indie pop, I would be hard pressed to even identify one of their records … I’m afraid they passed me by entirely.
You are correct in one respect, I wasn’t solely listening to Chicago and Detroit house music at that time – I was equally at home with:
Daydream Nation – Sonic Youth, It takes an Nation of Millions … - Public Enemy, Bug – Dinosaur Jr, Surfer Rosa – The Pixies, Introspective – Pet Shop Boys, Superfuzz Bigmuff – Mudhoney, Stone Roses –Stone Roses, 3 Feet High and Rising – De La Soul , Technique – New Order , Done By the Forces of Nature – The Jungle Brothers
Okay Smartypants, I may have been misled by Smitz' rather jaundiced view of the Twist scene. But you still misspelled 'Saxophone Colossus'.
Sorry Sonny Rollins. I'm not sure if Smitz ever attended a Tequilla Twist Night ... he was probably to busy listening to Straight Outta Compton - see Facebook
I did indeed go to at least one Tequilla Twist, lame wasn’t the word. Veet talks about it as if it was some hallowed underground club night comparable with the Hacienda or the Sound Factory. I remember it being held in Dalgety Bay Sports & Social Club, after the pensioners bingo. Taff had promised a spectacular sound and light show which culminated in him switching on a dry ice machine and throwing into the middle of an empty dance floor, four divers glow sticks chored from Rosyth Dockyard.
When taken to task on his son et lumiere spectacular, Taff replied that it had looked much better when he had tried it in his bedroom. Two other things I remember from TT was a really annoying guy blowing a whistle continually and the music being wall to wall Wonder Stuff!
Also I don’t know why it is so funny that I should list Straight Outta Compton as a record that I listened to that sticks out in my memory, after all on the same list I also included, The Skids, Tubeway Army, Bronski Beat etc, hardly designed to make me seem ‘cool’.
I expected SOC to be juvenile nonsense, there had been a furore in the press about their name and Fuck tha Police, but it struck me as a great album and quite different to the East Coast hip-hop, Beastie Boys and PE, that I had been listening to.
You misspelled 'to(o) busy listening to Straight Outta Compton...'
It all sounds like typical Smitz bluster to me, but I’m sorry Chris managed to dupe you about the light show. I would certainly never compare the Tequilla Twist with the Hacienda. Notable differences include:
The Venue
The Hac
Hugely expensive remodelled interior (£3 million in today’s money) in prominent city centre location.
The Twist
We got free rental of a number of function spaces in the Dalgety Bay (Sprts and Social Club) – Inverkeithing (Captain Jack’s) - Rosyth (Gladyer Inn) area. Usually all we had to guarantee was that there would be a minimum spend by “guests” at the bar – this was never a problem other than for Smitz who was unable to get an acceptable ginger ale and lime.
The Marketing and design
The Hac
Rob Gretton and Tony Wilson employed the services of Ben Kelly and Peter Saville two of hippest young interior and graphic designers in the country, and gave them almost unlimited resources to create a unified brand that reflected the Factory records aesthetic and the excitement of the (pre-house) New York warehouse party scene.
The Twist
Chris got me to knock up a poster and duplicate it on the photocopier at my work. Steve E created a backdrop using one of his Mum’s bed sheets.
The Music
The Hac
Some of the Hacienda’s early history is often conveniently overlooked. It started off in very early 80’s as a pay-to-play venue for Manchester indie bands. I visited it in late 86 with a couple of mates from Dundee, and it was pretty empty although I did spot Bernie from New Order talking to Mick Hucknall (true). The music policy at that time seemed to be mainly indie; I remember Iggy Pop being played a couple of times - not a great deal of dance music other than a bit of electro and less cheesy disco. Obviously this was all about to change as the Hac embraced the US acid house scene and popularised it in the UK.
The Twist
The first Twist (Dalgety Social Club) in October 89 had a mix of indie stuff and dance I can’t remember in detail but we probably played pretty high profile stuff like Bomb the Bass, S’Express, New Order, Stone Roses, Inspiral Carpets, NWA, De La Soul, Jungle Brothers, 808 State, Inner City, Todd Terry. Smitz remembers someone blowing a whistle a lot – my guess is that this wasn’t in time to The Wondersuff’s “Size of a Cow”.
Subsequent Tequilla Twists held at Jacks (£2) and the Gladyer (£2.50) in 90 were definitely less obvious musically – by this time Steve Evans was buying a lot more esoteric Dutch and Belgian house music but still playing favourites like 808 State’s Cubik, Stakker Humanoid and some ‘Madchester baggy’ stuff. Lel was playing a lot of Hip-Hop and Hip-House stuff like Digital Underground, Ice Cube, Gang Starr, The Geto Boys and Fast Eddie.
Smitz pensioners bingo? pensioner’s bingo or even pensioners’ bingo surely. Veet
I remember going to Tequila Twist at Jacks with a load of friends from Dunfermline, was a great night with a good mix of tunes, was also at the last allnighter at Jacks with the old Chill mob back in 91, 92 before it was demolished, great memories, thanks lads :)
Anyone got any old pics of captain jack's or the gladyer
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