I need your opinions

[dirty_bass]

Ok, well, I have finally sorted a venue (owned by the poepl who used to run the velvet rooms) for a club night. I am doing this because I find london offers little of interest these days for techno/electro heads that isn`t either banging squat music in a club (why not just go to a squat party) or techno by the old skool (mills, saunderson etc).

What I am looking to do is push new sounds, new talents, and in particular Live PA`s.

We have this venue for thursdays (so we will be filling the slot left by the end of Ultimate Base) and are looking to provide a night of Deep Techno, Electro, Glitch and Experimental. The slick end of the electronic spectrum basically. Anyone who came to our White Label nights, well we are thinking along these lines, only a little more slick.

My question is.
am I barking up the wrong tree?
and wasting my time?

I have tried to put on banging techno nights in London, but it is very hard to pull the punters out of the squat party mentality and so venue owners get jittery, and worry about what will happen to their venue (and in some cases pull out at the last minute, and cause me no end of hell). And anyway, why not just go to a squat party if you want that kind of music (although there is the safety issue).

Would you be interested in this, in particular would you like to see more live performance?
And who would you like to see?

I apologise in advance if this is in the wrong section, but as it is not exactly promoting an event, I didn`t think it should be in the events section.

[Stella Boy]

I've never been clubbing in London on a Thursday but in Leeds this kinda night would go down better on a Sunday night.
I say go for it though, all you've got to lose is a bit of cash and as a promotor you have to realise that you are gonna lose some money now and then.

[dtl]

The last time (April last year) I was at Base which is on a Thursday it was competely packed, there are defo people going out on Thursday, you just have to give them some if not extra appeals.

New Talent is a tricky one, coz none of the punters know who they are and how they sound, it's tough for an unestablished event to fill the place. So the first few nites there is a certain need of few name djs/ PA to boost your name a bit, then it's experimental time. IMO that would be your strongest part as you must have a good network of artists and on a Thursday 95% of them would NOT be booked (cheaper deals). Better still, if you can get it going for Easter weekend, IMO is the busiest weekend in terms of clubbing in Britain, you should recieve a good does of publicity.

In terms of London punters, I am pretty sure there will be more people who would be into the weirest type of techno, but the number is defo not close to 10% of hard house crew. Hence its good if you start your promotion 2-3 months in advance (Except if you wanna do something for Easter.), dont run weekly/ monthly, let them gag for the next one for 2 months whilst ensuring the lineup is as quality as original than the last, then you are not far off from getting breakeven.

As for loyalty, think as a punter - Give them suprises (CD, vinyls, sweets), quality visual (In time with music?)

I would like to see Justin Berkovi and Terence Fixmer, both do twisted live PA, I like. :twisted:

Eric.

[dirty_bass]

Yeah, well we are thinking of putting one bigger name per night.
when we were running White label we were also doing vinyl and CD giveaways for early entrant to the night, so e=we`ll be doing this again.

Never thought about a Sunday, I might look into this.

Yeah, I`m used to promotion and the lack of profits, so no probelm there, I`m not doing this to fill my boots, I just wanna get an outlet for good sounds that is a little less cliquey in terms of people getting in on the action.

[Stella Boy]

[quote=" Yeah, I`m used to promotion and the lack of profits, so no probelm there, I`m not doing this to fill my boots, I just wanna get an outlet for good sounds that is a little less cliquey in terms of people getting in on the action.[/quote]

Fully respect what you say. I've had the misfortune of playing for promotors who are in it for the money. Give me a promotor who's in it for the scene anyday.

[dirty_bass]

Any more opinions?

I am trying to provide a night that caters for what we as techno people want. So this is why I am doing this.
Rather than just go ahead and put on a night, and then sift through all the complaints about what people want, and what was wrong after the event, I would rather hear what you want from the get-go. and start off on the right foot.

I would really like a by the people for the people situation going on, a community type thing.

So any suggestions and advice would really be appreciated.

[wenna]

i'd love to see andy dux from germany :love: :love:

or autechre live :love:

[jonnyspeed]

From my point of view the problem I have is getting bored with the same venue rather than the music. I tend to see the same nights at club nights - year after year - some are excellent like Nuclear Free Zone but I'm not sure I could do yet another night at 414 - so new venues are welcomed!


Promotion is easy I guess - pay the flyer posters, o the flyers, buil the website, post the mixes, keep the tax at or under £10.

do you want to do good beer an quality punters or munters?

As for "why not go to a squat party" - well I think that but loads of people I know just get the fear that they'll burn locked in a building on mushrooms, pills whatever... if you want munters then people want to smoke puff, take drugs without security getting the arse but they also want health and safety, nice toilets etc. So if you can do "warehouse" in a club - like 414, EQ in Hacknet or Electroworks in Angel then I think you've got a goer.

As for music I think the stuff coming out of chicago and labels like Crime an Victim go own very well.

doing an open mic 20-30 minutes slots can be lots of fun and get a weekly crowd - and the winner egts a clib slot etc...


peace.

[Jimfish]

dont forget that BASE was normally half full of tourists hoping for a peek at coxy.. it was normally busy but not allways by any means, and it had lots of heavyweight names, busloads of japanese tourists & a history..

I think its a bit of a risk to be honest mate.. there was 'system' on a thursday (still going?) which i went to several times when i lived up there and it was never that busy when i was there, and again it had plenty of heavys as part of its clique (who probably played for **** all) - but no tourist punters as such, and of course, it didnt have BASE's history.

I dunno geez, it sounds great in theory but just think carefully about where base and system got thier punters (and they didnt allways have heaps) from and think about what you can do to make up for what they had without spending money cos im sure they didnt spend much.

make sure the flyer is decent too man, none of this 'hackney chic' on so many flyers going about, i wouldnt ever pay to go to a club that didnt have a good flyer, it says heaps about the taste of the promoter and the general quality of organisation behind the night. Get decent designers like Protean to do it.

As far as what id like to see, its nothing else than 100% quality artists djs. And to be frank ive never gone to a club where all the djs and thier tunes have been shit hot all night long :(
oh and of course a good sound system is vital
and sexy flyers
and pole dancers
nakid
rubbing baby oil int...err

urm..yeah anyway, just quality stuff all night, id like to see some decent breaks, some experimental bits and some techno all in one night but never straying too far from stuff you can swing yer pants too..

[dirty_bass]

Well, soundsystem wise, anyone that came to our underground city party will agree, we have one of the best in London. Big, Loud, full and most importantly Clear sound. We emphasise quality over quantity.

We won`t have 2 many overheads. the Door tax will be a fiver, the venue is very nice, so we are not looking for a munter rave.

Our main concern is paying the Performers a fair amount.

We are looking at 300 capacity.

Hopefully the main theme of the night is Live P.A`s and the newist shit.

Promotionwise, flyers are a no no, as they just get binned, we have a much much better way of promoting that we have up our sleeves (in fact, it`s such a good idea, we could end up putting flyer producers out of business).

The venue has a be discreet policy. So unless your a twat, you are safe to enjoy yourself.

As for quality Line ups, well, the offer of performance slots is open to black out audio forum, so get your demo`s in, we aim to provide a promotional outlet for artists and their labels.

I think it can work, we are not looking to do a huge rave (been there done that) just a night focusing on quality sounds, tunes, and new and fresh ideas.

[Sunil]

Well, soundsystem wise, anyone that came to our underground city party will agree, we have one of the best in London. Big, Loud, full and most importantly Clear sound. We emphasise quality over quantity.

We won`t have 2 many overheads. the Door tax will be a fiver, the venue is very nice, so we are not looking for a munter rave.

Our main concern is paying the Performers a fair amount.

We are looking at 300 capacity.

Hopefully the main theme of the night is Live P.A`s and the newist shit.

Promotionwise, flyers are a no no, as they just get binned, we have a much much better way of promoting that we have up our sleeves (in fact, it`s such a good idea, we could end up putting flyer producers out of business).

The venue has a be discreet policy. So unless your a twat, you are safe to enjoy yourself.

As for quality Line ups, well, the offer of performance slots is open to black out audio forum, so get your demo`s in, we aim to provide a promotional outlet for artists and their labels.

I think it can work, we are not looking to do a huge rave (been there done that) just a night focusing on quality sounds, tunes, and new and fresh ideas.

Great to see new, fresh nights pop up.. if there's a good vibe people should follow, surely 300 people in London a Thursday night can work?

[G-BO]

if you are offerin soemthing diff that is cool, but if u can follow that up with quality in terms of teh talent you are booking, (local/national/international), set-up, soundsystem

, i cant see why it wouldnt do well, or at least break-even...

[Tony]

yoooo,
still a bit lost from the posts as to what/who you want to put on. i know and distribute lots of the more slick end of the electronic market, and try desperatley to find further venues for artists that i can syndicate tours around the country for.
i have adam johnson coming over in mid may, and geoff white shortly after. does that sound the sort of thing??

[spiralx]

Uglyfunk is always pretty full when they do nights, there's definitely interest in more experimental stuff. I'd be up for seeing people like crime/quick and smart/Edit do a live PA :)

[T]

I say go for it mate. Unless I'm missing something there is a lack of decent midweek techno/experimental nights in London at the mo...
As Tony mentioned hearing some stuff by the likes of Geoff White/Edit records would definitely be interesting...also Vogel/Inigo K maybe??? ..... any decent electronic artists would do!

[jonnyspeed]

...its cos lots of us have jobs and are just about recovering from the weekend before and saving ourselves for the weekend to come :)

However if you like loungey techhouse and other such ponce, such as 'funky house' and 'Jazzstep' (whatever the **** that is, girls?) - then there is shed loads of such wine supping bollocks in Clapham, Islington, Hoxton...

Proper nights? There's very few of them in London, full stop.

[dirty_bass]

Well, looking at quality electronic music really. Techno, Electro, Broken, glitch, deep stuff, more for groovin than gurnin`

Still looking at all the options really, as long as it`s danceable.

[jonnyspeed]

Disgression and a feeling of a private party are a good way of keeping it friendly. Londoners have a habit of being so ignorant because you don't wanna attact nutters and wankers. So the more of a network you get going for the night rather than resorting to the use the likes of time out and mix mag.

I used to go to a party where 6 organisers who all knew each other loosely invited 30 people each max. People could only get in with an organiser - everybody knew each other, or thought they should, so it was top.

There's 9.4m people live in London you've gotta be able to fill a 300 punter space on a Thursday, init.

[dirty_bass]

Yeah, but you would be suprised, venue prices are skyrocketing and it`s hard to get people to step out of the box and take a risk, rather than go the normal same old same old.
I`ve been down this path before, so I`m no newbie, I just wanna make absolutely sure that everything is really well researched before hand this time. Pushing the underground/experimental and new sounds is a difficult game, and I have been at it for a while, but it can be a little testing on your morale when people won`t try new things and except the banal time and time again.

[djvartan]

i wish you luck.
;)

[gary_human]

Yeah go for it mate, it may take a while to build up the following but you just gota follow your heart and hopefully you can build up a bit of a network with it and a nice little crowd ?!!

Id like to see Terrence Fixmer over in the UK too, but hopefully me and the other geezer on this thread who would like to hear him in a party are not the only ones?

You only live once innit . . . & . . .nothing ventured nothing gained . . .
etc . . . etc . . . etc . . . .

:lol:

[death on a stick]

Ok, well, I have finally sorted a venue (owned by the poepl who used to run the velvet rooms) for a club night. I am doing this because I find london offers little of interest these days for techno/electro heads that isn`t either banging squat music in a club (why not just go to a squat party) or techno by the old skool (mills, saunderson etc).

What I am looking to do is push new sounds, new talents, and in particular Live PA`s.

We have this venue for thursdays (so we will be filling the slot left by the end of Ultimate Base) and are looking to provide a night of Deep Techno, Electro, Glitch and Experimental. The slick end of the electronic spectrum basically. Anyone who came to our White Label nights, well we are thinking along these lines, only a little more slick.

My question is.
am I barking up the wrong tree?
and wasting my time?
Sorry if I'm repeating anything here as I've not read the whole thread.

I don't know about wasting your time - sounds like a great idea!! But you're definitely wrong about what goes on in London. The scene here, particularly for the electro/glitch/experimental side of things, has never been as healthy. Perhaps not quite as mad-busy as last year, but there are still many things to choose from, both regular and irregular.

With regard to your venue - as has been mentioned Base was in a very busy central London location that meant a lot of random walk-in trade. It also was full of industry types out for a mid-week piss-up combined with the chance to arse lick some minor techno celebs. It was (as was it's short lived successor System) also a club that revolved around the cheaper end of the techno sound spectrum and a very familiar and repetitive rota of guests, thus not as alienating as more interesting/experimental music. Actual clued up punters were in a definite minority so unless your venue is likely to attract the same walk-in trade, or your guests are going to pull a lot of punters then you will struggle - sad I know, but a fact that needs facing. 300 people is NOT a small number of people at all, especially for a Thursday night in London - it's a pretty big figure.

Good luck, keep us posted as to your progress.