In the first two years of the millennium, the dance scene at large had become overblown and was stagnating. There was unavoidable evidence in the summer of 2002 when superclub Cream announced they were shutting their doors in Liverpool, and Ministry of Sound closed their magazine, triggering a spate of “dance music is dead” articles in the press. It wasn’t hard to see why 18-year-olds were looking elsewhere for their kicks. They found the Strokes’ Is This It and the White Stripes’ White Blood Cells a more exciting proposition than hearing their older brother’s tales of having it large in Ibiza.
The singles from these two albums were certainly featuring heavily in a Monday club I had started to attend: Erol Alkan’s Trash at The End in London. Erol’s club attracted girls and boys sartorially inspired by Peaches and Julian Casablancas – it immediately felt new and fresh. I had gone to the club to interview Erol for Jockey Slut about his singular approach to DJing; he’d play electro-pop by the likes of Tiga, Felix Da Housecat and Ladytron alongside his own bootlegs and unlikely mixes (Fischerspooner segued into the Smiths). Though Bugged Out was still very much about straight-up house and techno, we decided to try Erol out at our monthly night at the recently opened Fabric, slotting him into the smaller third room. He was an instant hit – in fact, the reaction was incendiary. He also didn’t look like a regular DJ. Where most seemed to opt for a V-neck jumper or plain T-shirt, Erol looked like one of the Ramones. We gave him a monthly residency on the spot and took him to our nights in Manchester and Liverpool, where he had a similar effect on an audience who hadn’t a clue who he was. By the end of his sets, people were clamouring to find out his name. Up to this point I hadn’t seen anything like it in a club, such fervour for something new. It proved that a big change was needed to shake up the old guard – ourselves included.
Other like-minded DJs very quickly became known, such as the Dewaele Brothers from art-rock band Soulwax. They had a DJ sideline called 2manydjs, and their genre-hopping compilation, As Heard on Radio Soulwax Part 2, was a pre-mixed party cocktail that went on to sell in huge numbers. While Erol and Soulwax came from more of a rock background alongside New York’s LCD Soundsystem and the Rapture, a lot of the acts who became associated with what briefly became known as electro-clash were DJs and artists with techno roots. Tiga, Miss Kittin and DJ Hell were the pivotal players, with the latter putting out salacious techno by charismatic artists through his International Deejay Gigolos imprint in Munich.
We had been booking Hell since the mid-1990s, so he turned to us to stage a label showcase in December 2001 that we put on at London’s Heaven. That night was a further game-changer for us and many who witnessed it. Miss Kittin came on stage wrapped from head-to-toe in white swaddling bands, which when unwrapped revealed a leather catsuit. Her eye makeup was inspired by the character Pris in Blade Runner, and her vocal delivery flat and monotone over stark electronica. It was startling. Pete Tong never made such an entrance.
New club nights sprung up to reflect the new breed, the enticingly named Nag Nag Nag, Electric Stew, 21st Century Bodyrockers and Return to New York in London alone. Nag had a DIY aesthetic coupled with a throwback to the new romantic and punk era and DJs named JoJo De Freq, Fil OK and Jonny Slut. Some of their patrons looked like they’d stripped naked, covered themselves in glue and run through Topshop, allowing whatever stuck to be worn out. One chap came to the club with a butternut squash taped to his head. These diversions aside, the music was fantastic – by acts like Vitalic, David Carretta and Black Strobe – and a marked difference to the linear prog house still soundtracking most of London. For many, myself included, it was the most exciting time to go to clubs since acid house in 1988, and seeing the likes of S-Express’s Mark Moore and Jack the Tab’s Richard Norris from that era in regular attendance at Nag and Trash seemed to confirm this.
For Bugged Out, these new sounds and arrivals provided the shot in the arm we needed. We were excited again and embarked on what would become our longest-running residency with a venue, at The End in London. It was time for us to embrace and support what had inspired us. Erol Alkan continued his residency, making the second room a riot each time, and we were soon joined by JoJo De Freq, with Miss Kittin and Tiga becoming regular fixtures. As we threw this door open, another started to close. The numbers at our large rave-up in Liverpool, which had been running for five years, started to dwindle. Running a 4,000-capacity night was at odds with the time. As clubbers eventually turned to more intimate venues, we held our finale there in September 2003.
