Whirl-Y-Gig

Last updated

Whirl-Y-Gig is the longest-running world music dance club in London, [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] England. It was set up by Ros Madden as an experiment of the Association of Humanistic Psychology in 1981, who passed it on to the capable hands of Richard Sutcliffe also known as DJ Monkey Pilot and Mary Sutcliffe four years later. Ros Madden died on 20 October 2011 in Luton. Monkey Pilot plays a wide range of music in the club, primarily world music/dance music fusions, but also many other genres.

Whirl-Y-Gig also appears at festivals, featuring both live bands and DJ sessions. Whirl-y-Gig has hosted stages at the first Phoenix festival, seven years at WOMAD in Reading, Guilfest, Beautiful Days, Canterbury Fayre, the Whitby Musicport Festival and at the first Sunrise Celebration. They also run their own record label called Whirl-Y-Music and have organised their own festival, the Whirl-Y-Fayre, which first took place in August 2013, and has taken place every summer since.

Whirl-Y-Gig's have featured artists such as Banco de Gaia, System 7, Dreadzone, Astralasia, Eat Static, Loop Guru, Baka Beyond, Transglobal Underground, Another Green World and Kamel Nitrate.

Whirl-Y-Gig celebrated its 21st anniversary in 2002, at which point it was one of the longest-running club nights in the United Kingdom. [7] Whirl-y-Gig were still active and as popular as ever at the start of 2024.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Disc jockey</span> Person who plays recorded music for an audience

A disc jockey, more commonly abbreviated as DJ, is a person who plays recorded music for an audience. Types of DJs include radio DJs, club DJs, mobile DJs, and turntablists. Originally, the "disc" in "disc jockey" referred to shellac and later vinyl records, but nowadays DJ is used as an all-encompassing term to also describe persons who mix music from other recording media such as cassettes, CDs or digital audio files on a CDJ, controller, or even a laptop. DJs may adopt the title "DJ" in front of their real names, adopted pseudonyms, or stage names.

House is a music genre characterized by a repetitive four-on-the-floor beat and a typical tempo of 120 beats per minute as a re-emergence of 1970's disco. It was created by DJs and music producers from Chicago's underground club culture and evolved slowly in the early/mid 1980s, and as DJs began altering disco songs to give them a more mechanical beat. By early 1988, House became mainstream and supplanted the typical 80s music beat.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Stone Roses</span> English rock band

The Stone Roses were an English rock band formed in Manchester in 1983. One of the pioneering groups of the Madchester movement in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the band's classic and most prominent lineup consisted of vocalist Ian Brown, guitarist John Squire, bassist Mani and drummer Reni.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Glastonbury Festival</span> Performing-arts festival in Somerset, England

Glastonbury Festival is a five-day festival of contemporary performing arts held near Pilton, Somerset, England in most summers. In addition to contemporary music, the festival hosts dance, comedy, theatre, circus, cabaret, and other arts. Leading pop and rock artists have headlined, alongside thousands of others appearing on smaller stages and performance areas. Films and albums have been recorded at the festival, and it receives extensive television and newspaper coverage.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Electroclash</span> Music genre

Electroclash is a genre of popular music that fuses 1980s electro, new wave and synth-pop with 1990s techno, retro-style electropop and electronic dance music. It emerged in the late 1990s and was pioneered by and associated with acts such as I-F, DJ Hell, Miss Kittin and The Hacker, and Fischerspooner.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Peter Hook</span> English musician

Peter Hook is an English musician, best known as the bassist and co-founder of the rock bands Joy Division and New Order. Hook often used the bass as a lead instrument, playing melodies on the high strings with a signature heavy chorus effect. In New Order, he would do this, leaving the actual basslines to keyboards or sequencers.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">World of Music, Arts and Dance</span> International arts festival

WOMAD is an international arts festival. The central aim of WOMAD is to celebrate the world's many forms of music, arts and dance.

EMF are an English alternative rock band from Cinderford, Gloucestershire, who came to prominence at the beginning of the 1990s. During their initial eight-year run, from 1989 to 1997, the band released three studio albums before a hiatus. Their first single, "Unbelievable", reached number 3 on the UK Singles Chart, and was a number 1 hit on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. Their debut album, Schubert Dip, went to number 3 on the UK Albums Chart. In April 2022, EMF released their first album of new material in 27 years, Go Go Sapiens.

The Boardwalk was a nightclub in Manchester, England, which was open from 1986 to 1999. This medium-sized club, owned by David, Colin and Donald Sinclair, was a popular live music venue and nightclub in the late 1980s and early 1990s. It had multiple floors, with a rehearsal space in the basement.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">John Cipollina</span> American guitarist

John Cipollina was a guitarist best known for his role as a founder and the lead guitarist of the prominent San Francisco rock band Quicksilver Messenger Service. After leaving Quicksilver he formed the band Copperhead, was a member of the San Francisco All Stars and later played with numerous other bands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Arctic Monkeys</span> English rock band

Arctic Monkeys are an English rock band formed in Sheffield in 2002. The group consists of lead singer Alex Turner, drummer Matt Helders, guitarist Jamie Cook and bassist Nick O'Malley. Former bassist Andy Nicholson left the band in 2006 shortly after their debut album was released.

Joi is a British alternative dub/dance music DJ team of Bangladeshi origin, originally composed of brothers Farook and Haroon Shamsher. Haroon died on 8 July 1999, and the remaining brother has continued Joi alone.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Leadmill</span> Music venue in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England

The Leadmill is the longest running live music venue and nightclub in Sheffield, England, based on Leadmill Road, lying on the southeast edge of the city centre. It opened in 1980 in a former flour mill, originally a Community Centre.

Electronic dance music (EDM) is a broad range of percussive electronic music genres originally made for nightclubs, raves, and festivals. It is generally produced for playback by DJs who create seamless selections of tracks, called a DJ mix, by segueing from one recording to another. EDM producers also perform their music live in a concert or festival setting in what is sometimes called a live PA. Since its inception EDM has expanded to include a wide range of subgenres.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bicycle Race</span> 1978 single by Queen

"Bicycle Race" is a song by the British rock band Queen. It was released on their 1978 album Jazz and written by Queen's lead singer Freddie Mercury. It was released as a double A-side single together with the song "Fat Bottomed Girls", reaching number 11 in the UK Singles Chart and number 24 in the Billboard Hot 100 in the US. The song is included in their 1981 Greatest Hits compilation.

Jon Carter is an English electronic musician. He initially rose to prominence in the 1990s as a big beat DJ. However, as his career progressed both his productions and his DJ sets became known for including a variety of musical styles. From 2004 onwards, he began to scale back his DJing due to tinnitus, but simultaneously launched a second career as a businessman, co-founding a company that runs a chain of live music pubs across London.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dingwalls</span> Live music and comedy venue

Dingwalls Dancehall is a live music and comedy venue adjacent to Camden Lock, Camden, London, England. The building itself is one of many industrial Victorian buildings that were put to new use in the 20th century. The original owner of the building, T.E. Dingwall, had his name painted on to the outside wall of the building, which was a common practice by businesses in Camden Town during the late Victorian era. The paint is still visible to this day, hence the venue's name.

Orchestral pop is pop music that has been arranged and performed by a symphonic orchestra. It may also be conflated with the terms symphonic pop or chamber pop.

Jazz is a popular musical style in Birmingham and has been so since the 1920s. Venues such as the Birmingham Palais pioneered British jazz and lead to the establishment of a string of jazz clubs in the city such as The Rhythm Club and the Hot Club. Today jazz remains a prominent part of the cities culture; events such as the Harmonic Festival, the Mostly Jazz Festival and the annual International Jazz Festival run each year along with Birmingham Jazz, an organisation that promotes and commissions dozens of jazz concerts every year.

Jeff Dexter is a British disc jockey (DJ), club promoter, record producer and former dancer, who rose to prominence in the mid-1960s as the resident DJ at the influential London club Middle Earth. He is closely associated with the Mod scene and popularising The Twist in England.

References

  1. Sue-Ellen Case; Philip Brett; Susan Leigh Foster (1 July 2000). Decomposition: Post-Disciplinary Performance. Indiana University Press. pp. 145–. ISBN   978-0-253-21374-7 . Retrieved 24 July 2012.
  2. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. (28 October 1995). Billboard. Nielsen Business Media, Inc. pp.  52–. ISSN   0006-2510 . Retrieved 24 July 2012.{{cite book}}: |author= has generic name (help)
  3. Victor J Kennedy (1 January 2008). Hypomanic- Mad in England. Chipmunkapublishing ltd. pp. 43–. ISBN   978-1-84747-419-3 . Retrieved 24 July 2012.
  4. Timothy Dean Taylor (12 October 2001). Strange sounds: music, technology & culture . Routledge. ISBN   978-0-415-93683-5 . Retrieved 24 July 2012.
  5. Jonathan Buckley; Justin Lewis; Rough Guides (Firm) (1996). Rock: the rough guide. Rough Guides. ISBN   978-1-85828-201-5 . Retrieved 24 July 2012.
  6. Musical opinion supplement. Musical Opinion. July 2002. Retrieved 24 July 2012.
  7. Deborah Schofield (6 August 2002). "Holistic hedonism - Silks and incense still uplift clubbers' senses as Whirl-y-gig celebrates its 21st anniversary". The Guardian . Retrieved 2 May 2020.