When the West went dayglo

When Venue arrived in 1982, clubbing as we know it today didn’t exist. Dance culture thrived in the margins, at b-boy house parties and soundsystem ‘blues’ in St Pauls, but it wasn’t the mass participation sport we know today. John Stapleton, who's been a major player in the West’s dance scene since the 80s, remembers it well: “Discos were like the old Locarno – chart music, watered down drinks and an underlying threat of violence.” Back then, Stapleton was the Friday resident at The Western Star Domino Club, an establishment whose very name gives an insight into the make-do spirit of the times. “It was an underground thing that very few people were involved in,” he says.

[More...]