Is this the future for nightclubbing? Bring your own alcohol nights

It is reported today that a club owner has come up with a novel way to try and beat the recession. He is allowing people to bring their own alcohol with them.  Bob Senior, who runs a Durham Live Club in Durham, said his industry had been wrecked by supermarkets selling cheap alcohol.  And in what appears to be case of 'if you can't beat them, join them', he is charging an entry fee, but allowing customers to provide their own drink.  While the practice is common in restaurants that don't have an alcohol licence, it is thought to be the first time a nightclub has made such a move.

I say this sound like a great way to make regular clubbing accessible again.  And if more people go out others will surely follow,  Currently there are just to many nights when you go into a club and its empty.  It certainly doesn't make me want to stay when they are like that.  People like crowds, lets fill these clubs up again before the whole nightclub industry closes and innovative ideas like this should be welcomed.  For to long only Student nights seem to have been target with price innovations on drinks....

How long until local councils ban the practice...?  

Nightclub business suffering some more as Luminar goes bust

Today it was announced that the biggest nightclub operator in the country has gone bust.  Luminar that has for a decade been the biggest operator throughout the country has finally run out of cash. First the extending of opening hours to pubs had an impact, then the smoking ban and finally the recession has meant the under 25's just don't have the money to go out.

Its will be sad for so many clubs to close and people to potentially lose their jobs it is perhaps an opportunity for independent operators to fill the void that has been created with potential much more creative offerings and perhaps the news ideas may reignite people desires to go clubbing again.....

Watch out for future episodes of Skins they are going raving..perhaps...

A little inside info for those that watch the C4 program Skins. Looks like some of the cast are going to be ravers in a coming episode as the production company has bought some raving t-shirts from us for them to wear.... featuring the Rave Not War t-shirt, we can't wait to see them on screen. Now maybe they should all come down to Fantazia @ Motion in Bristol on the 31st March 2012. They would have a blast ;)

You can buy the shirt on this link http://raveclothing.spreadshirt.co.uk/rave-not-war-A6848524/customize/color/5

You can get it in your choice of colours or sizes

Are we all getting old or is it just me? RIP Darryl Pandy & Dance Music on Radio 2

It seems dance music is perhaps no longer cutting edge.  Now I had a creeping feeling it was the case being that it is over 20 years since I first starting listening to the music but it does take a few news stories to bring it home.   The first today being the death of one of the early pioneers Darryl Pandy who did the vocals on one of the first house tunes, Love Cant Turn Around by Farley Jackmaster Funk.  It says something when a scene has been going long enough for people to start dying.  I guess its an age thing but as time goes by we will have more of these stories (hopefully not about any of the Crew for a while at least).  Sad news anyway and my feeling go out to his family.

The second news story was that Radio 2 are doing a dance music tribute day.  For a radio station known for hosts like Terry Wogan and playing classical music and operas to play dance music is a sign that we are getting old without a doubt.  As their older existing audience dies off they are clearly lining up a new generation of middle aged, greying ravers to take their place.  So the questions is should we hold onto what we listened to in our youth or give up and listen to something more appropriate for our age? I say no!  But please just don't play it to loud it makes my head hurt  :)

Myspace cuts back with 30% job losses

Showing that the Internet does not stand still and last years hot think can quickly become yesterdays thing Myspace have slashed 30% off their staff this week due to a drop in revenue and traffic... I am not surprised. We stopped actively supporting Myspace some time ago. It had not moved on and there ununiformed look of the user generated pages really made my eyes hurt. Facebook really has taken over from it as the place to be. How long until that gets obsolete? I can think of numerous problems including the increasing amounts of spam daily! Plus its really hard to track down someone you know, it needs better search functionality especially for common names where there can be 100's to trawl through

Darren Styles Skydivin album

Its a sign of the strength of the UK Hardcore rave scene that artist like Darren Styles have the confidence to release albums of their own work and get them TV advertised. To justify the expense sales must be good and only a more mainstream audience could get the numbers. UK Hardcore is in good health and long may that continue. With a teenage (15) daughter I know that her friends are really into the music. Some people laugh at the kids, but these are next years audience and a sign that future growth will come in the parties as they turn their aspirations from spending on the music and merchandise into actually going to the events.

It was the same back in 1992, and I have posted about this before with the flyer collecting etc.

Now when am I going to get my review copy Mr Styles. Oh well we can hear it all in September as he is one of the headline acts for Fantazia Heroes 3D

Resist and Amato Distribution bust

Sad news but to companies involved in the dance scene have gone bust in the last month. Amato had been distributing vinyl for many dance labels since as long as I can remember, but seems to have been a victim of the change in peoples buying habits, and I am sure will be replaced. We hope not to many labels lost to much money in the financial mess left behind.

Resist Music (which was formed out of Reacts failure) hits us a little closure to home. Resist were a compilation company and released the Bonkers Series as well as Hardcore Heaven and other releases and was due to release a new Fantazia compilation in December. Sadly that wont know be happening which is a great disappointment to us as we had put in a considerable amount of time and effort. Financially it doesnt effect us, but we were looking forward to bringing you our choice of the best tunes from the past 20 years all mixed by legends Bass Generator, Altern8 and Top Buzz.

Oh well back to the drawing board!

Dance news delivered to you free weekly.....

If you are passionate about dance music, but like to keep up to date with whats happening in the various scenes around the world, then I can recommend the ezine that I get each weekend. Establish over 4 years ago and now up to issue 329 Skrufff news is packed with funny, ironic, topical dance stories.

Oh and you can this week read a short interview with my views on the rave scene and Fantazia....you new there had to be more to this piece!

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We hope to book Skrufff as a DJ at a future Fantazia to....

Anti Youth noise turned into a Dance record.....

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/so...ast/5382324.stm

This is a great story. A tune has been released based on an Anti teenager alarm that emits a buzzing noise that appartently only younger ears can hear and was meant to be annoying. What a great idea to turn it from something annoying in to a tune and secret ringtone. Youth always make things their own leaving us oldsters behind.

I'm to old to hear it , so any one tell me what its like?