Electro Swing Club - London

It is to my great shame that I had never been to this event, even though it is the longest running in London - the timing has always been a bit of an issue - the third Saturday of each month is quite some distance from payday and funds always seem to be a bit low. This month was different as it was the Hon Rumple Fuddly's birthday, so a group of us trooped over from West London to Liverpool Street and thence to The Book Club on Great Eastern Street.

Clearly the length of time that this event has been running has worked in its favour, as when we approached we were rather surprised to find a huge queue. Using a certain amount of chicanery we were able to bypass this and get out of the rain pretty quickly.

The venue, which covers two floors, is pretty big, but there were a lot of people there. The ground floor, which has lots of seating, played host to Aunty Maureen's Silent Disco, which looked like it was drawing lots of Shoreditch locals. Downstairs was the main dancefloor, where DJs Globalution, Woolfie, and Kitten and the Hip played some great tunes.

We decided that we would rather be downstairs, but there was not a lot of seating. A little exploration revealed a small room at the back, so we piled in there, only to be told that it was a private party. Happily, Ruth, the guest of honour at that party, graciously allowed us to take a table as a base of operations - thanks to her we achieved our second blag of the night.

From this auspicious start things just got better. The DJs surpassed themselves time and again. The real climax of the evening for me was the final set from DJ Woolfie. His swingstep and swing-hop set completely blew my mind. One track in particular, a remix of Dead Prez's "Hip Hop" was so pleasing that I had to go and ask him what it was - it turned out to be the first track on this little mix from DJ Twister.
  Swing Session Vol. 1 (preview) available now at JunoDownload by Dj Twister

All in all I think it was probably the best electro-swing night I have been to. The main dance floor had just enough space for some vigourous dancing, without being empty, and the people were extremely friendly. I love to see other people really getting into the music, so it was especially nice to be able to share a couple of dances with complete strangers - a sign, I feel, of the friendliness of the crowd.

In the absence of any pictures from the night, I offer you instead this rather lovely little mix from Woolfie. The title says it all really. Note that the whole mix is available for download from Soundcloud.

Wolfie - Razzmatazz Whomp Concerto no.5 by Wolfie Razzmatazz