"Don't watch the DJ, YOU're the show." and the Design of Clubs

[Crispy]

Have been asking elsewhere but forgot to try here too.
So I'm still doing my architecture postgrad and have decided to study nightclubs (and other spaces for dance music).
One aspect I want to focus on is the "standing in rows watching a show" vs. social dancing, TAZ etc.
I could swear there's a KLF essay on the topic but that might just be me misremembering because they're cited in good 'ol TRANCECRACKER.

The Trancecracker!

This from a few years ago too:

Dancing: Schrödinger’s Cliche

Harold Heath takes another look at the 'people-don't-dance-anymore-they-just-stand-watching-the DJ' discourse. Late last year, I and thousands of others

www.attackmagazine.com

Any other articles/essays spring to anyone's mind? I'm looking for some quotable writing on the topic, and more generally anyone's thoughts on how the design (layout, proportions etc.) of a club can make it good or bad for The Party to form.

Any notably good clubs from a spatial point of view? Good for the dancing? good for the chillout area? etc.

Cheers

 

[yield]

This sort of thing? Typology: Nightclub - The Architectural Review

 

[Crispy]

This sort of thing? Typology: Nightclub - The Architectural Review

I'm more keen to hear it from the clubber's POV....

 

[rubbershoes]

One aspect could be that the advent of phones has altered what some clubbers want from a night out. Rather than just going mad on the dancefloor 90s style with no real interest where the DJ booth is, I think some modern clubbers want something to film. They expect a show, either from the DJ clowning around or from lights.

Do clubs need to be set up like auditoriums with lines of sight to the centre? The popular venues could be the ones that provide this.

I haven't set foot in a club for 20ish years so could well be talking bollocks

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

Any notably good clubs from a spatial point of view? Good for the dancing? good for the chillout area? etc.

The original Tresor - basically a low ceilinged cellar with the DJ booth stuck in a cage on one side. Perfect for that sort of music, dark and intense. No DJ worshipping for sure.

 

[Crispy]

They expect a show, either from the DJ clowning around or from lights.

Do clubs need to be set up like auditoriums with lines of sight to the centre? The popular venues could be the ones that provide this.

I am deliberately postitioning my argument against this notion

 

[editor]

The last thing I want when I'm DJing is to have people looking at me like I'm supposed to bust a cool DJ move or something.

 

[rutabowa]

Plastic People jumped to mind for some reason, theres a few good quotes here

Plastic People Remembered by the People Who Shaped It

Instead of a dour obituary, we asked a few people involved with the club to share their memories.

www.vice.com

was at this night among many others around then, they were my favourite club experiences... just going on your own after work for a few hours, no need to talk to anyone, just bobbing in a cloud of smoke

 

[Spandex]

Rooms set up like an auditorium with a focus at the front encourage people to stand facing forward looking at the stage, like they're at a gig or the theatre.

Rooms that are round/square with no stage or prominent DJ booth encourage the focus to be the dancefloor.

Club UK in Wandsworth was great. I can't even remember where the DJ booths were there. The back room looked like this (though in my memory it was full of people loosing their shit to banging techno):

The front room had steps down to a lowered central dancefloor with seating and a bar around the walls, making the dancefloor the thing to look at if you weren't on the dancefloor.

 

[pbsmooth]

great thing to study and write about.

there was a splurge of articles like this a few years ago and stuff on social media.

Facing the DJ: Is it time to look away? 👀 - Electric ⚡

The age-old debate about the do’s and don’ts of the dancefloor is an endless conversation fueled purely by the opinions of club and festival goers alike. Pragmatically there are no right answers, but it sure is fun to sift through the comment sections of Reddit, Instagram, and Twitter when...

electricradio.co.uk

this article mentions Despacio which was all about the sound system, big speakers placed around the danceloor: "James Murphy and 2ManyDJs Despacio project, who almost hide themselves behind a set up geared toward an optimal audio experience. The DJs are tucked away in a barely lit corner, while the rest of room is exploding in a mirage of reflected light and flailing bodies"

If You're Facing the DJ, You're Doing Dance Music Wrong v

Why are we hardwired to stare at the selector?

www.vice.com

I went to one of their nights and it was pretty great and definitely a very different feel with the DJs hidden away - forced you to connect more with the music, sound system and your fellow dancers.

 

[editor]

Where I DJ the people they're tend to dance and look at the people they're with rather than at me. And that suits me just fine!



Plus I have a big video screen covering half of the DJ booth, so there's even less reason to look at me.

 

[RevolutionSound]

You read this?

Out Of Space by Jim Ottewill

Jim Ottewill's Out of Space book maps the UK towns and cities where electronic music has thrived and where it might be headed next.

velocitypress.uk

 

[zedr]

I think the Boiler Room has a lot to answer for this. I'm sure it was an issue before, but those fucking videos prioritise the DJ and often mock the people dancing behind. It's the antithesis of what listening and dancing to music in a club should be.

Sorry, know that's not helping your ideas around architecture tho. Really interesting thread.

 

[pbsmooth]

I think the Boiler Room has a lot to answer for this. I'm sure it was an issue before, but those fucking videos prioritise the DJ and often mock the people dancing behind. It's the antithesis of what listening and dancing to music in a club should be.

Sorry, know that's not helping your ideas around architecture tho. Really interesting thread.

absolutely.

not helped by by covid, when everyone started showing streaming DJs, and then more obviously social media and the desire/need for promo videos of DJs on decks dancing around like clowns.

 

[May Kasahara]

Stating the obvious, but I think the utilisation of spaces not designed for this specific purpose has an influence in terms of focus on The Party rather than the DJ. One of the best nights I ever went to was a Lost in some disused office block in North London - one whole floor each for the main room and back room, so the dancefloor was just an empty space with some pillars dotted about and four strobes pointing inwards No raised up booth, so no focus of attention, which meant that even though Mills was tearing it up on three decks right there it was still not enough to pull your focus away from the happy mayhem in the crowd.

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

I think it predates Boiler Room and Covid tbh.

To me a lot of it is down to the prevalence of 'rockist' values as the indicator of worth. That music is all about the thrusting, stereotypically male, creator showing off while everyone looks on. Not seen it for a while but remember on here when you'd get someone popping up going on about how DJs don't even write their own music etc etc, and then there'd be pushback about how it's just as valid. So you get the DJ taking on that role. And actually I think they have a point in a way, that a good DJ set is actually the result of loads of different people's input, I just disagree that that's a problem or less valid. But I do think the DJ as rock star is a negative thing on the whole.

 

[pbsmooth]

fair point. the rise of the superstar DJ. and the DJ as the focus of the night rather than the night itself/music/event.

 

[editor]

I think the Boiler Room has a lot to answer for this. I'm sure it was an issue before, but those fucking videos prioritise the DJ and often mock the people dancing behind. It's the antithesis of what listening and dancing to music in a club should be.

Sorry, know that's not helping your ideas around architecture tho. Really interesting thread.

Not that I'd ever get invited of course, but those Boiler Room videos are toe curlingly naff.

I'm all for people dancing on the stage (although rarely allowed, sadly) but the thought of having a shedload of preening dancers behind me fills me with dread.

I guess those vids may be partly possible for DJs constantly tweaking knobs and sliders to no audible effect because you've got to be seen doing something I guess.

 

[Crispy]

Good stuff everyone, keep it coming

Of course it's impossible to find floor plans for most clubs so I might have to try recreating them based on photos/videos. Fabric have some plans on their event hire page though:


(that place really does have too many stairs).

As with Tresor mentioned upthread, and so many other classic venues, this space wasn't designed to be a club. You have to squeeze past tight corners, benches and seats are crammed into corners, you can get lost in the bogs, the stairs are like an Escher print. That kind of awkward transformation is hard to reproduce!

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

Also - railway arches (x too many venues to start listing). Partly that's just being allowed to make a noise there of course but they really do work don't they.

 

[spitfire]

Good stuff everyone, keep it coming

Of course it's impossible to find floor plans for most clubs so I might have to try recreating them based on photos/videos. Fabric have some plans on their event hire page though:

View attachment 447450
(that place really does have too many stairs).

As with Tresor mentioned upthread, and so many other classic venues, this space wasn't designed to be a club. You have to squeeze past tight corners, benches and seats are crammed into corners, you can get lost in the bogs, the stairs are like an Escher print. That kind of awkward transformation is hard to reproduce!

I might be able to get you a floorplan of The End, will ask the question.

Their DJ booth was right in the middle of the floor, designed to be amongst the dancers almost. Worked well. It was a little bit raised but only a couple of feet max.

 

[BigMoaner]

Some of the best nights I’ve ever had was at the jungle night Movement in Brixton church by the green in the early 00s. The dj was in the pulpit and the rest of the church was the club. The fanciest decor was perhaps a few neon signs. Incredible beautiful nights.

 

[Crispy]

Also - railway arches (x too many venues to start listing). Partly that's just being allowed to make a noise there of course but they really do work don't they.

A railway arch with one dodgily-plumbed toilet is the Minimum Viable Product of nightclubs

 

[Monkeygrinder's Organ]

A railway arch with one dodgily-plumbed toilet is the Minimum Viable Product of nightclubs

And all the better for it. 99% chance of being way more fun than whatever the other end of the scale is.

 

[Orang Utan]

I have fond memories of The Orbit being perfectly designed for dancing.
Someone recreated it in Minecraft. I can’t find the full tour though, just this:

 

[BristolEcho]

Have been asking elsewhere but forgot to try here too.
So I'm still doing my architecture postgrad and have decided to study nightclubs (and other spaces for dance music).
One aspect I want to focus on is the "standing in rows watching a show" vs. social dancing, TAZ etc.
I could swear there's a KLF essay on the topic but that might just be me misremembering because they're cited in good 'ol TRANCECRACKER.

The Trancecracker!

View attachment 447422

This from a few years ago too:

Dancing: Schrödinger’s Cliche

Harold Heath takes another look at the 'people-don't-dance-anymore-they-just-stand-watching-the DJ' discourse. Late last year, I and thousands of others

www.attackmagazine.com

Any other articles/essays spring to anyone's mind? I'm looking for some quotable writing on the topic, and more generally anyone's thoughts on how the design (layout, proportions etc.) of a club can make it good or bad for The Party to form.

Any notably good clubs from a spatial point of view? Good for the dancing? good for the chillout area? etc.

Cheers

DVS1 has said a lot about this so it might be worth looking for some of his interviewes.

 

[nagapie]

Apropos of nothing but I hate looking at people when I'm dancing so yay DJ booths.

I also regard the DJs I go to see as artists so why shouldn't you look at them.

 

[May Kasahara]

Some of the best nights I’ve ever had was at the jungle night Movement in Brixton church by the green in the early 00s. The dj was in the pulpit and the rest of the church was the club. The fanciest decor was perhaps a few neon signs. Incredible beautiful nights.

Yeah, a focal point doesn't necessarily detract from a joyful collective experience. I only ever went to the Que Club once (Atomic Jam) but that vast main room was big enough so that the tiers of people all focusing towards the front were still able to be lost in their own little micro communities. Although I should point out that I was unbelievably wasted that night, so my memories are possibly somewhat rose tinted

 

[zedr]

I wonder if decor helps this too. I first started raving to psytrance at tribe of frog and their nights are beautifully decked out in all sorts if psychedelic garb which helped you to get lost in the night. It also helped that it was usually at Lakota which (as far as I can remember) has tiny cubbyhole DJ booths.

 

[BigMoaner]

Anyone remember Escape from Samsara at the Fridge. Wild.