Sundissential
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sundissential is a music event formed in Birmingham, England, in the mid- to late 1990s. Hosted in various venues in the city the event originally took place as an 'after club hours' event specifically designed and crafted for clubbers who refused to 'go home' after a hard night of dancing to their favorite DJs. The events still take place across Birmingham and the wider world today.
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[edit] Culture
According to its often fanatical followers, what really sets Sundissential apart from other clubs is its legendary open and friendly atmosphere. Commonly people arrived at the club in fancy dress or elaborate outfits making them immediately appear dramatically different from other people attending more mainstream nightclubs.
Gatecrasher, another famous British club, this time in the city of Sheffield spawned a similar phenomenon with its so called 'Crasher Kids' who were revellers adorned in fluorescent colours and faux cybernetic bodily additions. This mode of dress was, initially at least, restricted very much to this particular club. Similarly regular attendees of Sundissential have their own styles differing from those indigenous to other clubs, usually consisting of fancy dress or outfits of a 'mad' nature.
The Sundissential phenomenon also spread to London during the summer of 1998, hosting an all day event at Heaven nightclub every Sunday for a duration of 4 months, before taking up a residency at The Aquarium club in Old Street. The Resident DJs were Pete Wardman (Kiss FM/Trade) and Kei (The Wag Club) joined by Boy George, Anne Savage, Lisa Lashes, Sonique and Judge Jules. The London promoters were Dan Prince and Kirk Field from Mixmag.
[edit] Music
Music played at Sundissential is of the highly commercial, formulaic and mainstream hard house subgenre. Despite bearing the name hard house, Hard-House arguably has more in common with happy hardcore music than it does with the quality House music of 1980's Chicago (Itself a descendant of Disco music.) Where the latter has soulful grooves and vocals, the former is often electronic, highly repetitive with very little difference in sound between tracks. In the early days Sundissential was unusual in its promotion of this style of dance music, while other contemporaries of the time were concentrating on less frenetic true house variants, or as in the case of Gatecrasher, Trance music. This distinction in musical styles evidently served to increase the identity that people felt with Sundissential.
Many other clubs now play Hard House music and other genres that are synergistic with it. Indeed many of these clubs recreate, or attempt to recreate the 'fast and hard' ethos of the original Sundissential. Some of these clubs arose out of the demand of Sundissential regulars for yet another place to go after Sundissential on Saturday nights (an additional event to the occasional and original Sundissential on Sundays.)
Notable DJs include but are by no means exhausted by:
Tony de Vit (a Sundissential legend and original regular who died in 1998), Fergie, Andy Farley, Lisa Lashes, Paul Kershaw and Nick Rafferty.
[edit] Controversy
In later years Sundissential was a troubled entity. Most notably due to the fact that in 2000 three people died at Sundissential events. These deaths were linked to the taking of drugs including ecstasy. Subsequently the club was raided bypolice, causing problems for venue managers and the promoters of Sundissential, Paul 'Madders' Madan and Danny Kirk and the promoters had difficulties in finding suitable venues at which to hold their events. A series of chaotic changes of venue from 2001 onwards coincided with internal problems and falling attendances.
The club retained a loyal following and was still hosting successful though infrequent occasional events despite regular predictions of its imminent demise over the previous three years, when, in November 2005, Paul Madan announced publicly that the club would close finally in early 2006.
Although Sundissential celebrates its 10th Birthday with a huge party in November at the infamous home of Sundissential, The Sanctuary.
