In the early days of nights like FWD>>, at east London's Plastic People, the atmosphere was more like a house party; familiar faces from in and around the industry, shuffling imperceptibly alongside hardened soundsystem nerds. But considering it started out, back in 2001, as a tiny residency in a dingy London basement, the legacy FWD>> created for the UK's underground, breaking the likes of Kode9 and Mala, is unrivalled.
Meanwhile, across town at Notting Hill Arts Club's YoYo, a blend of the best in new bass and hip-hop had kids queuing round the block so they had a chance of being in the background of snaps of Seb Chew casually LOL-ing next to Mark Ronson. Both had an air of exclusivity, which – from the outside looking in – made attendees look like horrible, cool-elitist monsters. But, if you were in, it was exciting, organic and, yes, wonderfully non-inclusive. These were nights strictly for the music heads.
So where are the modern-day equivalents of these incubators of the future? Nowhere to be seen. Small, loyally attended events look thin on the ground, appearing to have been largely replaced in clubbers' affections by the large, must-pre-book events like Manchester's Warehouse Project and stay-over weekends where Butlin's is transformed into a gurn-fest like Bugged Out!.
For some this is a cause for concern, but I'm optimistic about the future. I'm not going to state the obvious by pointing out that this is because the way we consume music is totally different from five years ago but... well, the way we consume music is totally different from five years ago.
In FWD>>'s day, online music promotion didn't really extend further than hoping your profile got into someone's MySpace Top 8. Twitter was still a weird website nobody had any clue how to use, rather than a scary social media juggernaut where a PR-unmediated comment from a pop star can legitimately be quoted on BBC News. Club music still lived in nights that built reputations through word-of-mouth and things called "flyers".
With the internet enabling a new access to underground artists, realisation dawned among the major labels that club music wasn't just the cheeky young scamp of the industry. Now, people no longer discover new music at their favourite nights, because every blog races to get tracks online the millisecond they're uploaded. Once-underground names can now demand luxury fees, and America has even given club music its own acronym. If the lure of the sweatpant still lingers, club connoisseurs can stick on a stream of the insanely popular Boiler Room or any one of its counterparts, like Just Jam. Failing that, there's always Rinse FM for a bedroom rave. You don't even have to destroy a coathanger to pick it up any more.
So, you could get histrionic about the death of club culture, but you'd be wasting valuable laptop time that could be spent, y'know, enjoying music.
