From: DJ Barrie Jay
The Twisted Wheel club was just a dank dark cellar of a club with long corridors and a low ceiling. I cannot recall all of the dj`s names without reference but the main one was a guy called Steve. The residents played a mixture of early r`n`b (some of it from the very early sixties), amercian soul that was released on UK labels and a few pioneering records like `Mr Bang Bang Man` and, of course, much Tamla Motown. They had a lot of live artists on - the full list would astound you - and the dj`s ventured more into the american market for the more upbeat soulful records that they liked. The first ever `rare` record
`Baby Reconsider` by Leon Haywood was one of the biggest tunes at the club.
Two momemtous events then set the birthplace of Northern Soul firnly in the history books (or should do).
The record collection was stolen from The Twisted Wheel. The resident dj`s and the owners had to turn to a friend who had a large record collection of similar music (again I cannot recall this name without reference but I will find it for you if you are still interetsed) but he had concentrated more on buying american imports. This lead to a lot more american soul being played in the club and more interest in importing records.
The second event was the closure of the club.
On the last night (I recall the dj`s were only told it was closing on the actual night, and also Edwin Starr was perforing live) instead of taking the safe route and playing all the clubs classics the residents (that now included the guy who `donated` his records in the first emergency) played a lot of new amercian material and well as many classics. The crowd went wild and that was how it all started and led to The Torch, Va-Va`s, The Highland Room at Blackpool Mecca, Wgan Casino and all.
For reading material you would have to do your own research. Any book on Northern Soul should mention the club although there are some very dodgy books around like Russ Winstanley`s (re-writing of) history of Wigan Casino.
The Northern Soul story is told very very well in Ian Levine`s triple video (maybe DVD by now) on the Motorcity label. The trouble is it features all the old soul artists miming to updated versions of old classics and it gets very very tedious to watch after a few songs and it does plug a lot of Motorcity music. But it tells the full story, warts and all and has some very interesting facts. If features all of the dj`s I have mentioned telling their own story.
