FEATURE:
Kings and Queens of The Dublin Castle
IN THIS PHOTO: Camden’s favourite daughter, Amy Winehouse, captured in 2004/PHOTO CREDIT: Ram Shergill
The Historic Camden Music Scene
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WHILST this feature is not especially Christmassy…
or related to the new year, Camden (Camden Town) will be celebrated and in the limelight in 2020. My favourite radio station, BBC Radio 6 Music, are heading to Camden to host a range of fantastic artists. It is an area of London that is synonymous with great music and, through the years, has housed some of our most-loved artists. Here are more details regarding the event:
“The BBC has announced that the 2020 edition of its 6 Music Festival will take place in Camden. Do they still have music in Camden? I guess they will between 6-8 Mar, when this whole shebang is due to take place. There’ll be spoken word, poetry, Q&A sessions and DJ sets too. Larks!
“I’m delighted that 6 Music is coming to Camden in March next year – it’s an area with so many musical stories to tell”, says Head Of 6 Music Paul Rodgers. “I hope you’ll join us there for our annual celebration of the best alternative music – or tune in to the live broadcasts across BBC 6 Music, BBC Sounds, BBC Four and BBC iPlayer”.
I am not surprised BBC Radio 6 Music are talking their festival to London, as they have, in previous years, been to Liverpool and Glasgow. London might seem like an obvious choice in which to home a festival; as the industry is pretty London-centric, some might question whether BBC Radio 6 Music should have taken their festival to other parts of the country.
Camden is a great choice, as many of us are familiar with some of the artists and movements from there. In terms of venues, there are so many unique and character-filled spots. This Culture Trip article gives you the skinny, but there are three particular venues that one must head to when visiting Camden. I will source from Culture Trip, who perfectly surmise and define these iconic venues. The Roundhouse, is perhaps, one of the most impressive venues in Camden:
“One of the most striking and impressive music venues in the city, the vast, round auditorium is both grand and intimate. Originally built in 1847 as a railway turntable, the Roundhouse opened as a performing arts centre in 1964. The natural round shape of the building makes it perfect for live music, with great acoustic and good views from any spot in the place”.
Whilst terrific venues like Koko have closed down, others are still going strong and pulling in some tremendous artists. Down on 94 Parkway, The Dublin Castle is, perhaps, the most-famous Camden haunt. It has hosted countless new and legendary artists through the years, and it will be a central fixture for BBC Radio 6 Music’s festival next year:
“If you’re an up-and-coming band wanting to make it in the Big Smoke, Dublin Castle has got to be one of the stops on your journey to the top. It’s been that way for years. Nothing fancy, in fact, cynics would say it’s downright dilapidated, but the posters covering the walls are a good indication of some of the musical royalty who have played here, including Oasis and Madness”.
If you want a venue that is smaller and has bags of personality, Dingwalls is somewhere you need to head. Like so many Camden venues, Dingwalls is so much more vibrant and original than a lot of venues – that tend to be quite cold, large and lacking in heart:
“A Camden Lock stalwart, Dingwalls brings artist-band intimacy to a whole new level. Simple stuff here. Big room, bar at the back. Stage at the front. You never quite know who you’re going to get, but why not take a gamble and get up close and personal with what could be the next big thing?”.
Let’s talk about last night... That was one to remember, London.
— The Pale White (@thepalewhite) November 8, 2019
📸 India Fleming pic.twitter.com/TaltdI88vT
There are articles that corroborate my findings, and provide plenty of other suggestions regarding great music hangs. It is a shame one or two loved spots have gone, but Camden’s music scene is thriving at a time when so many venues across the capital are closing down. This historic and busy music scene is a reason why so many new artists are breaking and able to play. Camden, as an area, is full of life and energy. It is hard to describe the magic and sense of wonder you get when walking through Camden. There is something in the air that draws you in and keeps you coming back. Right now, there are artists plying their trade in Camden’s successful and golden venues. The reason why Camden is so desirable and iconic is the history it has. When people think of Camden, they mention three things: Britpop, Madness and Amy Winehouse. The late Winehouse helped bring a whole new generation to Camden, whilst Madness helped put the area on the map. Camden and Primrose Hill were the epicentres of the Britpop scene and were the go-to places to be. Whether it was bands like Oasis and Blur performing or the coolest acts just hanging out, everything was happening in Camden. There are a few articles out there that highlight the connection between Camden and Britpop in the 1990s. This article is essential reading:
“Suede frontman Brett Anderson met bandmate Justine Frischmann while they were studying and the pair lived together for a time in Finsbury Park. The band enjoyed little success while Frischmann was a member.
She eventually split from Anderson and left Suede to fall into the arms of Blur frontman Damon Albarn and did not see Anderson again until she saw Suede play at the Underworld in Camden in 1992.
IN THIS PHOTO: Brett Anderson, lead singer of Suede, in 1993
The Good Mixer, Camden is the centre of Britpop
A small two-roomed Irish bar in Inverness Road, Camden Town, was the place to be for anyone who was anyone during the Britpop era.
The Good Mixer was where Firschmann and her band Elastica signed with Deceptive Records and also where Menswe@r are said to have formed.
Oasis and Blur’s famously bitter rivalry may have begun at the Good Mixer. When Oasis met guitarist Graham Coxon for the first time, one Gallagher apparently said: “Nice music, sh*t clothes.”
Iconic music hall The Forum in Highgate Road, Kentish Town, was awarded Best Venue having hosted renowned bands Pulp and Oasis”.
Articles such as this highlight the pubs and venues that were part of Britpop’s fabric and brought waves of new people to Camden. If you have a broader look at Camden and how it inspired Britrpop, Punk and gave birth to some iconic artists, there are tours one can take:
“Camden, London. Birthplace of Britpop. But not only Blur, Pulp, and Oasis all have roots in Camden. Also acts such as Madness, Blondie, Amy Winehouse, Elvis Costello, Van Morrison, and The Ramones are rooted here. Camden is also where the Punk movement started and where superstar Prince once owned a boutique in the 1990s.
Still today, this vibrant district boasts with independent record stores and unique live music venues. And lots of legendary music history stories.
Discover the market with its stalls full of vintage clothing, lovely antiques, tiny cafés, and numerous more cool shops. Stroll along Regent's Canal, enjoy a drink on a rooftop terrace, or a snack from one of the colourful dining booths selling food from all over the world. Shop your new favourite vinyl and explore the story behind the life of legendary singer Amy Winehouse.
For a deeper look into the history of the Punk movement in London and Camden, watch London's burning, a German documentary with Die Toten Hosen lead singer Campino”.
When we think of artists associated with Camden, Madness must spring to mind. In their case, The Dublin Castle is especially crucial. Back in 2017, Madness unveiled a plaque marking their first gig at Camden's Dublin Castle:
“Madness have returned to their old haunt to unveil a plaque commemorating their first gig at the Dublin Castle in January 1979.
The PRS for Music Heritage Award was handed to the Parkway pub to recognise venues that have played a crucial role in music history by giving famous acts their first break.
After several sweatily successful gigs at the pub, landlord Alo Conlon gave the band a year-long residency during which they made their successful first album One Step Beyond.
Later other bands were helped by the famous music venue with Britpop icons Blur and Amy Winehouse playing early gigs there.
“I am very fond of this place, without it we wouldn’t be standing here today,” said lead singer Suggs.
“We found our mojo in here,” adds bandmate Mike Barson.
IN THIS PHOTO: Madness at The Dublin Castle in 2017/PHOTO CREDIT: Jennifer McCord
“It’s funny how things happen. If they had said ‘bugger off’ other bands wouldn’t have come and it wouldn’t have become a famous music venue.”
The seven-strong Ska band included Marylebone boy Chas Smash, former Quintin Kynaston pupil Suggs and Barson, who went to Hampstead School. Initially known as the North London Invaders they pretended to be a country band to get the Dublin Castle booking.
Barson says: “We were looking for gigs and Chris came in here and asked behind the bar can we play in the back room. They said ‘we only book people singing country music’ so we said fair enough country music it is.
“We came and played reggae and they didn’t know what was going on but we got a bit of a crowd going, they started sinking the beers and it was all alright.”
Suggs adds: “All the pubs around here were pretty Irish with function rooms for family gatherings. Folk and country music were big in the Irish community so we just kept knocking on pub doors asking if they had a night when there was nothing on. They gave us a residency because we have a thirsty demographic.”
Madness got their first ever review for a Dublin Castle gig which described the mayhem of joyful, dancing, beery fans.
“They said by the third encore half the crowd was standing on the tables and the other half was rolling on the floor, but it ended up with a queue round the block which meant record companies were interested. All bands start with a little acorn like this.”
Madness never forgot their Camden Town origins and filmed the video for one of their 15 top ten hits My Girl at the pub. They later made Take It Or Leave It there, a film recreating one of their early gigs.
“Pretty much the same people came along and created the same chaotic anarchy with pints of beer flying everywhere,” says Suggs. “You look back and it was just at the end of punk rock, which had a slightly aggressive energy just on the edge of collapse, ours was the same kind of energy but more euphoric.”
They named themselves after a song by their Reggae idol Prince Buster but Barson remarks that it was apt: “There certainly was madness taking place in here when we played, it got to the point where you couldn’t get another person in here it was pretty maniacal with sweat pouring off the ceiling and people collapsing and climbing on top of each other. It was a wild time.”
The plaque was unveiled during Independent Venue Week and Suggs points out that as well as being “an important part of our culture” venues like the Dublin Castle should be protected because the resulting live acts like Coldplay and Oasis bring in millions of pounds in revenue”.
Madness were recently back in Camden to unveil some artwork to celebrate forty years in the business -a site that thrilled local residents and Madness fans alike.
In terms of modern icons, Amy Winehouse and Camden spring to mind. I remember hearing the news she had died – on 23rd July, 2011 – and being heartbroken. With albums such as Back to Black (2006) showcasing one of the greatest voices we have ever heard, many of us were looking forward to seeing a lot more work from Winehouse. Sadly, she was taken away at the age of twenty-seven and, when news broke, Camden became the centre of media and fan attention:
“In the hours following the news of Amy Winehouse's death, fans gathered outside her home in Camden and at her favourite local pub, The Hawley Arms, to pay tribute.
It was a time for quiet reflection.
As daylight faded, around 100 people had arrived in the residential square where Amy Winehouse had made her home.
Under a tree opposite her large three-storey residence, fans laid down floral tributes and photographs of the singer.
Local resident Karen Heath had been at the police cordon for most of the evening.
Letters and flowers have also been left at Winehouse's local pub the Hawley Arms
"I feel quite upset. I didn't know I was going to feel like this. It's so sad," she said
"I used to see Amy around and about in Camden. I knew the people who lived in the house before her. It's been renovated quite recently.
A few minutes' walk away, in a more bustling part of Camden Town, people were thronging to Winehouse's favourite pub, The Hawley Arms..
PHOTO CREDIT: Ewan Munro/Flickr
Music pounded downstairs, as drinkers remembered the singer who would sometimes serve behind the bar.
"It's like a little pilgrimage, really," said Andy Potter, who had come from King's Cross. "I've met her and I've met her dad. Her dad was so proud of her."
Krystle Stack, 27, and her friends had written tributes to the singer on Hawley Arms beer mats.
"The atmosphere is really friendly, a lot of people are a bit sad but trying to hold the emotions back a bit," she said”.
Rather than remember Camden and spots like The Hawley Arms for sad, reasons, instead, we can remember a vibrant spirit who was down to earth and hugely lovable. Winehouse was one of the people and Camden was her stomping ground. If Britpop’s central spot was The Good Mixer, 2000s Indie was located in the beating heart of The Hawley Arms. This article details Winehouse’s love of the place and why she helped bring so many people to Camden:
“Late on 9 February 2008, a Saturday night, I left a gig at Koko and made my way up Camden High Street in north London toward my house. I didn’t get very far before I was stopped by a policeman who told me that Camden was “on fire”, which struck me as unusual. Places, of course, are not usually set ablaze. Going the long way round, I found myself stood on a bridge over Regent’s Canal watching the most famous pub in British indie music burn. Or at least that’s how it had been put in the pages of NME at the time.
To be honest though, that wasn’t too far from the truth – over the previous couple of years barely a day had gone by when The Hawley Arms wasn’t in the papers. The likes of Liam Gallagher, Kate Moss, and Pete Doherty all drank there, but above all the Hawley owed its fame and notoriety to Amy Winehouse. In the mid-2000s she was a prime tabloid quarry. I was living on Camden’s Bonny Street at the time, and she lived round the corner on Prowse Place. Paparazzi used to crouch on our road, scouting down the perpendicular street, waiting for her to leave her flat.
When she did go out, more often than not she was heading to the Hawley. Even after “Back to Black” made her a celebrity in 2006, she was never likely to be put off going to her local. “She used to come in and say: ‘Craig, babydoll, can I serve some drinks?’” remembers the Hawley’s manager, Craig Seymour. “I’ve seen grown men break down in tears after being served by Amy.”
Her presence, coupled with being conveniently located a couple of minutes from the MTV studio, led to the Hawley becoming the British music industry’s favourite boozer. Tim Burgess of The Charlatans had already seen a few of those haunts come and go by then, but he remembers his days at the Hawley fondly. “Britpop had The Good Mixer but The Hawley Arms was the followup to whatever the followup was – a scene so cool it didn't have a name,” he tells me. “The Hawley Arms was the who's who of what's what. Amy Winehouse was pulling pints when I first went in – pretty sure she didn't work there, but it was that kind of place”.
The Hawley Arms survived its devastating fire and, like a phoenix from the ashes, it carried on stronger than ever. Looking back, we can see how important it was for upcoming musicians, given the reputation and status it had:
“The Hawley remains a special place for musicians who came of age during that mid-00s indie wave. Seymour jokes that Wolf Alice have been hanging out at the bar “since they were probably underage”, and says he bet them at a staff Christmas party bowling match that if they lost they’d have to play a gig at the Hawley for free. Sure enough, in October they launched their new album with a packed show at the pub – although overcrowding the dancefloor is not the most dangerous thing they’ve done at the Hawley.
“On [bassist] Theo's birthday we all got fucked up and thought it would be a good idea to get on the roof of the building and set off some fireworks to mark the occasion,” says Seymour. “Obviously health and safety goes out the window when you are fucked up, and I almost killed Theo with a stray firework. Thank fuck they were budget supermarket fireworks otherwise I might be telling this story from Royal Holloway Prison, serving time for manslaughter.”
The mid-00s indie scene may have ended up fizzling out like one of those cheap firecrackers, but the Hawley Arms abides. It even gets a seal of approval from Daniel Jeanrenaurd, 'Camden's last rockstar', who at the time of the scene’s heyday had a six-night-a-week, midnight to 4AM residency up the road at the Marathon kebab shop. “I think that place was cool, allowing a lot of bands to play,” he says. “It doesn’t seem there’s much of a music scene left [in Camden today], but of course I don’t know everything that’s going on”.
You can check out the place and also visit some of Amy Winehouse’s favourite locations. I have sped through Britpop, Amy Winehouse and Madness and, to be fair, Camden’s incredible venues are part of music’s rich tapestry. Late last year, Camden made the news, as it was announced it would receive its own version of Hollywood’s Walk of Fame:
“Camden, in north London, where Amy Winehouse lived, psychedelia thrived and Britpop flourished, is to host a Hollywood-style Music Walk of Fame from next spring.
The walk, an official spin-off from the star-studden attraction on Hollywood Boulevard in Los Angeles, will run between Chalk Farm and Mornington Crescent and will be laid with granite slabs commemorating more than 400 artists over the next 20 years.
British music promoter Lee Bennett came up with the idea while he was living in California and noticed the UK had no equivalent to the Hollywood walk. “Camden has more music history than anywhere else in the world, so it was a no-brainer to create the walk here,” he says. “Most bands have played here early in their careers – from Pink Floyd, to Nirvana, and Madonna – and Prince even opened a shop here in 1994.”
Visitors to Camden’s walk will be able to download an app to produce a “virtual museum” as they cross the slabs. “We’re going to digitally replicate iconic venues like the Caernarvon Castle pub that aren’t here any more,” Bennett said.
As well as preserving heritage, he hopes the Music Walk will look to the future. “We want to create new moments in music history,” he said. “We want to get bands back together to play after their stone is unveiled. We’ve had conversations with Noel and Liam Gallagher and Liam said if he got a stone he would love Oasis to play again. That’s something people thought they’d never see.”
Areas such as Camden have historically developed thriving music scenes through their independent venues – for example the Roundhouse, Underworld and Electric Ballroom. Yet, between 2007 and 2015, London lost 35% of its grassroots venues. A recent UK live music census found that 40% of small independent venues, such as Camden’s Dublin Castle where Amy Winehouse worked, and Dingwalls where the Clash, the Ramones and the Sex Pistols played, were threatened by escalating business rates. A third of respondents said they experienced problems with property development in the vicinity of their premises.
You can visit the official website to find out more about The Music Wall of Fame – The Who have received their honour –, and I am not surprised Camden was chosen as the destination. I started off this feature with BBC Radio 6 Music’s festival in mind, but I have been inspired to dig deep. I have, perhaps, only scratched the surface, so the best advice would be, if you can, to visit Camden and take in its fantastic venues and stunning scenes. You can find out more about BBC Radio 6 Music’s Camden-bound festival, and discover why it is such an important part of London. Camden has, through the decades, given so much…
PHOTO CREDIT: @rxcroes/Unsplash
TO the music industry.