The Haçienda Page 13
Thursday 27th CHANGE
Friday 28th NUDE Mike Pickering
MARCH
Thursday 5th King Kurt
Friday 7th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 11th Kurtis Blow
Friday 14th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 21st NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 28th NUDE Mike Pickering
APRIL
Friday 4th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 5th BIG NOISE: MUSIC FOR THE MODERN DANCE FLOOR
Friday 11th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 12th BIG NOISE: MUSIC FOR THE MODERN DANCE FLOOR
Tuesday 15th Big Audio Dynamite
Friday 18th NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 24th The Blow Monkeys
Friday 25th NUDE Mike Pickering; fashion show with Rosie Haywood/Armstrong Collins Sharp/Posh Frocks
Saturday 26th DISCO NIGHT Chad Jackson
Wednesday 30th LATIN QUARTER
MAY
Thursday 1st TEMPERANCE CLUB Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 2nd NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
Saturday 3rd BIG NOISE: MUSIC FOR THE MODERN DANCE FLOOR Andy Miller
Friday 9th NUDE Mike Pickering; fashion show by Su King
Wednesday 14th Jesus and Mary Chain; Pink Industry
Friday 16th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 21st FOURTH BIRTHDAY PARTY
Friday 23rd NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 28th Art of Noise
Friday 30th NUDE Mike Pickering
JUNE
Wednesday 4th Crime and the City Solution; Ghostdance
Friday 6th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 11th Gene Loves Jezebel
Friday 13th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 14th i-D MAGAZINE PARTY
Friday 20th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 21st BIG NOISE: MUSIC FOR THE MODERN DANCE FLOOR Rob Day
Monday 23rd Sandie Shaw
Friday 27th NUDE Mike Pickering
JULY
Tuesday 1st Black Uhuru; the Wailers
Friday 4th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 8th The Alarm
Friday 11th NUDE Mike Pickering
Sunday 13th FASHION: CLOTHING THE NAKED FLESH
WITH PLASTIC FLOWERS (a Festival of the
Tenth Summer fashion show)
Friday 18th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 19th WIDE Dean Johnson; Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 25th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 30th Zodiac Mindwarp; MC Evil Bastard
AUGUST
Friday 1st NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 8th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 15th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 22nd NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 28th TEMPERANCE CLUB
Friday 29th NUDE Mike Pickering
SEPTEMBER
Friday 5th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 12th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 19th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 26th NUDE Mike Pickering
OCTOBER
Wednesday 1st Trouble Funk
Friday 3rd NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 10th NUDE Mike Pickering
Monday 13th New Order
Set-list: ‘Sooner Than You Think’, ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’, of the Nation’, ‘Everything’s Gone Green’, ‘Weirdo’, ‘Sunrise’, ‘Temptation’
Tuesday 14th Erasure
Friday 17th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 22nd Full Force
Friday 24th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 28th The Fabulous Thunderbirds
Wednesday 29th RESIDENTS (thirteenth-anniversary show featuring
Snakefinger)
Friday 31st NUDE Mike Pickering
NOVEMBER
Friday 7th NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 13th The Railway Children
Friday 14th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 21st NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 28th NUDE Mike Pickering
DECEMBER
Thursday 4th David Mach (art installation until 11 January)
Friday 5th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 9th Spear of Destiny
Friday 12th NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 18th TEMPERANCE CLUB Felt
Friday 19th NUDE Mike Pickering
Monday 22nd CREATIVE CIRCLE PARTY
Tuesday 23rd SOUTH MANCHESTER COLLEGE PARTY
Wednesday 24th CHRISTMAS EVE PARTY
Friday 26th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 31st NEW YEAR’S EVE PARTY
FACT 51 Limited
Trading as: the Haçienda
FAC 51 Limited
Trading as: the Haçienda
Ruth Polsky was killed by a runaway taxi on the steps of the Limelight club in New York on 7 September 1986. It was the first time she had ever queued to get in a club: this was one of the first AIDS benefits and the Queen of New York City was making an important statement.
From 1979 until her death she had been responsible for breaking innumerable British bands in the States thanks to tireless work in promotion and as talent buyer at Hurrah and Danceteria. She had booked the fateful Joy Division tour, then New Order’s first tour as a three-piece. Others who owed her a debt of gratitude included the Smiths (who dedicated the ‘Shoplifters of the World Unite’ single to her memory), Sisters of Mercy, the Cocteau Twins, and Echo and the Bunnymen.
On 5 December 1986 New Order performed a benefit gig for her at the the Roxy in New York, during which they played ‘Atmosphere’ and ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’as encores – the first time the two songs had been played live since Joy Division was dissolved.
‘Mason told me it was “full of art students” and although I couldn’t work out whether he considered this a good or a bad thing he later called me up and asked me to start a Thursday at the Haçienda from 1 May 1986; the Temperance Club, the night was going to be called. I still hadn’t met Mr Wilson or Mr Gretton. No one talked to me much, although I did have another conversation with Paul Mason, who said I could play what ever I liked and I would be paid £40 a week.’
Dave Haslam
The year began on an optimistic note. The latter half of 1986 had seen numbers steadily increase as the club’s policy of staging DJ nights rather than live gigs (though prompted by necessity rather than choice) appeared to be paying off.
At the beginning of 1987 the Hacienda had three regular club nights: Thursday’s Temperance Club, busy laying the groundwork for Madchester; the ever-popular Nude on Fridays, hosted by Pickering and Prendergast and preparing the city for the explosion of house music that was to come; and on Saturdays there was Dean Johnson with a night named after the music policy: Wide.
By 1987 New Order’s constant touring of America had paid off and made us even more successful. We had graduated from playing clubs and theatres to headlining huge arenas and we were playing bigger crowds than Oasis or the Spice Girls ever did,plus we were still making great music (thanks to the taxman, remember), so it should have been a happy time.
It wasn’t, though. As people, we’d grown apart. The music kept us together but we had no rapport and there was a general feeling of being in the doldrums.Partly this was because of the financial situation: we felt like we were a money-making machine, working just to get the Haçienda and out of a hole; plus Rob was sorely missed. He may not have been the most efficient boss in the world but, in the words of Shameless’s Frank Gallagher,‘he knew how to throw a party’.Everyone missed that when he was ill.
It took Rob a while to get back his health back and during that time Tony was number one, working closely with Paul Mason on all aspects of the club – a move I think a lot of the staff resented. Rob and Tony had very different ideas,and Rob was definitely the most popular with the staff. He was a man of the people.
I didn’t get to many management meetings during this period because I was always off touring with New Order, but one thing I do
remember was the strange phenomenon of ‘financial projections’, where they’d write lists and lists of projected attendances for the club. Well, you can write anything you want on a piece of paper. Who actually turns up is a completely different matter. It almost seemed like they made it up as they went along. Today, I know that you never open a club or put a night on until you can afford to lose the highest figure, but at the time we convinced ourselves that it was great to carry on as usual. We’d look at the projections (all of them based on wishful thinking) and go, ‘Well, that’s not too bad, is it?’
I compare it now to mass hypnosis.Furthermore,music goes in and out of fashion. Even if you had a great year in the past, there’s no guarantee of even having a great week in the future. We learned that the hard way, too.
That year, New Order released the singles compilation Substance, two singles, ‘True Faith’ and ‘Touched by the Hand of God’, and toured with Echo and the Bunnymen and Gene Loves Jezebel in the US.
Being in a group, I went to a lot of different places. But this didn’t educate me. Touring should have opened my mind, opened my thinking, but whenever I came home to Manchester and the Haçienda, I’d be so glad to be home. I knew exactly where I belonged, and it was here. I enjoyed the stability. I’d go off performing all around the world with New Order, come back and find my mates sitting exactly where I left them. Thank God. Rock stars have our cake and eat it. You go away, act like a complete idiot, then return and expect a nice, quiet life. They’d ask how the tour was and all of us would say the same thing, ‘Quiet, you know?’
Of course, as soon as I became involved in the Haçienda, all of that changed. If you want a quiet life, take my advice: DON’T OPEN A FUCKING CLUB.
One cold Monday night in March 1987 the Chicago House Party Tour arrived at the club, featuring Marshall Jefferson, Adonis, Frankie Knuckles, Kevin Irving and Fingers Inc. Though the event signalled the impact house music was having on the club’s owners and DJs, it was not tremendously well supported. Still, the sound remained a staple at Nude and Wide. Patiently, the Haçienda waited for the rest of the world to catch up.
The video screens never worked properly – this was blamed on the cigarette smoke, funnily enough – so when they completely broke, around 1987/1988, we did away with them for good.
They’d always had a bit of a chequered career anyway. After a while, Bessy had stopped doing his controversial installations and we’d hired Tony Martin to do the lights and video.Although not as confrontational an artist as Claude,Tony took his work very seriously.He was followed by two lighting guys named Jonathan Unsworth and Mark Smith, professionally known as Swivel, until they too left, to be replaced by Steve Page.
As for filming, we got an employee to film the shows at the Haçienda and project them on the screens. The bands were given the tapes for nothing at the beginning – in true Factory fashion – which is why that Birthday Party gig lives on.
It meant we had video footage, with sound, of performances by virtually every band that played in the club – which was just about every band playing in England at the time. Most groups demanded we erase the tapes. In the early days this was because they didn’t like to see themselves playing to a half-empty club; later it was because we were asking for payment and they didn’t want to cough up for them.
Luckily they never got erased, though, whatever the band demanded. Unluckily for all concerned the tapes disappeared when Factory went bust and later appeared when they were released by a number of third-party video companies, who even released New Order performances without our consent.
So, anyway, with the video screens broken we just stopped using the equipment and because of that we never properly filmed anything during the acid-house era that followed in 1988 and 1989. Again, we should have sent cameramen round to capture it all; it would have been gold. We never thought to do that. We were too off our heads, I suppose. Instead all we have are snatches, a few news items . . .
Zumbar launched in October 1987, promising ‘an adventurous mix of live entertainment, fashion and disco, a night of exotic variety’. It boasted a Spanish theme, featured live acts and karaoke in the Gay Traitor bar and was hosted by Fred, who was better known as the club’s maintenance manager. The opening included a ‘wheel of fortune’, which dictated the price of the booze, and legend has it that Tony Wilson fell out with manager Paul Mason when the needle stuck at ‘free drinks’ three times. (Maintenance manager Fred had weighted the wheel so this wouldn’t happen and it never did during hours of rigorous testing. Mason was later reinstated.) Zumbar went on to become one of the club’s most popular nights, and would host Julian Clary (as the Joan Collins Fan Club,with Fanny the Wonder Dog),Jerry Sadowitz and Frank Sidebottom. In November the night hosted a ‘live happening’ involving artist Phil Diggle doing ‘action paintings’, which saw the club hit with four insurance claims in its wake, including one from Barney, while the Christmas special featured a visit from Coronation Street’s Vera Duckworth. A week or so later the club ushered in the new year with a ‘mega firework display’, and ...
Our money went up in flames. We’d routinely hire guys to come to set up indoor fireworks; this was overseen by Paul Mason, who got them to set up the fireworks on top of the big main room bar.
We were taking so much money, it being New Year’s Eve and all, they couldn’t shift it so they started stashing it behind the bar, where there was a small room. When the fireworks went off at midnight the sparks rained through the gaps in the bar and set fire to the money, burning all of the notes inside.
I still have this drunken memory of Paul Mason on his hands and knees,patting all this cash,trying to put it out.
‘Am I fucking tripping?’ I thought. ‘There is all our money, ablaze. No, no, no, I must be imagining this.’
That cost us, like, five grand or something. Happy New Year.
Little did I know, it would be. Maybe popular culture caught up to us. Maybe that pyrotechnic bungle served as a burned offering for good luck.Whatever the case,within the next few months,everything – and I mean everything – changed. For me, New Order, the Haçienda, Madchester and the entire world.
Acid house had arrived and the Summer of Love would soon be in full swing.
JANUARY
Friday 2nd NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
Saturday 3rd WIDE Dean; Hedd-Dave Haslam
Wednesday 7th TEMPERANCE CLUB Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 9th NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
Saturday 10th WIDE Dean; Hedd-Dave Haslam
Wednesday 14th TEMPERANCE CLUB Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 16th NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
Saturday 17th WIDE Dean; Hedd-Dave Haslam
Thursday 22nd TEMPERANCE CLUB Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 23rd NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
Saturday 24th WIDE Dean; Hedd-Dave Haslam
Thursday 29th TEMPERANCE CLUB Hedd-Dave Haslam
Friday 30th NUDE MP2 – Mike Pickering and Martin Prendergast
FEBRUARY
Friday 6th NUDE Mike Pickering
Monday 9th NUDE SPECIAL Mantronix; MP1 Dave Haslam
Friday 13th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 20th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 24th Neon (Peter Freeman art installation until 24 March)
Wednesday 25th Loma Gee; Hedd-Dave Haslam; Paolo Hewitt
Friday 27th NUDE Mike Pickering; A Prophylactic Party (Dave Dale in the Gay Traitor ‘to launch the Haçienda condom Vendor’)
MARCH
Friday 6th NUDE Mike Pickering
Sunday 8th Frank Chickens; Hope Augustus; Sensible Footwear; Joolz
Monday 9th NUDE Marshall Jefferson; Adonis; Frankie Knuckles; Kevin Irving; Fingers Inc
Friday 13th NUDE Mike Pickering
Saturday 14th Wide Art (performance-art installation by Adrian Moakes)
Friday 20th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday
27th NUDE Mike Pickering
APRIL
Friday 3rd INTERNATIONAL AIDS DAY PARTY
Tuesday 7th AIDSLINE BENEFIT the Woodentops; Everything But the Girl; Marc Almond
Friday 10th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 17th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 24th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 29th Mighty Lemon Drops
MAY
Friday 1st NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 7th TEMPERANCE CLUB the Bodines
Friday 8th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 15th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 20th FIFTH BIRTHDAY PARTY (Kung Fu Night)
Thursday 28th The Happy Mondays
Friday 29th NUDE Mike Pickering
JUNE
Friday 5th NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 10th New Order
Set-list: ‘Touched by the Hand of God’, ‘Paradise’, ‘Way of Life’,‘Shellshock’, ‘Ceremony’, ‘Thieves Like Us’, ‘Bizarre Love Triangle’,‘Subculture’, ‘Age of Consent’, ‘Face Up’, ‘Temptation’
Friday 12th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 19th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 23rd SLEEPING BAG FRESH REVIEW Joyce Sims; T-La Rock; Hanson & Davis; Just-Ice
Friday 26th NUDE Mike Pickering
JULY
Friday 3rd NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 10th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 17th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 24th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 31st NUDE Mike Pickering
AUGUST
Friday 7th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 14th NUDE Mike Pickering
Sunday 16th The Durutti Column
Friday 21st NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 28th NUDE Mike Pickering
SEPTEMBER
Friday 4th NUDE Mike Pickering
Tuesday 8th FRESHERS’ BALL Little Martin: the Legendary Stardust Cowboy
Friday 11th NUDE Mike Pickering
Thursday 17th TEMPERANCE CLUB Westworld (art installation by Adrian Moakes and Andy Parkin)
Friday 18th NUDE Mike Pickering
Friday 25th NUDE Mike Pickering
OCTOBER
Friday 2nd NUDE Mike Pickering
Wednesday 7th ZUMBAR MEGA OPENING PARTY Elvis (impersonator); fashion PA by Vidal Sassoon; Jose & Pedro