Music
Walking into the 100 Club is a singular experience. Placed amongst the throng of Oxford Street shoppers, the climb down its staircase feels as though you’re leaving the hyper-capitalist, sales-driven world behind. Noise hits you half-way down, just before the ticket booth, increasing in volume as you walk through the door and into one of Britain’s most historic venues.
With a floor beaten down by both pogoing punks and the intricate moves of Northern Soul dancers, the 100 Club has stood for eclecticism and honesty for decades now. Owner and director Jeff Horton knows this more than most – his father built the stage that everyone from The Rolling Stones to IDLES have played on, while the club itself has been a part of his life since his sixth birthday. “I think people love this venue for two things,” he reflects. “Genuine history and heritage”.
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Walking around the 100 Club, it’s easy to get a sense of both. The walls are decked in old posters – for iconic punk shows and jazz greats alike – while there’s also a sense that the venue has staunchly stood still, while the world outside has rushed forwards. “I think people want the place to stay the same. I want it to stay the same. That’s why it looks like it does,” Jeff feverishly explains. “It actually still looks like it used to when I first came here in 1967!”
Everyone involved with the 100 Club is here through absolute love and devotion. One of the last surviving venues in central London, the staff adore their jobs – from security to the cloakroom, right down to the bar crew and the sound team. It’s a family affair too – Jeff’s son and daughter both work shifts when needed, practically born and raised in this dusky old basement. “Here in Westminster and Soho, the community has died,” Jeff shrugs. “Since the turn of the Millennium it’s become a completely different place. It’s sterile now – it’s lost a lot of its pizzaz – and the reason that made London exciting. But when you come to the 100 Club you feel that again.”
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The venue first housed music during the Second World War, with jazz greats such as Glenn Miller playing ad hoc sets onstage. Changing its name to the 100 Club in the ’60s – after its address at 100 Oxford Street – the venue moved with the times, showcasing a coterie of now-iconic names. Later becoming a punk redoubt as the ’70s closed, the 100 Club moved into the 21st century as an eclectic home for outsiders who had nowhere else to go. “My dad had residencies with The Rolling Stones, The Kinks, The Who – when they were called The High Numbers – so I’ve often said to people, it hasn’t been a jazz club for almost 60 years! We do every form of music there is, including jazz, still. But it was never a jazz club, never a blues club, never a Northern Soul club, it’s always been a music venue.”
The 100 Club’s ability to evolve and shake off expectations is now reaching a new generation. Becoming a hub for young rap artists – the likes of Chip and Dizzee Rascal have all played packed out shows in recent years – has introduced the venue to a fresh audience, who instincitvely embrace both its lineage and its eclecticism. “We do a lot of hip-hop here and a lot of grime nights now,” Jeff says. “You get all these young kids – 21, 22 years old – coming down and going ‘this is absolutely amazing!’ They get it straight away. A lot of people don’t think young kids understand, but they do. They really do understand!”
Yet it hasn’t always been easy. 100 Club came within a whisker of permanently closing in 2010, before a high-profile international campaign managed to save it. Looking back, Jeff marvels at the grassroots support, while also recalling a spectacular set from Sir Paul McCartney – perhaps more used to arenas and sports stadiums, the Beatles legend switched things up to salute the impact of this Central London basement. “I vividly recall Paul McCartney standing up at the end saying: ‘Mr 100, you have to keep this place going because it is really, really cool!’ And that was the moment when it suddenly hit me like a bolt out the blue… maybe I had been doing the right thing all along.”
Later becoming the first grassroots venue of any kind to be granted Localism Relief – in effect, having their business rates removed – the 100 Club looks as though it’s here to stay for good. Looking back, Jeff marvels at the “stupid belligerence within me” that managed to find a path through. “I had to keep the club going because it was too fucking important,” he says. “Too many people that hadn’t been born yet had to come and visit the club.”
It’s Jools Holland’s favourite venue, and one that holds a special place in Paul Weller’s heart; it has secured shows by Kings Of Leon and blues great Muddy Waters, 2 Tone giants The Specials and a pre-fame Oasis. A hub for new voices that is sought out by the greats, the 100 Club is spearheading independent live music both in London and across the country. “I’m really proud of everything we’ve achieved with the club. My children work here now, and they understand the ethics of the club. And that’s the way 100 Club works, you can’t explain [it] to people. You either get it or you don’t.”
“Let’s put it this way,” he finishes. “If no grassroots music venues exist any more where are the headliners of Glastonbury and the Isle of Wight festival going to come from in two, three years time?”
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Related: Five Of The Best – London Independent Music Venues
The 100 Club is hosting special shows for Independent Venue Week. For the latest Music Venue Trust annual report visit their website.
Words: Robin Murray
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