The Splash Club

The Splash Club Music Venue was 90s London's award winning venue and hosted major breaking bands of the nineties including the legendary first London show by Oasis.

The Splash Club Book : Written by Ben Steadman. Founder of The Splash Club. The Splash Club became The catalyst for bands from the US, Britain and Australia on the 90‘s live music scene and the new musical styles crossing the pre and post internet eras who’s star shone so brightly it took 23 fire engines to put it out when it burned to the ground .
Photography: Ian Dickson. Ian has been photographing rock stars since 1972 and his work has appeared in Disc, Record Mirror, New Musical Express, Sounds, Vox, Mojo, Q, Rolling Stone and elsewhere over the years. He was recognised by the Rock And Roll Hall of Fame And Museum with his Rod Stew- art "pyjama portrait" ("Images Of Rock And Roll", Rolling Stone Press, Eric Clapton and Muddy Waters). He has photographed The Sex Pistols, Kurt Cobain, Bryan Ferry, David Bowie, The Prodigy and Lou Reed and for Splash he was one of the three exclusive photographers I tipped off to photograph the hot bands coming through such as Oasis, Ocean Colour Scene, Skunk Anansie, Feeder, Deus, Therapy?Sneaker Pimps and more. . .
George Bowstead freelance journalist and photographer photos include : Oasis, Whiteout, Ocean Colour Scene, Skunk Anansie, Teenage Fan- club, Sleeper, Echobelly, My Life Story, Levitation and many more. .
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Jocelyn Bain Hogg
Jocelyn Bain Hogg is the author of The Firm, an intimate view of London’s organised crime world, which won international acclaim, garnering the prestigious Lead Award for portraiture (2003 Ger- many) and Pleasure Island, which explores the pursuit of pleasure, rock and roll and dance culture
in Ibiza. His exhibition remains on the walls in the Ibiza Rocks Hotel, the home of the Ibiza Rocks Festival. His Splash Club photos include Jay Kay /Jamiroquai, Morrissey, Aimee Mann, Mike Scott, David Thomas and more. . .
WHY A BOOK?
By the time it all ended with a major fire in 1997 that burned our newly relocated venue in Camden to the ground, the Splash Club was voted A& R Centre of Britain and had infamously launched a whole wave of bands onto the world stage with shows including Oasis, Travis, Skunk Anansie, Placebo, Feeder, Moby, Weezer, Bush, Beck, Ocean Colour Scene, Deus, God Machine, Catato- nia, Reef Super Furry Animals, Warrior Soul, Ash, Supergrass, Kula Shaker, Sleeper, Echobelly, The Blue Tones, Mcalmont and Butler, Tortoise, Goo Goo Dolls, Whale, Tricky, Propellerheads, Aimee Mann, Robyn Hitchcock, Tiger Lillies, David Gray and even the comedian Harry Hill.
The Splash Club Book is a beautifully designed piece of social and musical history told by its founder. A document of a catalytic time in British and London’s music history and an amazing gift for anyone who was there and I hope, an inspiration for those who weren’t.
HOW DID IT START? �
The story begins twenty five years ago. Before heading off on a UK tour with punk rockers Chelsea I played a show at The Water Rats on Gray’s Inn Road and fell in love with the place - the music hall vibe, the red velvet curtains, the white grecian pillars and the kitschy chandeliers and I started plotting to run nights and promote bands and happenings there. I decided on calling the venue The Splash Club based on the fact that I felt I needed an identity of my own and because it was synonymous with my ambition to “make a splash” and feature the hottest new artists making a splash on the scene.
WHAT'S IN THE BOOK? �
As well as my 35, 000 words of text, there’s exclusive and definitive photos both black & white and colour of the bands, musicians, celebrities and the people who were there, quotes and anecdotes from bands, record company A& R’s, band agents, publishers, journalists, managers and faces and players on the scene, reprints of the 15 monthly splash news /fanzines from back in the day, a de- finitive gig guide of who played and when, gig review cuttings from shows at the Splash from the leading magazines and music papers, a collection of posters and flyers and playlists from Dj’s.

What’s the vinyl recording?
Captured in 1993 /1994 from the singer songwriter fortnightly Dream- house nights at the Splash Club run by Waterboy Martyn Swain the recordings were recorded digitally and feature never released live tracks by 22 artists including Aimee Mann, David Gray, Robyn Hitchcock, Tiger Lillies and Marcie Detroit amongst others.

Comments and anecdotes:
I started writing for Melody Maker in the early 90s and I got a tip-off that an amazing new band were playing the Splash. “The singer is amazing, she’s going to be a star, ” said my tipster. It wasn’t the first time I’d heard that, but when the band came on I immediately realised it was true. Or at least, I hoped it was. The singer was Skin, and the band was Skunk Anansie. This was their first proper London show. I lined up a profile piece with Skunk for The Maker, and made them my Tip for 1995. There’s a necessary symbiotic relationship between music journo’s and emerging bands, and it’s thanks to the broad and knowledgable booking policy of Ben and the Splash Club — giving tons of new bands their first London shows — that I got to write all the early hype about Skunk Anansie. . Carl Loben Editor DJ Mag
Will Matthews the singer for Rub Ultra had this way of talking where you never quite understood what he was saying but you felt like it must be really cool anyway! For example, he would describe Rub Ultra’s music as ‘bubble over crunch with a cosmic fruit centre’ or ‘testosterone crackle with a feminine underbelly. Nick Moore Splash Club Manager
Club M was one of the forerunners of the Easy Listening Scene and right up there with the likes of Indigo, Regency Rooms at the time but probably a bit more on the bonkers rock 'n roll side. Special memories for me was the Splash Christmas all dayer with the likes of the Tiger Lillies and Mike Flowers Pops and carol singing in the local Costcutter before it became a McDonalds. There was also the time when a girl had a hair cut and just burst into tears. She was alright after everyone told her how great she looked. Heilco van der Plonk Club M promoter.
The Bluetones got there first NME review at Splash, we also played a sold out fan club gig before we'd put a record out, cool memories. Neil Burrows Blue Tones manager
I was on the door and looking down at the guest list when I saw this pair of golf shoes. I looked up to see who they belonged to and saw Paul Weller. He’d come down to see Ocean Colour Scene and ended up on stage with them. Keith Eccles Splash booker
The tour’s gone really well, the fans have been great in their response to the new stuff, but I’m more excited about playing at Splash than I am about Brixton Academy. ” Andy Cairns Therapy
Rock music is mostly about moving big black boxes from one side of town to the other in the back of your car. David Thomas Pere Ubu
One night Johnny Rotten rocked up, kissed me on the lips, said loudly "up the Arsenal! " and walked in without paying. Then we couldn’t get him to leave. He was sitting at the bar having more and more lagers. Laura Lee Davies from Time Out kept trying to get him to leave in a cab but he didn’t want to go and it took forever to get him out. Joe Lee Splash Door manager
Some of my favourite memories of splash are of playing the first Skunk Anansie shows when everyone just went crazy and the club was packed. In fact we actually got signed there, so what a great place it was! Ace Skunk Anansie
AN EXCERPT
Yet again January got off to a flying start and the acts got hotter as the month went on. My old sparring partner Paul West’s band Out of My Hair kicked off on 5 /1 with a welsh band on the Ankst label called Gorkys Zygotic Mynci who sang in both english and welsh and were much loved by the
Velvet Underground’s John Cale who came down to check them out. King Prawn made their Splash debut on 6 /1 supporting Fat and their gentle giant guitarist Roger became a lifelong friend and huge supporter of all things Splash. TV Smith the punk rocker formerly of the Adverts did a solo show to great effect on 18 /1 and dragged down several faces from the punk scene and even had the Tom Robinson Band doing lights for him!
I’d thought an irreverent comedy night would go down well and had been approached by the pro- moter Charlie Gough, (a friend of Heilco’s who promoted the Club Montepulciano easy listening scene nights at Splash under the pseudonym of Featureman), to give it a shot on the basis that we could look at a regular monthly event provided he came up with some quality acts.
As things turned out he hadn’t really thought the economics through properly as he wanted to have it seated and make up for it with a higher door price and the venue was not even remotely established on the comedy circuit and that market was very price sensitive. Not only that with seats set up we could only get about 75 people in the main space. However he did put a fantastic bill together and a comic soiree on 21 /1 /1995 was topped off with a hilarious performance by Harry Hill. Stew Talbot The General Splash Stage Manager: "During his comedy act there was a joke about a fly having a heart attack and falling into an electric fly zapper which restarted his heart – what are the
chances of that?"