The Fridge is a nightclub in
Brixton, a notorious area of central
London. It was originaly started in 1981, in a small club at 390 Brixton Lane. It claims to be the first British club to have such innovations as
video screens & a
chill out lounge. True or not, it is however certain that The Fridge was at the heart of the early 80s
New Romantic movement, and booked such acts as
The Eurythmics and
The Pet Shop Boys before they were well known.
In 1985, as a result of increased popularity, The Fridge moved to it's current location; a converted 1913 cinema on
Coldharbour Lane. Since then it has hosted a variety of clubnights, mostly
dance music, and more recently mainly
hard dance. The most well known of these that are still running are probably
Escape from Samsara, Love Muscle and
Frantic.
There are several aspects that make The Fridge a very cool club, and certainly my favourite dance music venue in London. Firstly, it's big, as in around 2000
capacity. This means that there are always new people to chat to, and plenty of places to hang out and chill when you're totally
strung out on drugs.
Moreover, as a result of being big, the sound system is superb. It's about 40
k, and is well enough set up that it has enough
bass whilst still haing sufficent
midrange and
treble that you can hear the
synth sections that are esential to most dance music, especialy hard dance. The
lighting is also great, and the visuals (big
data projectors and slide projectors) and
pyros used at some events, are always fun.
Another aspect of The Fridge, is that it is very lax on
drugs. Though it gives an image of being tough on drugs, this is primarly for PR with the local police. Searches on entry are rare, and the
security staff never care about you smoking
dope, taking
ecstasy, or doing lines of
cocaine or
ketamine. Though this means the enviroment is not for some, the fact that everyone is on drugs rather than drunk makes for a very cool crowd, IMHO.