Turntable, Holborn

Studio!!! 

Sazeracs and old soul sounds: Turntable should be up my street. BITD when I used to DJ, nipping off to New York on Friday and returning to London on the Sunday night red-eye from JFK with a suitcase full of pre-release 12-inch discs was a monthly routine. I'm thinking of taking to the decks again: like the Valentine Brothers say, Money's Too Tight To Mention (he says, before HMRC gets any ideas ) and at various hip launches where the client has coughed up serious dough and booked a rare groover - as opposed to some celebrity's brat offspring/ precocious 'model', paid £10K just to press 'play' on an iPad  - I frequently find myself thinking "'Useless'" (Kym Mazelle) and how my record collection is stuffed with way better "Stuff Like That" (Quincy Jones ft Chaka)  So, I'm keen to visit this new vinyl-only DJ bar whose playlist is collated by Jazzi Q of Soul II Soul, big in the 90s. The sort of tracks I'm hearing - Phyllis Hyman, Linda Clifford, Gwen Guthrie, Cheryl Lynn, Shalamar, and a sprinkling of Motown - are guaranteed floor-fillers so It's A Shame (as The Detroit Spinners sang it)  that I don't want to "do a little dance, Get Down Tonight". Clearly, I've picked the wrong evening; it's not exactly heaving like Paradise Garage in its prime or about to wrest the disco crown from Studio 54. Maybe there's a secret door to a VIP lounge where Liza, Jerry, Bianca, Andy, Calvin, Halston, Grace, Divine and the gang are partying like it's 1979? Named after classic soul cuts of that decade, Turntable's street level bar's £8 cocktails  - Jungle Boogie (rum, Mandarine Napoléon and kumquat) and Ain’t No Sunshine (Aperol, grapefruit, rosé wine and blood orange)... but no Evelyn 'Champagne' King cocktail - are fair enough but the austere, claustrophobic, downstairs dance bar is way too (Barry) white; stark and boxy, unlike the late great growler's loin-locking smoochers, it's neither sexy nor Chic -  more joyless Norwich nightclub circa Joy Division tonight. Will I come back and order South Asian street food staples - Malay chicken, hot and sour fish, or lentil and aubergine curry -  to eat to the beat? Tempus fugit! I'm off home to mix Manhattans, Boogie Oogie Oogie round my sitting room, and hatch my big comeback plan.

7 - 9 Norwich Street EC4A 1EJ 7112 9179  http://www.turntable.london

Disco, Soho

Do I really need to go to... DISCO?

What: a new nightclub from Charlie Gilkes and Duncan Stirling - the brains behind Bunga Bunga and Maggie’s - disco promises ‘the glamour of Studio 54 and the atmosphere of Paradise Garage’ (I'll be the judge of that, mista!) with podium dancers and shirtless waiters in shiny tight shorts designed to show off their glitter-balls

Where: 13 Kingly Court, Soho. Twitter @DiscoSoho

When: from 28th June 

Pros: Ask the Hot Shot DJ for your fave Instant Replay, then get set to Jump To The Beat.  Do It Anyway You Wanna (Do It), and Dance Dance Dance (Yowsah! Yowsah! Yowsah!) at Funkytown’s latest Boogie Wonderland. Young Hearts Run Free, so after some (eye-to-eye) Contact, get ready to Get Down and Push Push (In The Bush) with those Bad Girls (toot, toot, yeh, beep, beep!!) 

Cons: none. A 70’s Disco Inferno? That’s The Way I Like It (uh-huh, uh-huh) and Shame Shame Shame, shame on you, if you can’t dance too! 

Go with: Gary’s Gang, Ms Grace, her Sister, Sledge, and Le Freak - coz He’s The Greatest Dancer.  

PS: bonus points to everyone that can identify who recorded all those big disco hits.
Here's one http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j5TlpUF2GGw

READ MY JULY 2013 REVIEW OF MY NIGHT AT DISCO here http://tinyurl.com/qfuqzdg