Paul Fryer Interview part 2.

Favourite 90s tunes?

Too many, too confusing. Arrgh.


Favourite Vague tunes?

Neuromancer, Read My Lips, Big Time Sensuality


How did TWA come about?

We (Suzy and I) had a club called the Kit Kat, and a number of gay men (and women) had started to come to the club because it was very cool and friendly. The management didn't like it and warned us off 'running a gay bar in their venue' I think they thought it might put off the footballers they wanted to bring in. So we all dressed up one week as a protest. Nick and I DJ'd in drag as part of the event. We'd been to Flesh and Kinky Gerlinky so we loved the whole drag thing and the glamour of those nights; as such is wasn't alien to us. But the managemt were not amused and we were kicked out of the venue as a result. After that Nick and I were offered a gig as TWA at Venus by James Baillie, so we did it. The rest is history.


Who were your your favourite guest DJs at Vague?

I loved Phil Faversham, but he was a resident really. He was as good as anyone, technically, in every way really. As I said though most of the guests were great DJs and were able to adapt to the vague crowd. this meant pushing it a bit, up and down, not just playing a ramp or flat with a few peaks. They liked it bumpy. We loved Eric Powell. Someone like Smokin Jo was amazing to look at as well as dance to. Tim Lennox, great. Chris and James, Luvdup, Sister Bliss, Fat Tony...I feel bad mentioning any cos there really were so many great turns.


What DJs did you want to play at Vague but never got?

Jimmy Saville and Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel (seriously, we tried)


Any standout Vague nights / moments?

Well if you have a look at the vague leeds warehouse page on facebook you'll see there were alot of standout nights. But Vera's Garden Party was a memorable one...we erected a marquee above the dancefloor and turfed the inside of the club...vera duckworth came and sand a medley of stevie wonder songs from a small cardboard boat whilst nick and I moved waves on sticks. We were dressed as flies.
Also the beach party. We put 11 tonnes of moroccan beach sand on the dancefloor. You couldnt dance but it was fun. We didnt tell anyone we were doing it. We just said "bring your swimwear next week". I think people thought we were going to do a foam party. haha. how wrong they were.


What made Vague so special?

Firstly vague was created by artists. I met Suzy at art college. Three of the visual staff were artists. vague really came out of art. The Kit Kat Club was an art orientated environment, and vague was born from that. people can say "oh that arty stuff it's meaningless" but it isn't ; art is in some ways the engine of human perception. Just as we rely on electricity for light, art is what lights our spirit, and it has done since we lived in caves. Artists first showed the human race that we have a history and a narrative; before cave drawings noone understood this. So in a way that's what we tried to do. We helped the people who came to the club realise that they had a story, and a role to play in life. That they were not worthless, despite what people might have said to them. That they had a right to be there. Practically this meant attention to detail, and a very visual as well as sonic ethos. And an attitude of "how can we improve" rather than "how can we make more money". And so the club was centred around the people that attended rather than the people that ran it.
The second thing was the door policy and the idea of a mixed club that was a safe environment for gay men and single women. Every great club I'd ever been in had a tolerant attitude to 'different' people and we wanted to enshrine that in vague's constitution. In fact, it was our policy to attract people who felt themselves to be or were in fact different. Artists know what it's like to be on the outside. It can be a lonely and dangerous place.
So in the end, believe it or not, vague was an intellectual club as much as it was a physical one. It was born of specific ideas, and the implementation of those ideas. Not that we knew what the outcome would be, we didn't. In retrospect it was an experiment. And we ourselves were some of the subjects of that experiment.