The liverpool Echo By Tom Duffy 19:00, 11 Jul 2020
Bootle’s Quadrant Park hosted some of Merseyside’s first ever legal raves
A Christmas Party for students at Hugh Baird College led to a Bootle snooker hall becoming one of the city’s first superclubs.
The students at Hugh Baird had been pestering their tutor, Mike Knowler, to put on a party for them in the Christmas of 1989. They knew that Mike was a top DJ at the State nightclub in Liverpool city centre, and wanted a big night out.
Unfortunately The State was about to close, so Mike asked the owner of Bootle club Quadrant Park if they could help. Jim Spencer, the club’s then owner, agreed. At the time Quadrant Park was very much a ‘Sharon and Tracy ‘ club in that it played commercial music for a mainstream audience. But that was all about to change. Mike Knowler’s Christmas Party for his students pulled in over 1,000 people, to the incredulity of the club’s management.
They quickly asked Mike to host the same event every Thursday, and the Southport DJ was soon playing house music to thousands of people. The success attracted clubbers from across the country, and the Quad became a rival to Manchester’s world famous Hacienda.
And then the club used their snooker hall’s 24 hour license to host legal all night raves, which soon entered into folklore. At weekend the club, just off Derby Road, was pulling in students, hen parties, footballers, scallies and gangsters.
In December 2016 Mike chatted to the ECHO about how a Christmas party helped change the history of dance music in Liverpool..
He said: “In the late 80s I was a lecturer at Hugh Baird college, and was a DJ at the State nightclub in Liverpool city centre at the weekend. Some of my students wanted me to organise a Christmas party for them at the State. The only problem was the club was about to close down.
So I got in touch with Jim Spencer, who owned Quadrant Park on Derby Road in Bootle. He agreed to host the college’s 1989 Christmas party and we decided to advertise the night in the ECHO. I agreed to DJ the night, playing house music. We ended up with over 1,300 people in the club on a Thursday night.
The club’s manager asked me to be the house DJ every Thursday night, and we managed to attract massive crowds every week. Jim then asked me to do a Friday too, and we ended up with 2,000 a night. The owner then asked me to start doing three nights from Thursday through to Saturday every week.
Quadrant Park DJ’s James Barton and John Kelly
The club was now pulling in crowds of around 2,500 people, attracting clubbers from all over the country. Mike told the ECHO how the quad’s snooker club helped Quadrant Park to host one of the country’s first legal all night raves.
He said: “Quadrant Park had a snooker club which not many knew about, with a 24 hour license. I think it was mainly used by local shift workers. So, the owners decided to use that license to host all nighters in the pavilion area of the club. I suppose it was a bit of a loophole, but it was all above the law.
“The all night raves ran for 44 weeks from November 1990 to August 1991.
“Unfortunately the authorities soon realised that non members were being let in and the club lost its all night licence.”
Although the quad had to stop hosting all nighters, it continued to thrive as a house music venue.
Mike said: “I remember the first time I heard about house music was at the new music seminar in New York in the 80s. A black musician from Chicago asked me if we played house music in the UK. I said ‘what is it’ and he said it was like New Order meets Philly soul. He wrote down the names of some house music tracks and I bought them in a record shop. That was it for me.
Mike Knowler at Quadrant Park in Bootle
“During the early 90s there was some very good house music coming out of America, which we played at the quad. We also played European stuff from Italy and Belgium. Some records were particularly popular. I remember there was a cover version of David Bowie’s Heroes with the American soul singer Billy Preston on vocals. It was brilliant and everyone loved it.”
Quadrant Park soon began to experience the problems that blighted many successful clubs in the 90s.
Mike said: “Drug dealers were coming up to me and offering me pills. So I went straight to the owners and told them there was a problem with drugs. I said if you don’t sort it we will get closed down. So the management made contact with the police and started taking more measures to keep drugs out of the club.”
Mike Knowler at The Quad in Bootle
The club did become associated with other problems such as violence and gangs.
Mike said: “They always had a strong door team, with up to 20 bouncers on a big night. But I always felt the bouncers were too heavily focused toward the main door to the club. There was a lack of security in the other parts of the club. The toilets became a byword for trouble. A friend of mine was assaulted and robbed in there. I remember he came back from the toilets with a bleeding nose.
“Toward the end of Quadrant Park’s life scallies and undesirables went there to prey on the clubbers.”
He said: “When 051 and the Academy opened in town, that was it really. Their prices were lower than ours and they were in the city centre.
“I remember I was in 051 in the early 90s, and it was chocker. I just thought we can’t compete with this. The club was in the city centre, while Quadrant Park was in Bootle. I knew it was over.
“I had brought in Andy Carroll, James Barton, John Kelly and Gary Jay to DJ at the quad. Andy and James had started playing at 051, and made it a success. They then launched a club night called Cream in the backroom of the Academy.”
Quadrant Park closed its doors for the last time in January 1992, Mike told the ECHO that Quadrant Park’s life was short it still managed to etch out an important place in the history of Liverpool’s nightclubs.
He said: “It was Liverpool’s first superclub, and I think the Quad gave birth to Cream.”
Famous super club Quadrant Park formed by accident and introduced Merseyside to house music
The Liverpool ECHO By Olivia Williams Senior reporter 19:03, 14 Aug 2022
Clubbers check their big 80s hair in the ladies’ toilets at Quadrant Park nightclub in February 1988
A famous super club in Merseyside was formed by accident and introduced Liverpool to house music.
Quadrant Park opened in the late 80s in Bootle, but it was in 1990 it became more influential. In the beginning, it was primarily a mainstream nightclub playing chart music. But then it took off and the club started to establish itself as one of the UK’s first “super clubs”.
By mid-1990 the club was drawing crowds of up to 2,500. Also known as the Quad, or Quaddie, this Bootle nightclub on Derby Road at the time was said to be the UK’s only legal all-night rave, because it didn’t sell alcohol.
But many may not know the super club started by accident. The students at Hugh Baird had been pestering their tutor, Mike Knowler, to put on a party for them in the Christmas of 1989.
They knew that Mike was a top DJ at the State nightclub in Liverpool city centre, and wanted a big night out. Unfortunately, The State was about to close, so Mike asked the owner of Bootle club Quadrant Park if they could help. Jim Spencer, the club’s then owner, agreed.
At the time Quadrant Park was very much a “Sharon and Tracy” club in that it played commercial music for a mainstream audience. But that was all about to change.
Crowds at Quadrant park in Bootle
Mike Knowler’s Christmas Party for his students pulled in over 1,000 people, to the incredulity of the club’s management. They quickly asked Mike to host the same event every Thursday, and the Southport DJ was soon playing house music to thousands of people.
The success attracted clubbers from across the country, and the Quad became a rival to Manchester’s world famous Hacienda. And then the club used their snooker hall’s 24 hour license to host legal all night raves, which soon entered into folklore.
Quadrant Park closed its doors for the last time in January 1992, Mike told the ECHO that Quadrant Park’s life was short it still managed to etch out an important place in the history of Liverpool’s nightclubs.
He said: “It was Liverpool’s first super club, and I think the Quad gave birth to Cream.”
The Highs and Lows of Quadrant Park – Liverpool’s First Super Club
Published:
Quadrant Park, “The Quad” or “The Quaddie” – however you affectionately denoted the building in Bootle, we’re guessing many of you spent many a night here. Some nights to remember and some nights you can’t remember. Quadrant Park was a nightclub that opened during the late 1980s to the early 1990s and was one of the most important in the UK at the time. During its stint it was known to attract a number of international guest DJs and the main styles of music played were Italo house, rave and acid house and many refer to it as Liverpool’s first super club. It welcomed people from all over the world unified by their love of rave and their defiance to go home. If just for one more song…
The nightclub was located on Derby Road, north of the city of Liverpool, in a converted warehouse. The building was originally an Owen Owen’s warehouse, which was purchased by steel magnate James Spencer in the late 1980s to convert into a nightclub and snooker hall. A “Heritage Market” was opened shortly after to make use of the large unused lower floor space at the rear. Originally opened in the late 1980s as a snooker hall and mainstream nightclub, there was also a market in the downstairs warehouse area, and the upstairs contained a small social club (the Harlequin Suite) which could be hired out for social occasions. After the Sunday market trade had moved to a nearby dock warehouse (Stanley Market), Quadrant Park started holding all night raves in the then-vacant space.
photo by Mark McNulty
Acid house was Britain’s biggest youth revolution since the 60s, and its legacy has changed the country’s cultural landscape forever. A quarter of a century on, its impact can be felt in everything from fashion to film, to interior design. It redefined our notion of a night out. Strangers and soul mates, black and white, straights and gays, north and south, football hooligans and doctors, students and scallies – whatever your background an acid house party was a huge leveller, and that has just as much lasting effect on some as the new music, or drugs.
A loop-hole in a Sefton council licensing law enabled Quadrant Park to be the only legal all-night rave in the UK as the venue did not sell alcohol. Quadrant Park’s main period of activity began in early January 1990 with a capacity of 2,400, Quadrant Park began focusing on house music in early 1990. The club was dubbed “The Quad” and in October 1990 it opened the Pavilion, the first weekly legal all-nighter in Britain. Pavilion was put on in the basement below the main club. Some party goers would travel long distances to get to the venue; from London, Glasgow, Birmingham and even as far away as Aberdeen. Famously known as a city who go out on a Monday and couldn’t care less about the Tuesday morning, it was testament to the stature of party Liverpool can throw.
Near the end of 1990, the club obtained a licence to stay open to six o’clock. That’s right, as most people were sipping coffee just about to start the day, hundreds of people were wide awake (not from Kenco) and apart of the raveolution that swept the UK. The club survived until 31 December 1991, despite considerable and persistent licensing issues and unfavourable media attention in newspapers. Quadrant Park closed voluntarily that night, following an incident of robbery and a stabbing. The building has since been demolished and has been replaced with a waste recycling centre. The club was featured in an exhibition as part of the European Capital of Culture in July 2008 of which Liverpool was the host city.
On New Year’s Eve in 1991 as many were making resolutions, Quadrant Park’s doors closed for good. Acid house had become part of the nation’s psyche and soon became just a distant memory to many. A fuzzy, hazy memory with grainy polaroid pictures and swinging jaws. It has been said that raving is as English as fish ’n’ chips and it’s a sentiment many would agree with. The doors of Quadrant Park’s may not ever open again but their legacy will live on. So this goes to the ravers that now wear a suit to work, the all-nighters that are now mothers and fathers and the revellers of the night that never stopped dancing. We may have ventured down different paths since the good old days, we may not catch up as much as we should but for one moment in time, we were going through this crazy thing called life together. And it was one hell of a ride.