Unusually, it employed black musicians and DJs it did not have a drinks licence, and illicit drug-taking was commonplace and generally tolerated by the police.
#Blue flamingo restaurant mod
īy 1963, the Flamingo also became known as a centre of the mod subculture, where fans and musicians of both jazz and R&B music would rub shoulders. In October 1962, the club was the scene of a fight between jazz fans Aloysius Gordon and Johnny Edgecombe both lovers of Christine Keeler, which ultimately led to the public revelations of the Profumo affair. You usually had to scrape a couple of people off the floor when you emerged into Soho at dawn.". It had that seedy sort of atmosphere and there was a lot of pill-popping. John Mayall described the club as "a very dark and evil-smelling basement. The Flamingo was sometimes described as an intimidating place in the early 1960s, where gangsters, pimps and prostitutes hung out with American servicemen, West Indians, and music fans, and fighting among customers was not unusual. Rik and his brother Johnny launched regular all-nighters and the ethos of the club gradually changed.
Jeffrey Kruger and his father Sam continued to own the club, but its management was taken over in 1959 by Rik Gunnell, a former boxer, market worker and bouncer who had previously run an all-night club at the Mapleton Hotel with the hotel's manager Tony Harris. The club became particularly well known for its weekend "all-nighters" staying open on Friday and Saturday nights until 6.00 am, a practice which had started on an occasional basis in 1953. In April 1957, the club moved to new premises in the basement of a former grocery store at 33–37 Wardour Street, where it initially remained primarily a jazz venue with Ronnie Scott and Tubby Hayes as members of the resident band. The club rapidly gained a strong reputation attracting visiting performers such as Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald and in 1954, Billie Holiday. The club acquired its name from the song " Flamingo", which was used as a theme tune by the resident band, Kenny Graham's Afro-Cubists. It was promoted as Britain's most comfortable club and male visitors were expected to wear ties. Jeffrey Kruger's intention was to provide a centre for high quality music in comfortable surroundings. Its first premises were in the basement of the Mapleton Restaurant at 39 Coventry Street, near Leicester Square. The club first opened in August 1952 under the ownership of Jeffrey Kruger, a London-born jazz fan, and his father Sam Kruger. No 37 Wardour Street was previously the address of the Shim Sham Club, which opened in 1935 and was known as "London's miniature Harlem". The club had a wide social appeal and was a favourite haunt for musicians, including The Who.
During the 1960s, the Flamingo was one of the first clubs to employ fully amplified stage sound and used sound systems provided by ska musicians from the Caribbean. It was located at 33–37 Wardour Street from 1957 onwards and played an important role in the development of British rhythm and blues and modern jazz.
The Flamingo Club was a jazz nightclub in Soho, London, between 19.
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