The K Club

Next month Polygram become the first major record company to release a dance cd compiled and mixed by an Irish DJ. Clubmix is the project of Digital Beat s own scribe and dance agitator , Mark Kavanagh. A 25-date nationwide tour will coincide with the release. With mix-cds by foreign spinners selling well in Ireland, it was only a question of time before a label of Polygram s stature would release one by an Irish club DJ .
According to Kavanagh, he got the idea for the CD last year, when his now-defunct Clubmix show on Radio Ireland was attracting up to 30,000 listeners weekly. When Radio Ireland became Today FM and dropped its dance music shows, it was questioned whether this CD would have the same appeal, he speculates, but interest among Clubmix s followers is high: they haven t had any mixes from me in a couple of months, so the timing is perfect. Dance shops have asked me to run them off a few hundred illegal mix tapes, so I ve got an indication that Clubmix will be more popular than I first thought.
Although Kavanagh s show was taken off the air by Radio Ireland at the start of the year, he claims that his club work schedule has become more hectic than ever, with increased attendances at his shows.
It s an achievement for the local scene that an Irish DJ now gets the same recognition as foreign DJs. I was recently offered a gig in Galway that I didn t want to play. The promoter came back and offered me #2,000 to do it, and although it was an honour to be valued so highly, I still turned down the gig.
Kavanagh claims that the CD is an accurate representation of his club set including anthems like Marmion s Schoneburg , tracks from labels and producers such as Tripoli Trax and Steve Thomas, and some unreleased exclusives, including his own Funky Monkey tune, his first (but by no means last) recording since his own Red Records label closed.
I ve just done remixes for two of my favourite English labels, and I m working on a single, but I don t want to get involved with running a label again as it takes up time that could be spent more creatively in the studio.
The nationwide tour to promote the release is being supported by Sony Playstation, a move by a multinational that Mark is proud to be involved with. Kavanagh views the tie-in with Sony as an inevitable and positive development, and denies any suggestionof a sell-out .
I m chuffed that they are sponsoring the tour. One of our aims was to sell dance music and clubbing to the Irish business sector. Up to now this has been one of the failings of the local club scene, and our DJs and producers have been unable to capitalise on dance music s popularity because of its inherent bad image in mainstream society. Anyway, corporate sponsorship doesn t mean selling out. My music is very much underground, but it can be played anywhere.
Dance music is today s pop music: look at the Irish sales of albums by Daft Punk and The Chemical Brothers dance is the mainstream now, and it needs to be wholly embraced by mainstream business if the scene is to develop and grow further.
While there is still a perception that the Irish club scene revolves around a handful of high-profile Dublin clubs, Mark is quick to point out that there are dance nights in every Irish town, and he is confident his nationwide tour will be a success.
Outside Dublin, clubbers aren t too interested in international DJs. I get eight hundred people turning up to a club in Letterkenny on a Thursday night and very few English names could achieve that. The music I play is underground, but unlike the UK, where speed garage and big beat are crowd-pullers it is also the most popular style of music in Ireland. Most people call what I play hard house , but it s not a name I m comfortable with. Then again, every sub-genre has a crap name, including speed garage and Big beat.
Kavanagh claims he has concentrated mostly on his own DJing in the last two years, and with two more Irish tours lined up in 1998, including workshops for aspiring DJs, he aims to help develop the burgeoning scene further.
I get kids coming up and telling me I inspired them to buy a set of decks, and, to me, that s one of the highest compliments a DJ can get. A lot of people have worked damn hard over the last ten years to keep our club scene going. They should be happy, not scared, that we are on the verge of seeing the rewards for all the hard work. Now all we need is a change in the licensing laws and a dance show on 2FM produced by dance DJs, the way dance fans want to hear it. That would be a major achievement for the local club scene, and one we could all be proud of. n
Clubmix is released on Polygram on April 13th.