Groove Central Presents The Up North Soul Groove All Dayer

It's a brave man that puts on a soul do in Birmingham (for reasons unknown), add to that to put on an all-dayer, and on a Sunday, takes major guts; well Tony Reynolds is just such a man. This had a lot to compete with - there was a popular weekender and and an all-nighter the day before, plus this was the day of the Vélo Birmingham & Midlands bike ride which meant half the City Centre was closed and, as if that wasn't enough to put people off, the sun came out for the first time since Easter and temperatures soared, so perhaps inevitably numbers were disappointing. This is (I think?) the fifth event here and I have been to all of them so far and, for those of us that made the effort, this was an absolute triumph. 

On paper this is a faultless event - lovely smooth, clean, polished dancefloor with enough room, cheap drinks (£3.20 Guinness), Tayto Irish crisps , food, good sized room, dark and DJ's in total shadow, free parking, central location accessible by train. And the line up was incredible: Dave Rimmer, Steve Glover (a Birmingham legend who just gets better and better each time I see him), Tony Reynolds (underrated but always excellent) and John Weston who (I am going to stick my neck out) IS THE BEST DJ IN BRITAIN TODAY, Alan Jenkins (from Scotland) and Martin Shaw were no slouches either neither did Carl pull any punches.

Don't know how best to describe the music but if you know these DJ's you'll have an idea - OK so it wasn't the 200mph adrenalin-fest that Macabre Soul, a couple of weeks ago, was but there was a similar range of solid proper Northern Soul - underplayed, stompers, obscurities and enough quality oldies to keep things varied but still exhilarating. In common with Macabre Soul there was little in the way of Modern stuff and none of the run-into-the-ground tunes like I Wanna Give You Tomorrow or done-to-death House For Sale, in fact if you could have transported Aaron and his crowd here today both sides would have benefitted immeasurably from the experience. NOT A BAD SONG all night, quite a few tunes that you're not sure if you've heard them before but instantly they come on you think "how is this not the most played record on the soul scene because I NEED to hear it over and over again about 20 times - right now".

Some pretty exuberant dancers too; I was only planning to come for a few hours but in the end only had to leave in order to not miss the last bus on a Sunday home. Some people go to gigs for the social aspect, some for the atmosphere a packed club brings but I go for the music and the dancing and whilst you could dwell on the low numbers I prefer to view this day/night as a heroic victory - The venue, dancers, DJ's and above all the music was second to none, immense, emotional, anthemic; holy sh*t what else could you ask for! People should write poems about this event because when Kenny Hamber - Anything You Want or Candi Staton - Now You've Got the Upper Hand are blasting out in the dark Digbeth night, your ears are ringing and you're the only person on that floor it's the closest experience to being in the Charge of the Light Brigade possible in the 21st Century.

Anyway this is only the second event this year I've given five stars, out of 34 events that ain't too bad, it's up there with Macabre Soul for me, a must-not-miss occasion. So do yourself a favour, leave any preconceptions about Birmingham behind and come to this. If there was any justice in the world the 'full' sign would have been on the door at 9pm.

Just to prove I do all my sketches on site, here's two of the DJ postcards I drew, it also confirms that it's bloody dark in there and that John Weston was wearing some very odd headgear?!

I rarely give 5 stars - I've noticed that often reviews are by people connected with the event who inevitably give 5 stars to everything. I am trying to be objective.