How This London Venue Brought Club Culture to the UK

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How This London Venue Brought Club Culture to the UK

Soho, Studio 54, Madonna, and the Wag.

Chris Sullivan opened the Wag Club in 1982, back when that square mile of city center just on the edges of London's Soho neighborhood was still the beating artistic heart of the capitol. A members club located at 33 Wardour Street—now the site of a branch of faux-Irish chain-bar O'Neils—the Wag revolutionized nightlife across the entire country, and shaped the face of club culture in the UK as we know it. It's eclectic blend of latin jazz, vintage funk, northern soul, hip-hop, and house, was a far cry from champagne and chart music of the VIP-friendly world of West End clubbing just up the road. "What we were doing at the Wag became a clarion call to the world," Sullivan told me over a coffee on a gorgeous spring afternoon. "It opened the door for dance music! That's what it did. You weren't hearing that music before the Wag. You went into a club round here and you'd hear Bucks fucking Fizz!"