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Daveid Phillips is head of music at Koko |
Welcome to cloud Koko Land
INTERVIEW
DAVIED PHILLIPS
DAVEID Phillips is head of music at Koko – one of London’s top clubs – once a Victorian music hall in Mornington Crescent, formerly Camden Palais.
It opened four years ago with a secret gig by Madonna and runs weekly gigs and clubnights including Club NME.
In an exclusive interview, and his first in three years, Mr Phillips tells Grooves why he contacted us after an article published two weeks ago criticised Koko.
Charlotte Chambers asked him about those secret Madonna and Prince gigs – and why Grooves wasn’t invited to the party.
CC: What upset you about my column?
DP: It was the comment about the Album Chart show, saying the bands only play it once and don’t enjoy playing it again. But there are acts like the Sugarcubes (Bjork’s original band) who’ve played it three times, and The Feeling, who have done it four times.
James Dean Bradfield, the Chemical Brothers and James Morrison enjoyed it so much they wanted to move their London shows to the venue.
CC: I called the Mint Group a “faceless organisation” partly because they have told me in the past that the local paper isn’t important to them. To me that is like saying Camden and its population isn’t important.
DP: [If they were dismissive of you] that’s a mistake. That’s arrogance. I think that’s something we’ve got to look at. The reason we got to that position was there were lots of things in place to do a big marketing campaign about Koko being a destination, and the people behind the company...
It kicked off big with Madonna and Coldplay and attracted a lot of media that wanted a piece of the action, and we were reticent to give up that. I didn’t want it to suddenly have a shelf life; I didn’t want it to be seen as a cool place to go – the only thing that makes it cool are the bands and DJs playing. We turned down loads of stuff, and in our haste we almost went on an anti-marketing drive, which you were probably a victim of. I never wanted to make us the story, but I also think it’s time for us to peek over the parapet a little bit – that’s why I rang you up. Otherwise it’s just perception and hearsay, and if your perception of [Mint] is it’s faceless, then that can grate.
CC: Another criticism was that the sound gets lost in the venue.
DP: When we first opened we had six months of real teething problems – the sound system wasn’t very good, but it was replaced about two months ago. Our sound is almost equivalent to the 02 Arena now.
Another thing with the sound is it’s controlled by visiting engineers. Ninety per cent of big bands bring their own engineers – you’re in the lap of the gods then, it’s down to whether they’re any good, and, to be honest, a lot of the time they’re not up to it.
CC: What has been the triumph of Koko since it came to Camden?
DP: I’ve been involved in venues for 23 years and the last three years I’ve worked here is the busiest I’ve ever been involved in. It’s open six nights a week. Club NME is maximum capacity every week, it’s one in one out at the moment.
CC: The Madonna thing was a massive coup.
DP: Yeah, but that was Warner Brothers ringing us to say Madonna played there in 1983, her new album’s called Confessions on a Dancefloor, it was all about the mirrorball – they came, did a reccy, and said they had to do it here.
It was a £1.5 million budget on five songs – but there have been better gigs at Koko.
CC: What are you planning for 2008?
DP: There’s a really special thing for July. I’d love to tell you more but it’s just being sorted out now. It’s a month-long festival by a particular brand that fits really nicely.
CC: How many people from Camden got to go to Prince?
DP: The Prince show was announced on his website at midnight, and it was sold out in 10 minutes [to] his über fans.
In the venue there’s these Greek topless male busts, muscly weird Victoriana stuff, and we had to have them covered up because they offended him – and then he sang about sex for two hours. It’s just a funny, quirky thing. He just didn’t want to see it.
It was a good gig – he totally busked it. He did a soundcheck in the afternoon, everybody was listening to him. I got a bit misty eyed, wobbly kneed, all a bit emotional.
But after the soundcheck he got a piece of paper out and a Biro and wrote out 20 songs and gave them to our stage manager and said, can you photocopy this please. The band had rehearsed 150 songs and he just picked 20 on the night.
CC: What’s so special about Koko?
DP: The capacity of 1,500 is unique in London. You’ve got the Astoria and Shepherd’s Bush and the Forum, but they’re all about 2,500.
It’s a unique building. Charlie Chaplin stood on that stage, and the Clash, and the Goons... you can’t buy that – it’s in the fabric of the building. People have been coming here and having a good time since 1910. |
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