UFO  - Tottenham Court Road, London

UFO, the name is now legendary........
I first went in early 1967. It was the prototype of clubs to come and I certainly had experienced nothing like it.
The club was held every two weeks and  was situated in an old dance hall in Tottenham Court Road going on until dawn. The atmosphere was other worldly-especially as England was still under a gray 50's conservatism. You went down some steps and entered an Aladdins cave of brilliantly coloured crawling slides, strobes, silent films and cartoons-all splashed across the walls simultaneously. The air was heavy with incense and there was a total feeling of passive innocence-most people knew of it by word of mouth-and there was not a touch of cynicism or irony-hence another reason for the name "children".
All sorts of bizarre people went to UFO -' 66 and 67 were the height of dressing up-old military uniforms from "I was Lord Kitcheners Valet" and exotic clothing from "Granny Takes A Trip". People would sometimes go from UFO to Happening 44, another club.

Like all psychedelia, UFO was an eclectic boiling pot of references. Massive amounts of drugs were taken-usually LSD or Methedrine, acid usually given out free--people floated through the haze and sometimes took their clothes off all in a blissfully naive way.
In one corner would be a juggler or poet, mime in another and the Floyd or Soft Machine bombarding the crowd from the anonymity of the crawling slide show -The Crazy World of Arthur Brown and Tomorrow would also play. However, during 67 The News of The World wrote a damning article about the " horrors" of this psychedelic dungeon and next week passive freaks were alarmed to find groups of suited Mods arriving for some of the "free Love".
Soon after, UFO died, but will always be synonymous with London’s psychedelic dawn.

We all went off to Middle Earth.

Rusty Cat Sneazin - March 2002

YES do I remember the UFO we used to gig there also Happening 44 as Armada, also the Electric Garden, Covent Garden.
How I ever survived still AFFECTED for life but what times we were free to live ...if you did not have money, no problems, you could still go there "Love and Peace man" and the guy on the door said “COOL MAN”.....and you went right on in.
I seem to remember £25 a gig, plus a percent on the door. Never could work that one out, packed house extra £5

Just for your interest??
Tim du feu from the Open Mind, Bass player in the sixties.
tim.dufeu@btopenworld.com - July 2002

Do you have any recollections of this club?
We want to hear from you if you do!!

email pooter@pooterland.com

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