That night was the infamous Godskitchen Friday nights in Birmingham, and their weekly dance music nights held in an old warehouse-turned-nightclub in the Digbeth area of Birmingham. Used to the weekly clubbing at the local Leamington Spa clubs, Andy was completely blown away by what he saw when he stepped in through the doors at the superclub. Big name DJ's, the best in the latest underground dance music, laser lightshows and more. He had found his Heaven!
This all sparked the idea for Residentclubber, which was initially just somewhere to host pictures from nights out - way before social networking sites like MySpace, and then Facebook, Instagram etc, were around. The first incarnation of the Residentclubber website was originally hosted on various free websites like Yahoo Geocities, but as the site started to grow, it needed a much larger home.
And so after a couple of years enjoying the bright lights of the Birmingham nightlife, it wasn't until September 2003 that the Residentclubber cameras were out and about, returning home to Leamington Spa, with Daz A soon joining as contributing photographer - and the local profile of the website exploded as a result!
Over time, the website expanded and included a multimedia section with videos of some of the events they attended and the regular annual summer clubbing video project, a selection of club flyer and poster designs, an events section of the events that they hosted that attracted some of the best up and coming DJ's at the time, and Residentclubber.co.uk creator, Andy B's own DJ section.
In the many years that the website was around, Residentclubber had visited quite a few venues and events, mostly based in the local Birmingham and Leamington Spa areas. Most memorable nights include; Godskitchen, Gatecrasher at the NEC, Hed Kandi, Polysexual, Sundissential, Fuel, Global Gathering, Bounce and of course, not forgetting dance music's spiritual home; Ibiza, plus a whole lot of smaller local nights in bars (including their own), which had been just as good (sometimes even better) than some of the bigger club nights they attended.
The Residentclubber Mantra
The mantra for the website was:
"The message and spirit of a website is created in no small part by the editor. Without any creative control you just get a mish-mash with no overall style or direction. There are photo galleries with the photos uploaded exactly as they come from the camera, warts and all, visitors to Residentclubber.co.uk shouldn't have to skip through the many near-duplicates, blurry photos, failed experiments, and other dodgy photos.
With Residentclubber.co.uk, the part which takes the most time and care is the editing of the photo galleries. Many decisions are made, based on the criteria that was developed over the years since the site began, accepting some pictures whilst rejecting others.
And equally important, is that the photos need to reflect the philosophy for the site. Simply put, The week ends, life begins! It's what we believe in."
