The Twisted Wheel is, to use that over-used word, a legendary name in Manchester. It became famous in the 1960s as a place where people could hear and dance to 60s soul, later dubbed ‘Northern Soul’.
The original Twisted Wheel was located on Brazennose Street. Later in the 1960s it moved to Whitworth Street, next to Piccadilly Station, where it continued until 1971. In 2002 it reopened as a club night, held on the last Friday of every month. The main club is Legends, though the Twisted Wheel name can be seen outside.
On the evening of Friday 25 July I made my way there and descended the stairs into the cavernous interior.
At first striking, perhaps even shocking, was the fact that most people here were over the age of 50. Like me they must have grown up with this music, in the 60s, and still get off on it today.
But while clubs and musical genres come and go, sixties soul is still the same today, and virtually everything about today’s Twisted Wheel looks to be as it was four decades ago: The playlist, vinyl records on turntables, the lack of flashing lights – All disco lights were turned off, the only light source being the fluorescent ceiling lights.
As compared with the past, only the clouds of tobacco smoke were missing, though this fact only crossed my mind later in the evening.
The records are all sixties soul, some familiar to me, many others I don’t recall ever hearing before. But that’s the way with Northern Soul. The music is over 40 years old, and yet you constantly hear great new records and artists you’ve never heard of before.
Guest DJ this evening was Richard Searling, veteran of northern soul clubs, including the Wigan Casino. I have listened to his show Soul Sauce on Smooth Radio for the past few years. I briefly chatted to him at the DJ console.
The club is like a time capsule – and though many of the club-goers are not exactly preserved in aspic, there were a few younger ones there too – a guy in a tank top and trousers dancing in an authentic looking style – young, but obviously into the music, and the era. Another guy, also around half the age of most of us, looked like Simon Dee or a clothes model from a 1968 knitting catalogue.
A very striking Barbara Streisand lookalike – maybe with a touch of Amy Winehouse – looked on with interest, accompanied by her more contemporary looking boyfriend.
For me, sixties soul is a key element of the atmosphere of Manchester in the sixties and seventies. The interesting thing is that while musical genres – like building styles – come and go, the Twisted Wheel with its strict playlist of imported black American music continues unchanged.
It’s a relic from the sixties still going strong today. I suppose you could say that’s true of most of the people there, including myself.
The Twisted Wheel website can be found at www.twistedwheel.net
A brilliant account of the Twisted Wheel in the sixties can be found on the www.soulbot.com site.
More info on Wikipedia.
I’m currently reading a book – actually a PDF file on my computer – entitled The Manchester Wheelers, a Northern Quadrophenia. Using the format of a novel, it tells the story of the Northern Soul scene in the mid to late 1960s and is centred around the Twisted Wheel Club.
