Stella Artois and Scooter: How Clubland TV Stuck Its Fingers Up at the Underground

If we're in agreement that the word "underground" has been co-opted by those who, on the surface, seem to be the antithesis of it, then we've got to reassess what it actually means, how it works, and where, when, and why we should use it.

It's all too easy to think of electronic music, and more specifically dance music, as something that exists on only two levels: the mainstream and the underground. While this is a seductive narrative that gives fans of the latter a chance to sneer at the former, imbuing them as it does with a misplaced sense of confidence in their own tastes, it is also, more importantly, a false one.

"Underground" culture, in the context of 2015 at least, amasses to little more than a dick-waving competition over who can get the least hits on a blog, who can put out the smallest run of records, who can self-mythologize about seeing a particular DJ when they were still in the womb. And post-post modern poptimism has killed the notion of a genuine, democratic mainstream too. So what are we left with?

Things like Clubland TV, are the answer. Populating the lower reaches of Sky's music section on EPG, Clubland was borne out of the compilation series bearing the same name. Those CDs, stuffed to the gills with trashy, trancy, euphoric floor-fillers, were the brainchild of label and production house All Around the World.

Founded in 1991 by Matt Cadman and Chris Nuttal as a subsidiary of Universal, and run out of Blackburn, the label has played host to the likes of Basshunter, Flip & Fill, and Ultrabeat. The Clubland brand knew its worth and its late-00s heyday saw a series of club trotting live shows that gave pissed punters exactly what they wanted: the chance to see live PA's from the likes of Cascada, N-Trance, N-Dubz and Scooter while you splash your pals with alcopops and get off with someone from the other sixth form in town. These days, operations have been scaled down somehwat, with the live element jettisoned and the release schedule slimmed down.

For the heads out there it was the Clubland Live 2 tour that was the game changer. Featuring a stellar line up fit for the Stella swigging clubbers, it was a Woodstock for the flip phone generation. Grouping together Scooter, Kelly Llorenna, N-Force, September, the sweatsoaked travelling high NRG was pure carnival, an extended exhaltation of joy. Luckily for those of us who weren't able to experience the sensational summit in the flesh, the night can be relieved thanks to AATW's comprehensive, subculture collating YouTube channel. Ultrabeat's rendition of "Pretty Green Eyes" which, if you've forgotten is the greatest song ever, is one of the great live peformances of our time.

The cavernous MEN rocks throughout, reminiscent of the megaraves held at Wembley back in the Strictly Underground glory days. Scooter's set is greated like the second coming of our lord the saviour. It is truly a stunning 90 minutes of footage.The whole thing is a monumental testament to the crowd pleasing eternal appeal of music of this kind.

That music, the music played on and promoted by Clubland TV, was never the mainstream. It may have flirted with the charts but it was too brash, too bold, too vulgar, in its own British way, to penetrate the consensual consciousness that unites Buzzfeed browsers and Pitchfork readers alike in the way the mainstream – if we can think of it as still existing – theoretically does. This is a channel that pumps out round ups like Judge Jules' Vocal Trance Anthems, one that plays Baby D next to Breeze and Styles. It's reflective of the kind of club scene that goes largely unnoticed, the scene that exists in what we're taught to think of, disparagingly, as the provinces, as if anything outside of London isn't worthy of any kind of real dissection - the places we think of, again disparagingly, as lost.

Your Wakefields, Huddersfields, Stockports, Scunthorpes. The Newquays and Newports. These are the places people go out to go out, to go out and enjoy themselves, to go out for the pure pleasure of being in a room full of people all there to be out and enjoy themselves.
 
In contrast, trap yourself in London and you're stuck in basements full of tweeters, joyless statues attempting to convince themselves that being in the right place at the right time is enough, or that any actual participation in the event itself is an unnecessary expenditure of energy better spent on telling people about how you were on the guestlist because you know the DJ.

Instead, these are clubs with roped-off VIP sections and weekend billionaires, places where the air is heavy with dry ice and VK, spots where shiny shoes are welcome and shirts are worn, the scowling face of the capital replaced by beaming grins. These are clubs where donk and hard house mingle with chart smashes. These are nightclubs that still feel like nightclubs. You aren't going to hear DJ Deep's deep cuts or the new Girl Unit b-side; there won't be a L.I.E.S takeover – you're going to get the full clubland experience courtesy of Clubland cohorts.

What's incredible about Clubland TV, what makes it stand out from its televisual peers, is that it is a genuine and accurate reflection of its core audience, a perfect encapsulation of what its demographic craves every weekend: fizzy bangers that sound like being hammered in a club on Christmas Eve with your best friends. Flip it on any time – and thanks to the kindness of their hearts, the lads over at AATW have decided to make it streamable 24/7 online – and you're likely to see videos for hard house acts you've never heard of, promotional clips for forgotten Gigi D'Agastino gems, tunes you forgot you held a flame for.
 
These aren't songs that'll ever be featured on greyscale arbiters of cool (ahem, THUMP for example). They aren't songs your mum hums along to in the car, either. They exist in a liminal zone of perpetual hovering between the acceptable and unacceptable. This kind of music – music that isn't afraid of melody, isn't scared of sentimentality, isn't worried about perception – is both embarrassing and utterly not. It sounds more like going out than anything else out there. It's the sound of a million adolescent awakenings and a million more sozzled memories.

There once was a time when music was about having fun. At some point it became more about representing your place in society, a status symbol, and the colour drained from its cheeks and most retreated to the walls or the smoking patio. Because we're all so effectively indoctrinated into this economy of hip, we can't let go enough to be lame and enjoy crap music. So consider this a celebration of those who haven't drank the kool-aid, those who don't care who the DJ is, of those for whom Friday night is eternal.

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