Brian Nigel Taylor

All about club life in Switzerland and Austria.

(An interview - my comments and questions in Italics).

I loved my time in Austria but for me Switzerland was the best place to work. The nightclubs and venues had so much class, style and were so well run, it was exciting to DJ there. However, Vienna was a load of fun too, I think of the great times I had with Mike Norwood, Roger Tovell and Andy Sutherland and the crazy things we got up to. I was at the Wake Up, Roger was at Magic Club. We all used to get together in the day, have a few drinks, and here is a picture of a Toga Party we once went to at Mike’s resident gig, St Tropez. I don’t even remember being at that party at all that night. Oh, by the way, Brian continues, did you know that Wake Up burned down? They think it was arson.

There’s a common story about night clubs burning down. And, the question that was always asked was ‘Did the Architect have the new designs before the club burned down or after”?

In Denmark, that happened all the time - especially during the 70s.

Well, not in Vienna, that is the fascinating part. We had opened up and I was the first DJ in. Let me tell you from the first night onwards six days a week we were full. And, we emptied out practically every club in Vienna. We had a huge Saturday Night Fever styled dance floor that was steered by a Commodore computer, we could put different patterns in. New Years Eve we’d put in the Count Down Clock and so on. Clubs that used to have 300 or 400 people a night now had 6. And, this went on for about two years. Then one night I went to sleep and woke up and heard on the twelve o’clock news that Wake Up had burned down. As I went rushing down there I did a walk through with the boss got back to the third bar and found the gasoline canister smelling of gasoline down the back. It wasn’t investigated by the police and they investigated my boss first - obviously. All the furnishings and equipment was only two years old. You don’t deliberately burn a club down that is only two years old!

How about the competition burning it down?

Well, that was it. They did burn it down. We know that, we just don’t know who! But the competition definitely burned it down. And, the boss didn’t have insurance to cover the loss of income whilst it was closed. The one thing he did have going in his favour was he owned his own woodworking company. He used to build restaurants and night clubs so he built that one himself. So, very quickly he put his team together, stripped everything out and rebuilt it. Oh by the way, it was great for me and Mike, Andy and Roger because all the alcohol that was in the bars could not be used anymore, could not be resold or be claimed on the insurance - so me, Mike and Andy collected up all those bottles of booze and put them in a wheelbarrow. Whiskey, bourbon, vodka the lot and ran them down to my flat and put them down in the cellar and that’s how me and the gang were all wasted the next few months.

When did all this happen?

It must have been late 70s, perhaps 1979. And, when we reopened we emptied everyone else out again. It was hilarious.

Whilst Wake Up was closed I was contacted by a little club in Windischgarsten in Upper Austria in the middle of nowhere that wanted help - could I come and rescue him.

My boss at Wake Up said sure I could go and help out as long I was free to come back and work then they reopened.

So I went up there to find out what was going on. I discovered his club was sliding downhill being frequented by cokeheads and heroin addicts and overall was listening to hard rock music and clientele getting stoned in the bathrooms and the Police had raided him twice and told the owner they would take away his licence if it happened again. The owner asked me how do I get out of this? So, I spent a couple of days going round the other clubs listening to what was being played. It was Austro Pop, and what we like to call ‘Fox”. (German Foxtrot) and that’s what was being played locally. So, I said OK this is what we are going to do. I am going to empty out your club in about 15 minutes and then what you are going to do is close down and we are going to come up with a new opening and when we get people in we are going to appeal not just to the kids but the parents as well and you are going to show the parents that there is a change here.

So, on the Saturday night I put a baseball bat right underneath the turntables and put on a cassette to let the people come in and all the drug addicts would come in and these other disgusting people and the place filled up there must have been three or four hundred people there then I switched on the microphone and announced in my best german ‘Welcome Ladies and Gentlemen, ‘change has come to Windischgarsten’ then I hit the button and played “Hands Up” by Ottowan, remember that one? You should have seen the faces of all the Judas Priest fans in the audience. Shock, disbelief and the threatening glares. It was hilarious. I was walking dead! Literally within ten minutes the place was empty. So we closed the club for a short while and for the grand reopening I managed to persuade a very famous comedy duo “Muckenstrunz und Bamschabl” (friends of mine) to come and perform their TV cabaret show just for the cost of the gas. It was stacked to the rafters, parents came with their kids, I mean 14 - 20 year olds. I then played Austro Pop and Fox for a while, and the place was heaving. It was a great success. The owner of the club was voted in as deputy mayor and later mayor of the town. Job done,

I used to love shutting down clubs like that for the right reason! Of course, occasionally I landed in the wrong disco for my record collection and ‘involuntarily’ emptied a couple in my career as well. Can’t win ‘em all!

Another story comes to mind. I remember when Graham Bell (a.k.a Gray Harvey) came to visit us all, it was the day I nearly crippled Mike Norwood. Visits from International D.J.’s generally involved copious amounts of alcohol and after an evening of drinking we all piled into Andy Sutherland’s Rover to drop Graham off at the railway station, he was off to Denmark for his next gig. We put him on the train and went back to my place to continue drinking. The phone rang... it’s Graham whining about how he’d gotten off the train to get a drink and it left without him. Right, back in the car and off we all went to the train station with an inebriated Andy clutching the wheel as the heavy snowfall created whiteout conditions. We searched the train station for a half hour before realising that Graham had had the last laugh on us. We rushed back to the car and piled in before the Rover got snowed in... and in my haste, I slammed the door on Mike’s right hand... Good job he was somewhat anaesthetised from the Vodka Orange... Thankfully, the X-rays came back negative!

Later on, I worked at a great place in Geneva called CLUB VELVET, my first gig in Switzerland.. I think it was your club, Alan, because Ady Babe was in there.

You know, I will tell you what happened. Towards the end of the 80s, most of my International DJs, they kind of rebooked themselves, found their own work, were offered direct residencies by local night clubs…so by then they didn’t need an agent, they didn’t need me. Tschuss, Alan, - farvel og tak! Sure, I remember the Velvet but I think Ady arranged his own contract there.

Well, I didn’t know Ady at the time. I know I arrived a few days early, went down to Geneva and listened to the music that was being played, watching Ady Babe perform.

I sat in the club on the first night and he was the most gracious guy you could ever meet. When you go to a new club in a new country and you don’t know about the music they want it can be quite a challenge. There were assholes who put stickers over their records so you couldn’t see what they were playing. Then there were true gentlemen like Ady Babe who shared his playlist, so I could hit the ground running and play what the crowd loved to dance to. The guy was so gracious from top to bottom. He just wanted to make sure that when I walked into the venue on day one that I was completely prepared. And, that’s rare. He didn’t leave Geneva until he knew I was OK. I think his next gig was the famous CASINO in Montreux,

I was at Club VELVET for three months when the french DJ Frederique from Club GRIFFIN came in and said he was taking vacation for a month would I like to do it? I said, sure why not. I loved the music, here and I loved Geneva. A beautiful night club, with regulars like Charles Aznavour, Julio Iglesias and Davidoff (of cigar fame) with an amazing restaurant. (I put on 10 lbs in a month there!) From there, I was offered a 3 year residency (8 months, Spring and Summer) in Club 58, that was back in 1982. Was that still one of yours?

No, the more international DJs there that were floating around Europe, finding their roots and settling down, it’s quite logical they’d secure the best work around and take residencies. Those clubs would not have to risk taking agencies DJs anymore who might not be up to scratch (‘scuse the pun). But I did have Club 58 as a customer during the 70s. A lot of fascinating stories about it too. A lot of famous diplomats and politicians used to go there…

Yes, I met Kennedy there. Ted Kennedy that is. He walked over to me, I am not going to say who he was with obviously, but asked if I would play ‘I just called to say I love you’.

I also worked with artists like The Platters, Percy Sledge and other great acts who would appear nightly for a week at a time at the venue.

Anyone else famous you ask? Did you ever supply the Green Go at the Palace Hotel in Gstaad?

Yes, for a while, they particularly wanted female DJs. I seem to remember I sent two.

One of the James Bond films was filmed there.

I got the job via the owner of the Griffin who told me Gstaad was the place to be in the winter of 1983. (Too right, jet set, skiing for the rich and famous..) I had the most amazing winter there, talk about meeting famous people. Somewhere I have got some exclusive negatives of Elizabeth Taylor. She was in Gstaad for the winter, and one day I met her in the parking lot, she just got out of her Rolls Royce (the reception had just tipped me off she would be there and told me to get out and see her). So, I grabbed my huge Canon and flash and all the other gear that I had and running out to see if I could get a photo of her. (You weren’t allowed to take pictures of guests inside the Hotel, but you were permitted to solicit outside). So, I walked up to her introduced myself and she immediately said ‘I know who you are. You are the Disc Jockey at Green-Go’.. I said, ‘would you mind if I took a photograph’. She said sure and just stood there. My camera was a fully manual camera and I was trying to focus, and was shaking, getting nervous and was desperate to get the best shot. She saw how nervous I was and told me to just relax and said. I am here and puffed up her fur coat collar and put her fur hat on and told me to just take pictures. She was awesome.

Who else? One of my most exciting meetings was to meet Dame Shirley Bassey. I had no idea I was going to meet her. She was my mum’s favourite singer so I knew all her songs. So, of course, I was a big fan of Shirley Bassey too. Her adopted son would often come into Club 58, Geneva and then in the winter he would turn up in Gstaad which surprised me. Of course, you don’t ask too many questions and one day he said oh my mums coming I will introduce you. I had no idea who his mum was. And, that evening in the club, he said excitedly ‘She’s here, come over’. When I saw her I was almost speechless. I stammered.’You’re Shirley Bassey’ ! I freaked. She was so gracious, I told her all about my mum, such a big fan and so on, and asked if she would she sign an album for my mum. I told her she was a traffic warden so Shirley wrote “To Mary, that’s the ticket, girl”. Other regular guests at the Green Go was Roger Moore and John Travolta. I loved playing music for them as they were that little bit older. I’d play Glen Miller, Mills Brothers for the older guests and see the smile on their faces, it was great.

By the way, did you called yourself Brian or Nigel back in those days?

It was Brian. There was a problem with the name Nigel. It wasn’t very common out there in Austria, Germany and Switzerland, they would pronounce it as ‘Niggle”. I didn’t like that so I was known as Brian. It would drive me nuts so it wasn’t until 1992 when Nigel Mansell become World Champion of Formula One and therefore world famous that the german speaking population realised how to say Nigel properly.