Angels and flirty paces

ONCE a month, a flock of angels decide to quit the heavens and spend

the night in Glasgow. The reason lies on the other side of a large

wooden door, its surface jutted with horns, and down a dark flight of

twisting stairs to where music leaks from a source at the end of a

corridor.

Through an entranceway and into the heart of the sound is the main

room of The Tunnel nightclub. The angels are evident not only as icons

within the decor -- alongside cupids and artificial white clouds that

have a ceiling for a sky -- but, somehow, within the music itself; in

the rhythms that shake up the mind and dust down the soul, and in the

rising plains of hot sound that give birth to an expectant surge in the

chest and the throat.

Angels, it seems, know a good thing when they hear it.

After all, this is as close as the contemporary club-scene gets to the

divine.

It's Renaissance night at The Tunnel -- the dance event that happens

once a month, when the Newcastle-based Renaissance promoters take up

residency, and 1200 people congregate to let the emboldening experience

filter into every pore.

The theme of rebirth extends through more than just the name of the

visiting club and their use of renaissance motifs.

Renaissance itself has been credited with helping to bring about a

rebirth in nightclubbing direction and popularity during the past few

years, and The Tunnel, after recently being named UK Discotheque of The

Year by BEDA (the British Entertainment and Discotheque Association), is

leading a renaissance in credibility for the Scottish club scene -- a

belief echoed by the judges as one of their reasons for making the

award.

In recent times, Glasgow's clubland reputation has been dogged by the

city's hard-man image dying hard, and by the imposition of the

late-night curfew to stop clubbers migrating between venues.

The club scene has always been a cyclical beast, turning over one

fashion and form after another. So what does The Tunnel nightclub have

planned to ensure not only growth for itself -- thereby further

improving the city's clubland reputation -- but to ensure that their

clientele stay entertained and attentive?

One important bond set to be strengthened is the Tunnel/Renaissance

relationship.

''We're really pleased with the way the shows have been going at The

Tunnel,'' said Mark Wheaton, co-promoter with Renaissance. ''The quality

of the people going to the gigs has been refreshing, and the club is a

beautiful environment in which to do a Renaissance party. We're looking

to form a long-term relationship. We're already booked to stage a

monthly event in the club until May of 1996.''

The Renaissance stable of house DJs are much sought-after and include

some of the finest talent around: John Digweed, Keoki from New York,

Radio 1 DJ Danny Rampling, Italy's Fathers Of Sound and Ian Ossia. All

of them have performed at The Tunnel in recent Renaissance visits.

''Wanted: a castle by a loch. Function: to be used as a nightclub

venue.''

That could be the advertisement wording if the Tunnel/Renaissance plan

to hold a one-off club night in a Scottish Stately Home works out. In

May of this year Renaissance planned to start a five-venue tour of

English Stately Homes but plans fell through because of licensing

problems and adverse rumours spread by rival promoters.

Now, Renaissance feels that it is getting the knack of the complicated

licensing and PR game they have to play, and everything has been

formally secured to stage the first English date. All going well down

south, a similar one-off event in Scotland is a definite plan for the

future.

But club-life goes on outside of the relationship with Renaissance.

The Tunnel's resident DJs are not currently national, let alone

international, names on the club scene. But that could all change, and

the club's reputation be further enhanced, by the planned release of a

triple CD collection of mixes through Network Records.

The first CD will be a special set by Paul Oakenfold, the grand-daddy

of the modern mixing method, the second will feature resident Friday

night DJ, Michael Kilkie, and the third will highlight the Saturday

night sounds as mixed by Colin Tevendale and Steven McCreery.

Nightclubs are now a huge business in themselves -- real evidence of

this can be seen in the way nightclubs are spreading into other areas.

The Ministry Of Sound in London is installing a video games area and

building a cinema within its complex, and The Hacienda in Manchester now

has a bar officially affiliated to the nightclub.

This development is one that The Tunnel is keen to emulate. To have a

bar open during conventional hours that could act as a pre-club venue

would no doubt be used by those happy to be associated with the club,

and happy to be in the company of others who frequent it also.

As The Tunnel approaches its fifth birthday later this year, its

history paints it as originally a couture-conscious club, where the

music was of secondary importance to the designer visibility of its

patrons, and where management attitudes retained some of the slipshod

practices that the old style of ''disco'' could get away with.

''In the beginning the club played a greater cross-section of music.

Now, at the weekend it's house music with a greater cross-section of

people,'' said Brian Reid.

Reid managed The Tunnel for three years, until a recent promotion

within the Big Beat organisation that owns the nightclub, and has been

instrumental in putting the club into its current enviable position.

''The whole business has become more complicated. Now even one

advertising flyer has to be arranged months in advance -- now you have

to think about contracts and the club's direction, and the direction of

house music and what up-and-coming DJs the club should book in

advance.''

But for all its growing complexities, the club's clear eye on the

future of clubland should ensure that this is a rebirth where the angels

-- both of Renaissance and of its dressed-up, danced-up clientele --

keep flying back for more, into a tunnel with a pretty strong light at

the end of it.