A former Liverpool nightclub loved by 80s stars was once one of the "coolest" venues in town.
Cagneys club opened up on Fraser Street, just off London Road, in Liverpool City Centre back in 1979. The premises had originally opened in the early sixties as the Compton Club and had a succession of names, such as the Peppermint Lounge, Dinos and Gulliver.
But many will remember Cagneys for being a prime nightspot in the 1980s and a place to be seen for New Romantics. In its heyday, clubbers would travel from across Merseyside and elsewhere in the North to attend its Roxy/Bowie night and to be amongst people who had a similar taste in music and fashion.
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Cagneys is also remembered for hosting a number of public appearances, seeing the likes of Ultravox, Duran Duran, The Human League and more walk through its doors before they gained international acclaim. DJ Steve Proctor, 63, was one of the first DJ's to work at Cagneys and was heavily involved in the alternative music scene in Liverpool.
Often lending his records to Mike Davidson who was DJing at The Hollywood, Steve had never worked as a DJ, but while working at Penny Lane Records, he saw was an advert for Cagneys in the ECHO and decided to go with a friend. Steve learnt the DJ was a friend of an owner just filling in and was given the opportunity to audition that night.
Steve told the ECHO: "Dave, who was the owner and manager at the time said come next Thursday at 8.30pm with your records and I'll give you an audition. But 20 minutes later he came up and said do I wanna have a go now with his records.
"I played for half an hour and Dave said that was brilliant you start next week. It was £7 a night, 9pm till 2am, that was the start."
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Steve said when he first came to the club, it had two floors, glittery walls, a dancefloor and DJ set, two bars and a restaurant upstairs. Steve said: "It was one of the coolest clubs in town at the time, without a doubt.
"It was always good atmosphere, there was never any negative energy in the place at all, I never encountered that. It was really modern and it foresaw the glamour and the glitz of the 80s that came afterwards."
Within the first few months of opening, Cagneys started attracting more attention and nearly reaching capacity. Clubbers also began to travel from elsewhere in the North to come to the Roxy/Bowie Night on a Thursday and as a result, Steve started hosting on a Sunday too.
Steve said: "In the late 70s into the early 80s, Roxy Music, David Bowie, Iggy Pop - all the artists around then were pretty much the bedrock of music. Then it quickly became about the new electronic music - The Human League, Depeche Mode, Kraftwerk and a lot of alternative electronic music as well.
"The New Romantic scene had started getting going around the country. Cardiff had a big New Romantic scene and Liverpool was developing a New Romantic scene and I was determined that that was the DJ I wanted to be and I wanted to do that at the club."
To stand out, Steve began fostering relationships with up and coming bands, promoting their records and securing a number of public appearances. He said: "I worked really hard to make Cagneys special by getting things that no other club in Liverpool could get.
"I used to travel to London once a month to meet with record companies, with band management companies and agents and people like that to promote myself and the club as well as being at the forefront of the New Romantics scene. One of the things that made you stand out as a DJ were personal appearances for artists to promote their records.
"To get Ultravox at the height of their fame, Duran Duran at the start of their career, Spandau Ballet, The Human League. Whenever they were playing in Liverpool Cagneys always threw them a party, so we stood out.
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"They knew they were gonna be amongst like minded people. They'd be able to have fun and be around people who got them and were genuine fans rather than just going to some club being stuck at a table in a VIP area and boxed off.
"Then I had bands like ABC who did to PA’s at the club and Bill nelson did PA’s there. The first ever gig that I promoted was Pete Shelley from Buzzcocks playing live there, he’d just had a single out called Homosapien, that was my first ever live gig promotion."
"There were no mad fans as it were, people were just like ‘oh Duran Duran are here tonight, oh Ultravox are here.' For me, it was about creating a safe space for people to dress how they wanted, whatever their sexuality was and be able to be themselves knowing it was safe and they were amongst friends to do that.
Steve said he can only speak from his perspective from what Cagneys was like on Thursday and a Sunday, but that the club was doing "something different" that nobody else in the city were doing at the time. DJs Chad Jackson, Ian Gordon and Phil Hughes were also amongst the names to host nights at Cagneys.
Steve said some of his favourite memories were when ABC made two public appearances, as well as bands like Duran Duran, The Human League, Ultravox, Spandau Ballet and more. Steve said: "One of the things about Cagneys was they always had top DJs and I'm proud to say I was one of them.
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"My favourite memories are of us all being a part of something so new and different. I’m proud that I was one of the first DJs in the world to play their records and get people to get into them as it were."
Steve said the owners, bar staff and door staff all made Cagneys "warm and welcoming" and that it was "a great place to be." He said: "It's still extremely well thought of.
"It is still fondly remembered and highly regarded as being such an integral part to a lot of young people’s start to going out clubbing. It's held in the highest esteem for what it meant to a lot of people."
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