Helter Skelter Profile - Rave Scene

Helterskelter started back in 1989, the people behind the organisation were only young but knew what they wanted to put on a party for the right reasons and give value for money, the same reason still applies for the parties they organise today.

David and his partner’s from Milton Keynes were the people behind the organisation and the first event was an illegal party which took place on the 30th September 1989, five miles out of Banbury, they flew a package of acts and DJ’s from the USA, acts like Ce Ce Rogers, Kariya, Lolletta Holloway, Two In A Room, Jomanda Lil Louis got together to perform. At the time the other main organisers putting parties on were Sunrise and Energy, David thought if they got the best acts they would have the best party on the night, Lolletta Holloway (Black Box) was performing Ride On Time, the same time as it hit the charts at No 1. They put plenty of flyers out but they were new to the scene and didn’t know the score, basically they didn’t put enough flyers out or advertise it properly. The week before their event Energy did a big party and they didn’t pay the land owners, the police made the land owner change his mind from letting the party go ahead so they broke into a warehouse are Colchester which kicked off at 81m. They went there and put the flyers out but Energy had promised a big line up with a load of big acts which were not there, basically the same as what it happening today, so the Helter Skelter flyer looked like a big blag to them but of course it wasn’t. They did the party anyway, the police tried their best to stop it but there were five other parties going on that weekend who had all set up in the day, the police helicopters saw what was going on and they got busted. Helter Skelter were a bit more clever than that, they hid all the equipment and didn’t set up until later on, by 11pm they were all ready to go, the police couldn’t do anything to stop it, Helter Skelter had a QC there with them, but with so many other parties going on they couldn’t pull the people, the police also blocked the roads off, they ended up with 1,700 people, they lost a lot of money with the acts costing £36,000.

The people that did get in thought it was the best party they had ever been to, the acts they had were the best going at that time. But they certainly learnt a lot from that first mistake. What is most admirable is the fact that they do not regret it to this day, it was something that they wanted to achieve although it didn’t work out the way it was planned to, but they pulled it off. After that they worked really hard to pay the debts off from that event and when they scraped the money together they started an underground thing called Ohm, Man Parris helped them out when he was a DJ, then he had a go on the mic and found he was better on the mic than on the decks. That carried on for a while then David got a contract doing the sound for Millwalkies, Murray from ESP had a night in there every week, they all got friends and after a while ESP said that they were no longer needed, they were getting another sound system in there. David couldn’t understand this because he thought things were going well, they then found out that ESP were in fact actually paying another guy more for the same sound system. This annoyed David as there was no apparent reason and from there on Helter Skelter got every other week in Millwalkies, they convinced the owner that they would fill it, they worked on a percentage deal, advertised it properly, and got all the top DJ’s in there, and that is how they filled the club to full capacity. Murray from ESP cashed in on the deal when it was their weekend, which was the opposite week to Helter Skelters, the public thought it was a great club and ended going every week, so in actual fact it was Helter Skelter that filled this club and kicked off what is still a great success today.

Whilst David was on holiday the club owner sold Millwalkies and the new owner would only do a deal where Helter Skelter actually worked for the owner of the club, consequently they got out fast.

They started a fresh and leased their own club at Telford, it took ten months to get the licence, during this time the whole of the music had changed, they visited clubs all over the country to see what it was that the people now wanted, it was techno all over, they decided to be a little different and bring in some new sounds from the USA, the quality of the music was different and a lot better, but it didn’t work, if it had been done in a city or a place where everything is happening it would have worked really well, but Telford was really out in the middle of nowhere, and nobody knew where it was, money was low and consequently they couldn’t advertise it efficiently, the club would have made an excellent venue if it was in a different location and the money was available to have money spent on it..