A Southerners Soul Story

Living in Bournemouth since the mid seventies you might wonder how I got into the scene. I started to attend the local youth club disco when I was about 15 and danced with the other kids to the usual records. But after a few weeks I noticed that every week a group of lads/girls would dance to records I hadn't heard and they danced and were dressed different to the rest of us. My mates didn't know who they were or what the records were called so I plucked up courage and asked one of the group what the name of the record was being played. The lad said it was Tobi Legend - Time Will Pass You By. Of course the next day I'm at my local Rumbelows record store asking for Tobi Legend. After much searching it became obvious that not only did they not have it but they couldn't even find it on their order list. Totally pissed off, at the next disco I approached the guy who gave me the info and explained what had happened. He started laughing and then told me all about the Northern Soul scene. From that moment I knew this was for me and I made every effort to find out more subscribing to Blues & Soul & Black Echoes and going to the dedicated soul nights that were held locally. I started saving all my money and bought my first records pressings of Yvonne Baker & Pookie Hudson from a guy at a soul night and then my first mail order Bobby Hebb from Colin Bee Promotions. In 1978 I made my first trip to Wigan talk about mind blowing wow I don't think I'll ever forget looking down from the balcony I just stood there for about 5 mins letting it all sink in. From there I became a regular visitor to Wigan right up to the end running coach trips from Bournemouth. I also went to Peterborough, Yate, The ill fated Bedford nighter and many other all-nighters & all-dayers. We also had a couple of all-nighters and dayers in Bournemouth which were well attended and until Yate then Wigan closed down we had a healthy following down here. After these two closed down interest dropped off locally and although  I went to few all-dayers I never attended another allnighter again. It isn't all gloom however as we still have Soul nights down here every couple of months which get about 50 or so people in plus the Kent/Goldmine LPs/CDs mean I still collect the music although not in the purists eyes. After all how can you compare the commercial pop stuff to Northern soul????
Great web page - like your plans for the future keep up the good work
Yours Steve Carter