The Observer asked me to write about Duckie’s departure from the Royal Vauxhall Tavern after 27 years. It was the introduction to a four-page spread of personal memories from the club’s organisers, performers and punters including Mark Wood, Kit Green, Ursula Martinez, Azara Meghie, Liz Carr, Wolfang Tillmans and SJ Watson. The piece begins like this:
In November 1995, six twentysomething mates in London were sick of never finding anywhere to go out that fitted their idea of fun, so they put on a night of their own at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern (RVT) and called it Duckie. They were host Amy Lamé, DJs the London Readers Wifes (Mark Wood and Mark Johnstone), producer-promoter Simon Strange (AKA Simon Casson) and “door whores” Jay Cloth and Father Cloth. It was the start of one of the world’s longest-running LGBTQ+ club nights and the ignition of a powerhouse performance collective that runs dozens of projects with hundreds of collaborators to this day…
