Idris Elba's How Clubbing Changed the World

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Welcome to How Clubbing Changed The

World. Over the next two hours,

I'm going to show you how clubbing

completely transformed

the world we live in. Yeah.

Clubbing is the most significant

British cultural export

over the last 30 years...

it's a multi-million pound a year

global industry,

it's the sound

of your favourite popstar,

the look of your favourite shops,

it's changed the way we socialise,

work, and how we holiday.

Clubbing has changed our attitudes

to race, class, sexuality,

and even football.

You don't believe me?

Turn it up.

We're about to go deeeeep.

Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Disco.Detroit techno.

Electro house.

Drum and base.

I'm Idris Elba, DJ, actor,

lifelong raver, clean-shaven.

Over the next two hours,

I'm going to be counting down

40 of the most defining moments,

that have shown how clubbing's

changed the world.

Now, we've consulted with the

international clubbing community,

and this is what they came up with.

That's right, people,

we've spoken to some proper

club land heavyweights.

You know you're only in it

cos it's hot right now

Hot right now

Turn it up right now

Put your hands in the air

if you want it right now...

The roots of the modern mass market

phenomenon of clubbing

lie in the clubs of New York in the

'70s, and Chicago in the '80s,

where disco and house music emerged.

The beats may have been born

in America

but modern club culture as we know

it is definitely British.

In the late '80s, UK youth chanced

upon a drug and a music

that offered up an antidote to

Thatcher's recession-hit Britain.

I'm going to show you how the

cultural and political shockwaves

of this chemical and sonic collision

can still be felt all around us.

You see, the influence of club

culture has reached a new height

in the 21st century

as a fresh generation

of British and European producers

and DJs are creating sounds

that have revolutionised

success and the times when it all

went a bit Pete Tong.

This, my fellow beat junkies, is how

clubbing changed the world.

To understand how club culture

has become so ingrained

in our modern lives,

we need to go back to a scene that

started on New York's underground.

It was the '70s

and the city was suffering.

In the '70s, New York was going

through a real decline, financially.

A lot of businesses moving out,

you could just start a club

almost for nothing.

These cheap, empty spaces

gave underground clubbers

the freedom to do

exactly what they wanted.

Clubs like Paradise Garage

and The Loft

broke the mould and created

a blueprint for the clubs today.

The Loft was my taste, my friends,

and continuous music.

You really could get lost in there.

Disco came out from a melting pot of

black, Latino, straight, gay, white,

male, female as well.

This disco thing, that wasn't called

disco, by the way, at the time,

we were just clubbing. And they were

just playing hot records.

But, of course, once it becomes big,

you need to put a label on it.

Disco exploded

out of the underground

and into the public

consciousness in 1977,

when a film called Saturday Night

Fever hit the silver screen.

Because we want everyone

to see John Travolta's performance,

Saturday Night Fever

is now rated PG.

When people think about disco,

they think about that film.

It was a hugely important film.

Saturday Night Fever the movie

was about racism.

Dancing transformed this, you know,

tough guy race,

you know it's like, "Hey, let's get

in the car and go beat up the guys,

"you know, from the other

neighbourhood." But when he's on

the dance floor, everybody's equal.

'Saturday Night Fever, rated PG.'

The film was a box-office phenomenon

that penetrated British suburbia.

Even your gran in Skegness

was learning how to do the dance.

Ten years later, however,

things in suburban club land didn't

seem to have moved on all that much.

In 1987, record producer

Pete Waterman developed a TV show

that aimed to capture the '80s

British club scene.

That show was The Hit Man And Her.

Hello, welcome to The Hit Man And

Her. This is the Hit Man.

And this is Her.

We're at Chorley at Camelot.

It was a representation of kind of

cheesy nightlife

that did play kind of good dance

tunes, but was only on,

and people only watched it

because all the clubs shut,

and there was just nothing to do.

Let's go dancing, come on.

'This was the first night time

television show.

'The whole point of The Hit Man And

Her was, to reflect youth culture, '

the way it changes

overnight sometimes.

But halfway through production,

there was a musical

and cultural revolution.

Repetitive electronic beats

in four four time.

House music was taking Britain

by storm.

And these are the DJs,

these are the guys.

They're mixing it as they're going

along from one to the other.

This is what real club music's

all about.

There was a kind of vacuum of voids

before 1988,

and, you know, it was

waiting for something to come in,

and that thing was acid house.

Acid house culture was like

a revival of kind of the '60s

peace and love movement. And it was

about unity and togetherness.

It was so incredible, the turnaround.

Discos were always a place to sort

of be sort of slightly wary of.

But people were talking

to each other,

people were hugging each other.

The Hit Man And Her accidentally

captured the moment

this new underground British culture

was thrust into the mainstream.

And the result was something

uniquely chaotic.

Pete, what's the track?

I think it's...

I'm not sure, actually.

Not Elvis Presley, that I do know.

This is warts and all, that's what

it was like. There's a guy

taking a slash in the

background at one point,

because he can't make it to the loo.

We'd like to say thank you for

having us, and we'll see you soon.

Rave culture and the establishment

hasn't always been the easiest

of bed fellows,

but, with the world's eyes on

Britain for this summer's Olympics,

it was techno superstars,

Underworld,

that were chosen

to provide the soundtrack.

A lot of pressure on you.

Yes, and you can see

I'm laughing hysterically.

Across the globe,

what are we known for?

Rain, Beef eaters, rave.

Rave is the heart of our culture,

and now it's at the heart

of the Olympic Opening Ceremony.

And that is right and appropriate.

Underworld being part of the Olympics

was a great opportunity

to show the world,

"Yeah, when we party here,

we know how to party."

If we went back, say, 30 years,

that wouldn't

have happened for one minute.

But underworld wouldn't be

taking electronic music

into the heart of the mainstream

if it wasn't for this next lot.

None of us would have gotten

involved in electronic music

if we hadn't heard Kraftwerk.

Kraftwerk didn't make music

in a studio,

they constructed it in a laboratory.

And when they appeared on the BBC

science show, Tomorrow's World,

in 1975, a whole generation was

inspired to create electronic music.

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