Friars Aylesbury
| Members club | |
| Founded | Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, 1969 |
| Headquarters | Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire |
| Website | [1] |
Friars Aylesbury is a music club that runs in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire, England. It has 90,000 members and is believed to be amongst the largest music clubs in Europe. It opened in 1969 but closed down twice, once in 1970 for a period of nine months and again in 1984 for a period of twenty five years. Friars Aylesbury reopened in June 2009 to tie in with its fortieth anniversary.
Friars Aylesbury ran as a music club in the market town of Aylesbury in Buckinghamshire between 1969 and 1984 in three distinct phases denoted by the venue in the town. Over these fifteen years, there were various trials and tribulations which saw Friars teeter on the edge more than once but it pulled through and presented the best artists of its day and is acknowledged as being heavily responsible for the subsequent success of such artists as David Bowie, Genesis, Wishbone Ash, Mott the Hoople, Cockney Rebel, Sailor, Stackridge, Stiff Little Fingers and more. Fans and artists loved the club, not least because of the atmosphere and the fact they were treated well by people who were genuine music enthusiasts.
Phase One – New Friarage Hall, Aylesbury
New Friarage Hall, Walton Street Aylesbury – 2 June 1969 – 6 August 1970 (capacity approx 400)
The club was started after local school teacher Robin Pike suggested to David Stopps, a budding music manager whom he had previously bumped into when he was managing local band Smokey Rice and they appeared at the school dance that Pike was heavily involved with, that Aylesbury needed a music club based on Pike’s seeing of groups elsewhere notably the Mothers club in Birmingham. Stopps was initially reluctant feeling it may work better in nearby High Wycombe which had a bigger population. Persuaded otherwise, Pike had sounded out premises in Aylesbury, namely the ex-Servicemen’s club in Walton Street, Aylesbury, known also as the New Friarage Hall. A committee was formed which aside from Pike and Stopps, featured also John Fowler (initially as he had made a financial investment) and local youngsters Adrian Roach, Jerry Slater and Terry Harms. Roach and Slater were pupils of Pike and ran their own enterprise running the Bog Hog Folk Club at the now defunct Derby Arms pub in Aylesbury. Collectively they promoted the early gigs and sold underground magazines that at that time could only be purchased in London. The first gig on Monday 2 June 1969 with blues guitarist Mike Cooper and progressive rock group Mandrake Paddle Steamer drew a crowd large enough to suggest that this might be a viable proposition. The next week, The Pretty Things played and then such bands as Free, King Crimson, Edgar Broughton, Genesis and Hawkwind played there. During this time, Stopps was standing out as the promoter and public face at Friars and the only one able to do the job full-time. Gigs were starting to be put on at other venues in Dunstable (including a very successful Pink Floyd gig in 1969), Bedford, and Watford. This Phase ended prematurely when the committee overseeing the ex-Servicemen’s club refused to allow Friars to continue running there after August 1970 due to complaints about the noise from local residents.
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Wikipedia