‘Really, no words can capture what it was like at Paradise Garage, because everyone had their own feeling of what it meant to them. It opened up doors for me, it made me know who I was as a person. It was my learning experience that brought me into the world. I hold it so dear in my heart.
‘I worked at the club from the beginning. I helped decorate it, made videos, put records away, did security for the VIP room, I did everything. As Larry was getting busy in the studio he’d get to the club late, I’d put the reel-to-reel [tape machine] on for him, and then when it needed to be turned or replaced if he was still late, I’d put a record on. Then I just started throwing records on for him here and there, so I accidentally became a DJ.
‘I was very accepted by the crowd, because they saw me there from day one. They knew I worked in the DJ booth. I was no threat, I wasn’t there to take Larry’s job. The audience was very respectful to me and I was very respectful to Larry. I didn’t play any of the records that I knew he wanted to play. I was the ice cream, and he was the whipped cream and the sprinkles and the cherry to make the sundae.
‘I would play the new stuff and save all the good stuff for Larry. Sometimes he’d hang out in the club and let me play for an additional half hour or so, because he was listening to the new stuff. He would come over and say “I like that”, and then by the end of that night he’d turned that new record into a hit.
‘You never knew what to expect [at the club]. It was a democracy. You walked in through those doors and you were 100% free, no matter what you were, whether you were old, young, Asian, Spanish, black, white, gay, straight – it didn’t matter. When you walked through those doors you were equal, you were loved.
‘Larry would pick out groups on dancefloor and play records that he knew they liked at certain points in the night. They knew it and they would reach out from the dancefloor with their arms stretched high, like they wanted to touch him and thank him. When you witnessed that every weekend you knew the club was 100% there for your fun and pleasure. It wasn’t there to make money from liquor or for the owner to become a millionaire, it was there for the party. They made it comfortable. There were two lounges, a movie room, a roof deck, they served you food, they gave you coffee and cupcakes. They wanted you to spend the whole night with them and go on the whole journey.
‘It’s over 30 years since the club was around and it’s still talked about – Larry’s work, his remixing and producing, the club’s quality, the thousands upon thousands of people that it meant so much to.
‘When I’ve played at Ministry of Sound, I saw a club that wasn’t just there to make money out of people. They wanted you to have fun. I felt the party.’
