The London night club in Putney which was established in 1963 has been staging live music almost every night for close to 50 years. Some of the UK’s finest bands of modern times performed there during the early stages of their musical careers, namely The Rolling Stones, U2, Kasabian, Van Morrison and Kate bush, to name just a few.

As we all know, the recent recession that our economy is slowly recovering from, had a terrible effect on thousands of people as well as London clubs and bars around the capital. It was due to this very reason that The Putney Halfmoon club in the South West of London was facing closure. A press release which was released by The Halfmoon in November stated the following reasons for its proposed closure:

“Due to market forces, the current economic climate and other circumstances beyond our control, The Halfmoon will not be able to carry on as a music venue after 31st January 2010”.

They later added that: “It is important to reflect, that the troubles the Halfmoon have faced financially are not because of low turnout of gigs. Rising rents, alcohol duty, wholesale beer prices and the recession are the reasons for The Halfmoon dilemma, not a downturn in live music”.

It was later also revealed that the Landlords of the Putney property were looking to revamp the large venue and change it into a Gastro Pub.

Regular party goers and customers of the Halfmoon were horrified to hear that the venue would be closing down. The London night club’s manager sent out a plea to their faithful supporters to do everything they could to save the venue from eviction. A Facebook group was launched and grew to a size of almost seven thousand supporters who petitioned for the landlords to reconsider their decision to close the London club. A later press release posted on the Halfmoon’s website stated:

“There has been overwhelming support from the public, the press, the music industry, our local MP, Wandsworth Council, The Musicians Union and even a few celebrities, all shocked that a successful live music venue with over 50 years of legendary music heritage may be forced to close it’s doors to make way for a gastro pub.”

All of the pressure and commitment shown by the community, music fans and the club owners themselves finally resulted in the landlords changing their minds and agreeing to give the London night club another go at beating the recession. A few changes have however been made with one or two ex-employees of the club having been recalled to once again optimize the running of the club and implement some new and fresh promotional strategies.

The current tenant, James Harris expressed his relief in a recent interview with the BBC:

“The support from the public and the industry has been overwhelming. This was never just about jobs, but about a part of our music heritage. We still face tough times ahead, but at least we can move forward now, and my staff and myself are thrilled and excited”.

Putney residents are thrilled at the outcome of their efforts to save the club. Some big names in the industry have been booked for gigs over the coming weeks to show their support for the London club which has a special place in the hearts of many accomplished bands around the world.

Click here to check out the Halfmoon’s latest gig guide!

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3. What to do in Kensington on a Budget

Thursday 07 January 2010 saw a sudden influx of girls from all around the world suddenly updating their status to simply indicate the colour of the bra that they were wearing. Bizarre! Was it for breast cancer awareness, a genius online marketing ploy or was simply just to annoy us guys! If I was a cat, the curiosity would’ve killed me!

Turns out, the eventual objective of the fad was to raise breast cancer awareness amongst girls around the world. Personally, I wonder whether or not the idea was a deliberate attempt from a breast cancer charity to raise awareness, or simply just a fun message that started amongst a small group of girlfriends to irritate their boyfriends (it drove me crazy when my girlfriend refused to tell me what her “black” status was all about) and grew into a worldwide trend. Either way, I’m all for it. Anything that creates such a stir (especially for breast cancer treatment and awareness) is always exciting to me.

Allegedly, the message in circulation read as follows:

“Some fun is going on…. just write the color of your bra in your status. Just the color, nothing else. It will be neat to see if this will spread the wings of breast cancer awareness. It will be fun to see how long it takes before people wonder why all the girls have a color in their status… Haha”

One source claims that statistics (who gets statistics on Facebook updates obtained in one day?) indicated that “White”, “black” and “beige” were the most popular updates. Some girls got a little more creative with updates such as “pleather with spikes”, “training” and “Gilligan’s Island Coconuts!” – Interesting. I actually noticed quite an alarming number of “nothing” updates amongst my girlfriends (Apparently hanging low is more popular than I thought).

In reaction to the fad, a few irritated guys (clearly it worked) rapidly started creating groups of their own. Some of the more popular group titles were as follows:

“”Quit telling me what colour your bra is and make me a sandwich”

“I don’t care what colour your bra is, show me your breasts”

“We don’t care what colour your bra is TELL US THE SIZE!”

Boy oh boy – us men really don’t do ourselves any favours when it comes to proving how mature we are, do we?

Whenever and wherever this started is irrelevant. The fad was a rather phenomenal success and has definitely managed to raise awareness for breast cancer worldwide – even if that wasn’t the initial goal.

If you would like to find out more about breast cancer information, treatment or signs of breast cancer, click here.

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