Angels was a

nightclub A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a Bar (establishment), bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighti ...

and

music venue A music venue is any location used for a concert or musical performance. Music venues range in size and location, from a small coffeehouse for folk music shows, an outdoor bandshell or bandstand or a concert hall to an indoor sports stadium. Ty ...

Burnley Burnley () is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Burnley in Lancashire, England, with a 2021 population of 78,266. It is north of Manchester and east of Preston, at the confluence of the River Calder and River B ...

, England. It became most famous during the early 1990s with the rise of the

house music House is a genre of electronic dance music characterized by a repetitive Four on the floor (music), four-on-the-floor beat and a typical tempo of 115–130 beats per minute. It was created by DJs and music producers from Chicago's underground ...

scene, drawing visitors from across the United Kingdom. It occupied part of a

multi-storey car park A multistorey car park (Commonwealth English) or parking garage (American English), also called a multistorey, parking building, parking structure, parkade (Canadian), parking ramp, parking deck, or indoor parking, is a building designed fo ...

on Curzon St, currently the site of another car park and

Primark Primark Limited (; trading as Penneys in Ireland) is an Irish multinational fashion retailer with headquarters in Dublin, Ireland, with outlets across Europe and in the United States. The original ''Penneys'' brand is not used outside of Irel ...

and

Next NeXT, Inc. (later NeXT Computer, Inc. and NeXT Software, Inc.) was an American technology company headquartered in Redwood City, California that specialized in computer workstations for higher education and business markets, and later develope ...

stores.

History

June 1974 saw the official opening of Angels by TV's

Pan's People Pan's People were a British all-female dance troupe most commonly associated with the BBC TV music chart show ''Top of the Pops'', from 1968 to 1976. The group, founded and led by choreographer Felicity "Flick" Colby in December 1966, accompanie ...

and the Mayor of Burnley. In 1992 the first episode of the long-running late-night dance music show ''BPM'' featured footage from Angels with

Dave Seaman Dave Seaman (born 29 April 1968) is a British DJ and record producer. He was formerly a member of the DMC Publishing, and editor of music magazine ''Mixmag''. Biography He formed Brothers in Rhythm with Steve Anderson and they were later ...

DJing. Footage of the event can be found on

YouTube YouTube is an American social media and online video sharing platform owned by Google. YouTube was founded on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim who were three former employees of PayPal. Headquartered in ...

. Even at the height of its fame, Angels' days were numbered. Despite being just over 20 years old, the concrete framed multi-story car-park structure, of which the nightclub building was a part, had developed serious structural defects. The landowners

Great Portland Estates Great Portland Estates plc (branded as GPE) is a British property development and investment company. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. The firm switched to Real Estate Investment Trust status wh ...

and Burnley Council, decided that demolition and redevelopment of the area was the most economically viable solution. The last night at Angels was 27 April 1996. The original Angels nightclub building reopened briefly under the name 'Heaven' due to delays in demolishing the structure. Faced with eviction, the club's owners decided to launch a new venue elsewhere in the town centre. Extensive work was undertaken to convert the former Aenon Baptist Chapel building into a multi-storey nightclub, which was intended to rival

Liverpool Liverpool is a port City status in the United Kingdom, city and metropolitan borough in Merseyside, England. It is situated on the eastern side of the River Mersey, Mersey Estuary, near the Irish Sea, north-west of London. With a population ...

’s Nation (the home of Cream). The club opened its doors in May 1996 as 'XPO'. This new venue proved to be unsuccessful, however, and receivers were appointed in February 1997.

DJs

Carl Cox Carl Andrew Cox (born 29 July 1962) is a British house and techno club DJ, radio DJ, motorsport team owner and record producer. He is based in Frankston, Victoria, Australia. Cox has won and been nominated for numerous awards. He has perfor ...

Paul Oakenfold Paul Mark Oakenfold (; born 30 August 1963), formerly known mononymously as Oakenfold, is an English record producer, remixer and trance DJ. He has provided over 100 remixes for over 100 artists including U2, Moby, Madonna, Britney Spears, Ma ...

Pete Tong Peter Michael Tong (born 30 July 1960) is an English DJ who works for BBC Radio 1. He is the host of programmes such as '' Essential Mix'' and '' Essential Selection'' on the radio service, which can be heard through Internet radio streams, for ...

, Sasha and

Judge Jules Julius O'Riordan (born 26 October 1965), better known by his stage name Judge Jules, is a British dance music DJ, record producer and entertainment lawyer. He is known for his DJ activities, music production and long-running radio show which ac ...

all regularly DJ'd, and there were also appearances from

Boy George George Alan O'Dowd (born 14 June 1961), known professionally as Boy George, is an English singer-songwriter and DJ who rose to fame as the lead singer of the pop band Culture Club. He began his solo career in 1987. Boy George grew up in Eltham a ...

and

Nigel Benn Nigel Gregory Benn (born 22 January 1964), is a former British professional boxer who competed from 1987 to 1996. A two-weight world champion, he held the WBO middleweight title in 1990 and reigned as the WBC super-middleweight champion f ...

. Anne Savage had her first UK residency at Angels, under her contemporary pseudonym 'DJ Fresh'. DJ Paul Taylor also held a residency at the club, throughout the 1990s, and originated his "Retro" club night there.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Angels (Nightclub) Nightclubs in England Defunct nightclubs in the United Kingdom Buildings and structures in Burnley Former music venues in England Electronic dance music venues Demolished buildings and structures in Lancashire Buildings and structures demolished in 1999