Rock Shrine No. 22 – The Scotch of St. James
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Artist:
The first London rock star club was the Ad Lib but by 1966 it was passe and everyone was on to the next club - The Scotch of St. James. The area of St. James has a long history as a discreet playground for the louche, moneyed, and landed and The Scotch of St. James was the ultimate in discretion - in a small yard off a side street, reached only by an easily missed driveway.
Andrew Loog Oldham described it in 2 Stoned: "You'd knock at the door and be auditioned through a peep-hole. Once in you'd travel downstairs via the twisting staircase... The Beatles, the Stones, the Yardbirds, Eric Clapton, Long John Baldry, Keith Moon, the Searchers all starred in the main room on their nights off... Lennon and McCartney, Jagger and Richards and I and our ladies would sit back in a dark corner and smoke and gloat." Here's a photo from 1965, starring The Merseybeats and Pattie Boyd (the future Mrs. Harrison/Mrs. Clapton aka "Layla").
Forty years later it's still a club.
The Scotch of St. James, 13 Masons Yard, London SW1 6BU
Put this post code into Google Earth and go for a ride: SW1 6BU
Comments (7)
Sorry John, your facts are wrong...The Scotch of Saint James preceeded the AdLib by a year if not more....I should know...I was the Host / PR / Booker who took it from an empty up-market venue where no-one went to the most famous club where the music industry came not to pose but relax (I don't know where that picture with Patti came from because no pictures were allowed when the club was open). The Scotch followed on from the Cromwellian where I also did some PR (all this was moonlighting - truly! from the day job...as a journalist at Disc and Music Echo. Much more to be read in detail in my upcoming book....