Northern Soul, Capturing The Passion To Dance
Northern Soul is making another resurgence at the moment and it’s been some 29 years since my days of attending all-nighters at various venues and Scooter rallies across the country. One of my friends Terry however is still hitting the talcum powder dusted dance floor from dusk to dawn (I’m not exaggerating!) across the UK. He still is a remarkable dancer and considering he’s older than me (sorry mate had to get that in) that is even more credit to him. With this in mind, I just had to create an image that captured his passion to dance and my vision/memories of those ballrooms across the UK.
We shot the images in our studio which is an old stone barn with ideal solid wood floors for Terry to strut his stuff upon.
The shoot was incredibly fun and we ended up with so many great images that the selection process took me forever to finally decide on my final image as did cleaning up all the baby talc from the studio floor!
The post-production consisted of compositing an appropriate background and creating just the right ambiance.
Below is a short video of the shoot, completed images, and a few that got shortlisted but not used.
Bloody awesome pictures and video Simon
Nice one mate, keep the faith 😁👍
I love Northern soul with passion i only recently got into it since 2017 i did have a chance to go to an all nighter back in 1975 when i was 17 but turned it down because of what this girl had told me at college where i was studying hairdressering at a college in Cambridgeshire she put me off when she said about this blue haze across the room ie dope so i never went it was been held at all nighter in Cambridge so i never went unfortunately but im making up for lost time now and reliving my youth again which is fantastic i did get to an all dayer in 2019 which was absolutely amazing fantastic come across a pub where they were playing motown and Northern soul in 2017 and have made many friends through since i started going to these soul events
Hi Carol,I don’t go to many these days but Terry (in picture) travels all over UK on the weekends attending events.
Happy memories of going to many All Nighters and a few All Dayer’s too.
Oh that’s fantastic that Terry still goes all over the UK sorry you don’t go many of them these days i will be glad to get back out again missing the soul events so much but come across some rave northern soul sounds on YouTube infact i never thought in a million years that i would actually get into Northern soul but im glad i did only wished i had done it earlier instead of waiting until i was in my late 50s well im 63 now but i still can move i was actually into motown has a teenager back in the 70s i also was into glam rock too i was class as a smoothly back than because we weren’t into anything in particularl but i now im a soul girl but i have no regrets of my past and im glad i have had a second chance of dancing to the music that i love Northern soul but of course i love all types of music too deep down that hasn’t changed in me but im definitely a soul girl when i go to these soul events it’s like another side of me it’s like bringing my past into my future but i feel like that 17 year old in me again happy memories of the past and of course happy memories of the future of Northern soul that is still going strong today and a new breed of young people to carry on this great music keep the faith i have been watching 2 girls on YouTube called veins and passion or passion and veins not quite sure which way round but they are absolutely amazing to watch there videos are fantastic ✌️
Fantastic photos Simon, Very atmospheric and capturing the Feeling, Are any of the photos available for sale?? Thanks Jim.
Hi Jim yes https://scooter-life.com/northern-soul/
https://www.redbubble.com/people/scooter-life
Cheers Simon