Klooks Kleek was a jazz and rhythm 'n’ blues club on the first floor of the Railway Hotel, West Hampstead, north-west London. Named after "Klook's Clique", a 1956 album by jazz drummer Kenny Clarke (Savoy Records 12006), the club opened on 11 January 1961 with special guest Don Rendell (tenor sax) and closed nine years later on 28 January 1970 after a session by drummer Keef Hartley’s group.
There were over 1200 sessions at Klook’s Kleek, around 300 of them were featuring jazz, and the others, rhythm ‘n’ blues. Zoot Money, Ten Years After, John Mayall and Graham Bond recorded live albums at Klooks Kleek. The British blues and rhythm and blues boom of the early 1960s brought to the club many living legends.
History
Jazz
Klook's Kleek founder Dick Jordan was a jazz enthusiast and aspiring trombonist who had made previous attempts to establish a jazz club in the inner suburbs of North-West London. KK proved to be third time lucky. Don Rendell played the club a record 20 times, followed by the hugely popular Dick Morrissey and Tubby Hayes, the best-known jazzer of the time. The only non-British jazz came from the Polish Modern Jazz Quartet led by Zbigniew Namyslowski, who returned by popular acclaim three weeks later.
The club's policy of featuring top British jazz soloists made the club viable as long as the 18- to 25-year-olds remained interested in jazz. The promotersin 1962 Dick Jordan had invited childhood friend Geoff Williams to partner him at KKalso believed in making their punters part of the club, rather than just a crowd of fee-payers. So there were competitions and coach outings which helped ensure loyalty to the club. But jazz at KK ceased on 11 November 1964.
An attempt to revive jazz nights in “Dopey Dick’s” on the same premises lasted for 18 months from April 1967. With earlier performance restrictions removed several American jazz “royalty” appeared, including saxists Ben Webster, Roland Kirk, Sonny Rollins and Zoot Sims. Drummer Max Roach, also appeared. British artists included pianist Stan Tracey, and the man responsible for bringing the Americans to his own famous club in Soho, Ronnie Scott. The last-ever jazz session, on 29 October 1968, featured organist Jimmy McGriff.
Rhythm and blues
In 1963 the promoters were very aware of a burgeoning scene in both blues and RnB which arrived at Klooks Kleek in the shape of Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames. The band's mix of Louis Jordan, soft soul, funk and even vocal versions of bebop numbers (“Parker’s Blues”) met the interests of a pretty diverse audience. Their first appearance at KK was on a scheduled Jazz night causing a queue of a rare length and mass approval of their music. They opened the Tuesday RnB nights on 10 September 1963 and performed a further twenty-one times, continuing to appear at this small venue even after two No 1 chart singles. Their legendary manager, Rik Gunnell, [3] allowed them to work for “peanuts” every so often because the band so liked the ambience of KK.
Appearing regularly in rotation with Fame were the Graham Bond Organisation. Apart from the prodigious musical skills of the leader on keyboards and saxes, the rhythm section was Ginger Baker and Jack Bruce, Guitarist John McLaughlin (“Mahavishnu Orchestra”) was also a member of GBO.
By the beginning of 1964, RnB nights had become so successful that an additional Monday session was introduced. Georgie and the Blue Flames opened on 13 April that year to the usual full house, but Monday nights proved not to be viable, and on 1 April 1965 Thursday became the second club night. Zoot Money who was already on the way to becoming a club legend opened. The last Monday session took place on 26 July 1965. Thursdays endured until November 1969.
Also appearing in the early sixties was Rufus Thomas (Walking The Dog).
Most Appearances
The Mike Cotton Sound's 45 appearances were made mostly on Thursday where they were effectively the house band.
Graham Bond made 39 appearances under the RnB banner and a further 4 as a Modern Jazz artist.
Zoot Money and The Big Roll Band performed 34 times. They were the Club's most popular attraction.
John Mayall brought many future stars through his various bands. He Appeared 33 times and did much to foster interest in blues nationwide.
Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames played 22 times within the first two years of RnB at KK. Commercial success then took them into larger venues, but spin-off bands, e.g. The Night-Timers who played 21 gigs, kept the genre going at smaller clubs like KK.