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| The Kingfish entrance |
The year was 1987, a friend of mine took me to Lafayette, Louisiana for the first time and introduced me to this amazing place that now lives in the pantheon among the best clubs in the south. The place was actually located just outside Lafayette city limits in Breaux Bridge right close to the bayou. The place would open Saturdays from 2 A.M. to noon the next day as an after hours venue where the real party took place. It had a huge parking lot in the front filled with underage teens hanging out in hopes to get inside this shrine of dance music madness fueled by a rainbow of drugs.
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| the famous parking lot |
A warehouse in the middle of nowhere where all inhibitions were null and everybody was welcomed regardless of race, class and sexual orientation right in the big ole south. The Kingfish was pretty much my indoctrination to the idea of a rave before it was even called a rave or a club space where dancing was priority. The music was very eclectic with a mixture of house, industrial, goth, free style, techno, synth pop, R&B and even rock. The place even had it's own dances such as "grabbing a rail" and "feeding the chickens".
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| Inside the Kingfish |
There was so much X in that place alone that if word that the police was on its way, people would drop so many drugs that the dance floor would be filled with the pills. I was there for the dancing and the music for the most part and I must say that the sound system was quite amazing, Razormaid remixes ruled and the Dj's knew how to work the crowd. As always, good things had to come to an end and the place was shut down towards the early '90s after so many raids due to it's bad reputation of excessive drug use and its sad after effects. The place had several reincarnations later under different names but never captured the euphoric glory of the early years as the socio-economic landscape in the south shifted as well. Choosing what songs to feature here has been quite a challenge and I tell you that I feel like I've experienced a musical rabbit hole while researching the extensive playlists found on several blogs. Here are a few of the songs I feel captured some of the feeling of the club knowing the spectrum here will never do justice to the eclectic and extensive repertoire played by the Dj's. For more info on the entire playlist go to
The Fish - Robert's Blog which was a great resource for this posting. Enjoy!
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