Music

Norman Cook
aka Fatboy Slim
‘Danny [Newman, current boss] rang me and said, “You know we’re closing down, will you do the last night?” and I’m like, “Hell, yeah!” We were gonna go away for Easter but that club means a lot to Zoë and me. We did a lot of our copping off in Turnmills. I remember being in the booth with Tom and Ed [The Chemical Brothers] and going, “That Zoë Ball’s here again. What’s she doing here?”

‘I would always start DJing with a really “stupid” record, just to get everyone’s attention, and that always worked. Once I started with “Sunshine Superman” by Donovan not knowing that Zoë had been making me a mix tape – a sure sign that you fancy someone – which started with “Sunshine Superman”. It quite freaked her out; she thought someone had told me.

‘Probably my most memorable night was the night after Woody was born. I’d been booked to play and then when we got the date for Zoë’s C-section I said I’d cancel it, and Zoë went, “No, no, no! It’s traditional that you go and wet the baby’s head; what better place to do it?” But it had been in all the papers that I’d had a baby so everybody turned up with cigars: [techno legend] Dave Clarke gave me the biggest cigar I’ve ever seen in my life. And everyone in the crowd was congratulating me and throwing cigars at me.
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‘Chesh, who was the accountant and general fixer there, ended up my best friend: he’s godfather to my son. It might have looked seedy and sweaty but we were a gang, me and Jon Carter and Richard Fearless played every weekend together; suddenly it felt like our gang was ruling London. It was daft already and then we all started having hits and it got really daft!

‘I think Turnmills is a one-off; the people who run it could never be replaced. They’ve put on so many groundbreaking nights. Fabric has kind of taken the ball and run with it, but it’s not run with the same kind of joie de vivre and family spirit that Turnmills was.’

Sister Bliss, Tall Paul and Judge Jules play at The Gallery on March 21; The Chemical Brothers and Fatboy Slim play at The Heavenly Get Together on March 22; Frankie Knuckles, Danny Rampling and CJ Mackintosh headline at The Last Dance on Sunday 23. All are sold out but Time Out has five pairs of tickets for each night to give away, enter our competition now.