Venue: Vague
Town: Leeds, GB

Vague was an influential art club night held at The Warehouse nightclub in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, from 1993 to 1996. Vague metamorphosed from an earlier proto-club night called the Kit Kat Club at Arcadia operated by Suzy Mason and Paul Fryer (former lead-singer of eighties electropop group Bazooka Joe). Fryer and Mason then brought in Nick Raphael, and debuted Vague at the High Flyers club in Leeds on 10 April 1993, before moving to The Warehouse a month later. Vague blended kitsch with the artistic and theatrical; its outlandish theme and costume parties included a recreation of a day-night out at Blackpool Pleasure Beach only inside the club that was believed to have been filled entirely with beach sand, parasols and miniature fairground rides, a retake on royal garden parties that was held annually and an evening with Vera Duckworth a fictional character from the British soap opera Coronation Street. The club is credited as being the first in the UK to advertise itself as "mixed"- i.e. for homosexual, heterosexual and polysexual patrons equally, however the claim is not entirely true for example the promoter Leigh Bowery and creator of the Taboo Club night in London in 1985 could be credited with embracing poly-sexual identities in club culture at a much earlier date. Although the vetting of customers on the door at Vague was notoriously strict, for example it was rumoured on some occasions that visiting male heterosexual customers were asked to dress up as a woman, then come back to the club or passionately kiss another male customer in front of door staff, to prove they held no prejudices (a rumour, but never my experience as a heterosexual male - the door staff were always lovingly tolerant of gender and sexuality differences, but Madame JoJo [such a nice person - harsh but fair] - was always delighted to receive a sherbet fountain [not a euphemism] as a sweetener to help accept us non-gay chaps into the club. I hung out with the most flamboyant, spe