| RACHEL AUBURN: The alcohol was kind of like on tap. Leigh would ply his guests with as much alcohol as they could drink. It was the first place in England where people took Ecstasy - definitely. People brought it over from America. It was really expensive then, so not many people could afford it. And it was mixed up with acid and a lot of alcohol and a lot of heroin. Heroin came in later, but it was always there. |
| ALEX GERRY: The toilets were always crammed with people taking drugs. And people showing their bits to one another. There was an old attendant in there with grey hair. He was very sweet. He never tried to stop anyone. |
| RACHEL AUBURN: Towards the end, it was always getting really bitchy. People would just be pouring drinks over other people - shit like that on the dancefloor. |
| ALEX GERRY: It ended up seedier than the bottom of a birdcage. You had bodies lying on the dancefloor. You didn' know if they were OD-ed or were just messing about. You had Leigh Leigh Bowery doing dance routines with Malcolm (Duffy), in one corner. Everyone was off their face. It was extreme and and also very dangerous. You got the impression that people were pushing their boundaries and didn't know where to stop. |
| MATTHEW GLAMORRE: The whole Taboo thing was "who can gross who out the most?" I mean, I used to vomit over people. It was about being vile to people and that ended up expressing itself as being as vile as you could be to people. Hence the heroin and dence the deaths. Taboo was a celebration of abuse - as well as glamour. I kind of kept away from it, cause I thought it was quite scary. People were nodding out in the club, but I thought they were just asleep. I don' know if Trojan started it, but Trojan got very into it. And then John Maybury was really into it and Mark Vaultier started it. And of course (Boy George) was on it as well. It was just in vogue - " Hey, we are all going to take heroin" |
| RACHEL AUBURN: The whole heroin thing really exploded. That's what closed Taboo down. Alix Sharkey wrote an article about heroin use in London club culture, with included the whole scenario with George - all this shenanigans. It basically put the onus on the people who owned the club to throw as out. There wasn't a last night - like 'this is the last night!' The article appeared on the Sunday and by the Monday we were out. End of story. |
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| JEFFREY HINTON: Basically, Taboo shut down because it was becoming famous. People were writing about it and so you were getting people coming down who just wanted to gawp and all the rest of it. And when it started getting written about, Leigh lost interest. The club could only work for a short time anyway, cause it was so extreme. The things we were getting away with there! When a club is burning really brightly like this, it can never have a long life - it's like a moment in time. I wasn't surprised when it stopped. When Leigh started Taboo he said to me, "Oh, we'll probably only do it for two or three weeks..." |
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| LEIGH BOWERY |
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| BOY GEORGE AS LEIGH IN TABOO, THE MUSICAL |
| BOY GEORGE |
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