Cream, Liverpool

When you think of Superclubs then Cream is one of the first that springs to mind. First formed 9 years a go by 2 mates in Liverpool it has gone from strength to strength, now holding nights across the globe, from Ibiza to Argentina, from Japan to the USA, yes, they're everywhere. Well, that's enough of a history lesson for you, now, what you've all been waiting for, my trip to Cream...

My first trip to Cream at Nation (I've been to Cream at Amnesia in Ibiza, but lets not go into that) came just a few weeks a go, on Saturday 13th October, and for those in the know you'll realise that on that very day they were in fact celebrating their birthday, so we were in for a big night. After having a few problems purchasing our tickets, mainly due to them not having any outlets in Leeds, doh, we finally managed to book some through ticket master, to be picked up on the night, this obviously caused us some worries as we didn't want to get to Liverpool and then learn that we didn't actually have any tickets, but it was the only option open to us so we grabbed it with both hands. So, after purchasing (we hoped) our tickets all that was left for us to do was sit back and wait for Saturday arrive.

Finally it was Saturday, but still it wasn't time to go, we had all day to waste, what should we do? I passed the time with a mammoth DJ set to get us in the mood and my girlfriend got ready for 6 hours (no joke). So after a hefty amount of time wasting we set off across the Pennines on our journey. After a pit stop in Manchester to pick up my mate we were finally in Liverpool, now, did anyone know where the club was? Well, no. We knew it was in the city centre but apart from that we were stumped, after a few laps round the one way system we thought the best thing to do was to park and then find the club on foot. We left my mean machine in the Paradise Street car park for a reasonable £3.50 and strolled out in to the wide world where we accosted the first Scouser we saw, who, luckily, rather than mugging us took us most of the way to the club, about 10 - 15 minutes walk from home base.

The first image that we got of Cream was their shop, where we had to pick up our tickets, luckily they had heard of us and even gave us the magical bits of paper, hurrah, nothing could go wrong. As we had arrived at 8.30 we thought we had better wet our whistles before heading to the main event, so into a nearby bar we went for a few light ales and the like. I think the bar may have been called TVR or something like that but I couldn't be sure, the drinks were cheap though (£1.50 for a Smirnoff ice) and the music was pleasing, so basically it was all good.

Finally the phone call came, the other part of our group had arrived and it was time to head to the club, expecting a long wait in the freezing cold, but as luck would have it we walked straight in, well, after an ID check and a thorough search. They seem to be very strict on ID as our group are all over 20 and don't exactly look young, so remember to take yours along, and it has to be photo ID as well, so don't forget! Once our credentials had been verified we entered the club.

The club has three different rooms of music, the main room, the annexe and the courtyard. The annexe is home to the more funky sounds and is home to scouse house maestro Yousef, whilst the courtyard is the spiritual home of one Mr. Oakenfold and is only open on special events, and as tonight was more than special is was most certainly open. I won't really try and describe the club as it is far too big and I'll just confuse you, not to mention bore you to tears, I'll just give a brief outline. The rooms are centred around a bar area, which homes a large video screen telling you who's on where. Each room is big enough to be an individual club and they all have great sound / light set ups, the courtyard and the annexe are very dark and smoky whilst the main room is a bit more 'in your face', they all have lots of dance platforms and massive dancefloors.. The annexe and the courtyard each have their own bars and a bit of seating, and there is a coat room and cafe / shop thing in the annexe. The atmosphere in all the rooms was wicked, the crowd was 'well up for it' as some may say and despite it being a bit crowded people were certainly having it as big as a badger.

The DJ's on the night included Paul Oakenfold, Judge Jules, Tall Paul, Timo Mass and Seb Fontaine. They all played good sets as far as I could tell, but the best set of the night award has to go to the monkey man (Oakenfold) who nearly took the roof of the courtyard. Great stuff. The night ended almost exactly on time at around 4 as I think Liverpool council are quite strict on that sort of thing and all it remained for us to do was stumble back to the car and bez back to Leeds, reminiscing about what a good night it was and wondering when we could go again.

INFO:
Cream is on every Saturday at Nation, Liverpool from 10-4. Tickets are £10/£12 except for specials when they can be a king's ransom (we paid £30). You can buy tickets through ticketmaster and various other outlets in Liverpool and Manchester. But not Leeds. The residents are Seb Fontaine, Timo Mass and Yousef and they have a large array of guests so check the website at www.cream.co.uk for full listings and other info that I've missed out. We parked in the Paradise street car park, which was around 15 minutes walk from the club, our mates parked in the St. Johns car park which was considerably closer. I think there may be signs for both of them but you could always just drive around the city centre til you find it, if you're like us, well, we got to see Liverpool didn't we? Entry is for over 18's only, photo ID required and is subject to search for all manner of nasty things. The dress code is smart, most people were wearing shoes/shirts/clubwear and luckily there wasn't many glowsticks in attendance, though there were a few beer boys, but then again it was Liverpool so what do you expect? At least I didn't see any dodgy perms.

So there you go, my trip to Cream. Was it super, smashing, great? You betcha, can't wait to go again, now what am I doing on Saturday?