It started with a question

written by Mick Martin

Nothing like the start of a new adventure, and this is… very much the start of a new

adventure as well as the continuation of an old one. I first started looking at the northern

soul scene and the utterly unique and beautiful dance culture that flowered in the north and

midlands around it, at the end of the 90’s, a process that became Once Upon A Time In

Wigan. But that was then and this is now, so much has changed, not least the country we

live in.

Back then it was Blair’s Britain, all sunny optimism, until Iraq shattered all that, but never

mind. Now we’re in post Brexit Britain, a never ending cost of living crisis, a spiral of doom

and national self loathing. The ‘northern powerhouse’ never got plugged in, and as for

levelling up, yeah right! Post industrial decline has never been addressed, and combined

with online shopping, rising prices and falling incomes it means our high streets struggling as

never before. The once proud industrial towns that were also home to the beating heart of

the northern soul scene ( no co-incidence by the way ) such as Wigan, Blackburn, Blackpool,

Wolverhampton, Stoke and others are now lined with empty shops and broken streets.

Why am I telling you this? Because it was through these thoughts, as I was at

Skegness Weekender, in the beating heart of thousands of passionate soulies coming

together to share and celebrate their love for this music, that the seeds of Keep On Keepin

On! began to germinate. It started with a question: how have all the many and vast

changes we have seen since the Wigan Casino heyday ended in the early 80’s affected them

and the characters who populated Once Upon A Time In Wigan? Where might they be now?

And so it began. Unfortunately so did the pandemic….

Thumbnail image by Adrian Korte.