By Dr. Joel Isabirye
12th November 2024
A few weeks ago, social media was awash with rumors that Club Guvnor might close shop before the end of this year. If this comes to pass, it will be because a lot has changed since DJ Charlie Lubega who had established Soul Disco while residing at Livingstone Hall in Makerere University opened up a club called Ange Noir in 1991 as a permanent residence for his patrons at Soul Disco. In 2001, he created Ange Mystique an executive wing and in 2010 he closed the two and launched Guvnor at the same location.
Today, neigborhood lounges, bars, gardens and hotels (operating at a far lower cost) have replaced what the masses used to look for in Guvnor: exclusive music.and an exotic/classy aura. They have free entry, free music, football matches on screen, computer driven mixes,occasional perfprmance by live bands and local musicians, dancers and comedians, attractive and colorful decor, variety menus and some are in the proximity of their homes making it easy to cross the road and enter their abodes.In addition, what used to be the exclusive product for Ange Noire/Ange Mystique/Guvnor i.e. new records released on vinyl and exclusive.CDs imported from abroad is now freely available to consumers at the click of a mobile smartphone button. In these circumstances ,it was becoming difficult for Guvnor to maintain its clientele.

Ange Noir in Industrial Area occupied the premises of the defunct Kololo Night Club. It became the official home of Soul Disco and its army of solid professional Deejays who had been mentored by Charlie who along with the late DJ.Berry were in the echelons of the Deejay space in those years.
While operating Soul Disci, DJ Charlie often travelled to the United Kingdom during holidays and always returned with new records (12 inches and album versions) on Vinyl (LPs). Through word of mouth, it was always known across Uganda that Charlie had gone to the UK and had returned. Revellers trekked from distant places (some as far as Mbale) to listen to the new records from the UK and the USA, the metropolis of the global record industry at the time. There was no internet to know who had released what.
For some reason, Charlie Lubega used to include many Jamaican Hit Records in the collections he came back with. Given the huge Jamaican Diaspora population in the UK at the time, particularly in Brixton London and in Manchester, Jamaican Dancehall, Roots Reggae, Cultural Dancehall and Lovers Rock Reggae flooded the streets of those parts of the UK. Lubega’s instinct felt that this music would also be popular in Uganda.

Artistes like Shabba Ranks, Chaka Demus and Pliers, Patra, Terror Fabulous, Cutty Ranks, Red Fox, Wayne Wonder, Buju Banton, Shaggy, Mad Cobra, Barrington Levy, Papa San, Dirtsman, Nardo Ranks, Super Cat, Tiger and others became club names in Uganda through Ange Noir and the diffusion to other clubs. Later on, Ange Noir also prioritized the newer age Jamaican artistes like Sean Paul, Beenie Man, Bounty Killer, Lady.Saw, Chevelle Franklyn, Goofy (Mr. G), Red Rat, Hawk Eye, Merciless, Mr. Vegas, General Degree and others carefully blended with Dancehall Soca artistes like Leston Paul, Metal Sound (from Martinique), Krosfyah (from Barbados) and Square One (from Barbados).
This period preceded or at least coincided with the launch of Radio Sanyu 88.2, Uganda’s first privately owned FM Radio in 1993. The liberalization of the electronic media was in tandem with the economic liberalization that government embraced in the late 1980s. Some of the presenters Radio Sanyu recruited were hired from Ange Noir. Rasta Rob (who Charlie Lubega had poached from SM Sounds) and RS Elvis became some of the young and upwardly mobile presenters that Sanyu enlisted. Their recruitment had wider implications. RS Elvis who loved Jamaican Dancehall music, had a show called Hot Mix on Friday nights on Radio Sanyu. On this show, he played the latest Jamaican Dancehall artistes whose records Charlie Lubega had brought from England. At a time when there were only two FM radio stations, this had a ripple effect with many young aspiring Ugandan artistes adopting Jamaican Dancehall ingredients. Today most of Ugandan popular music is laden with Jamaican Dancehall inflections (some call it Ragga). Without Charlie Lubega, perhaps Ugandan pop would have stayed in the structural lane of Congolese Rumba and Soukouss (collectively referred to as Lingala in Uganda).
As Ugandan artistes began to sing like Jamaican artistes but using local languages, Charlie Lubega introduced the jam session in Ange Noir. Often coming in the middle of the night, Ange Noir Deejays played Jamaican B-Side instrumentals for Ugandan artistes to perform for the crowds that were present. The jam sessions helped artistes to not only become famous but to test the.reception of their original compositions before finalizing their studio recordings.

Soul Disco, Ange Noir, Ange Mystique and Guvnor’s playlists also shaped other music played on radio. For example to cultivate an Afro sound, Radio Simba at inception played a lot of Dancehall Soca (that had been popularized by Ange Noir), with Krosfyah and Square One enjoying heavy rotation on the station.
Guvnor and its antecedents also improved the public’s respect for the Deejay. Firstly, the club emphasized discipline.amongst its Deejays. Lubega hired carefully sometimes carrying out some background checks on potential employees. There was a code of conduct and a dress code of sorts for staff. All their Deejays.and staff were very disciplined and there was hardly any evidence that they took or openly too substances or alcohol and caused mayhem. They were always smartly dressed and on some occasions one would think that they were going to a formal office after their club sessions.
Secondly, all his Deejays had either finished school or some were even at the University. For example Charlie was studying Social Work and Social Administration at Makerere. His proteges DJ Alberto was studying Social Sciences, his brother DJ Patricko was studying dentistry, while DJ RS Elvis was studying arts including Advanced Literature. All were on Government Scholarship at a time when it was not only the option available at the time but it was an uphill task to qualify for government scholarships at Makerere. This caliber of Deejays reshaped how the public perceived Deejays, a career that was previously considered as unserious. Indeed Charlie’s team helped to cement the Ange Noir brand among the emerging corporate sector in post-1986 Uganda, which was also germinating from the neo liberal reforms undertaken by government in the late 1980s.
Guvnor, Ange Mystique, Ange Noir and Soul Disco were very organized outfits. The Deejays had smooth mixes and coherent sessions which was an indication that they practised and prepared to entertain the club’s patrons . They were thematic in nature, sometimes playing music by era, tempo, gender, and genre, key.variables for organizing music content in media spaces.
Although Charlie Lubega’s clubs and disco faced stiff competion, he had defined his product and service so clearly that he was always in the lead. He focused on creating a classy but cross.generational club (by ingeniously creating a mix of hit music from the biggest songs of the moment and the past). Most of his competitors like Club Silk, Club Vibrations and Club Pulsations were good clubs which through the music they played however attracted youthful audiences yet it was common for students at Makerere to find their lecturers in Ange Noir, a testament to its cross-generational appeal.
Despite being in business for 33 years, the pressures of social change have made it difficult for Guvnor to operate as a business. While the decision to shut it down remains close to the chest of its owner, if it does close, the curtains would have fallen on a historic urban cultural monument in Uganda.
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