Dave Shirt was born as David Coates in Nigeria on September the 14th 1953
I spent many years travelling the world with my parents, my father being an advertising executive ,in 1968 I was asked if I would play some records in a club at a holiday resort in Kenya called Jezzabelles, this was attached to an annexe within a complex called the mount Kenya safari club virtually at the base of Kilimanjar
o,
& so it began one record deck & a reel to reel tape recorder, so at the age of 15 or so
I caught the bug and had some fine times in the three weeks I did this for including getting a taste for vodka.
1970 Dave becomes Dave Shirt when arriving at a club in Croydon surrey the DJ Roger Ashley decides that my African shirt was so bright in the u/v lighting that I became Dave shirt. Two weeks later Roger leaves the club to discover himself & yours truly gets offered his job, now doing two nights a week I have now started working as a roadie for the Emperor Rosko hu***ng tons of gear and vinyl by the trunk full, by now the favourite tipple is Bells whisky,& yours truly is flying hi. By 1971 I have my own spot with playground bars working for a large brewery I am travelling the UK checking out DJ�s and guesting all over the place, still doing croydon/Rosko & my own spot I now seem to be working 24/7 I had to play in a pub called the red deer in south croydon and I duly arrived only to find the DJ booth was tiny, the manager at the time christened me Big Dave Shirt and so here we go again, I stayed there for three years. Left Justines the original club and started working a club called Dr Jims still in croydon and very busy indeed, 400 bodies a night going into a place built for 300,it was major, then simultaneously started playing down the road at Penny Farthing�s flagship called Scamps, holding 900 people I was actually competing with myself at other clubs, by now there were some very hot DJ�s around, Nick Love Big N Bob Roberts who was a superb performer, the biggest problem by this time was alcohol myself & Bob were going down a very slippery slope, He eventually retired & dried out. In 1978 I came back with a bang and a new sound Black Dance all the dj�s were still playing top 50 etc I played disco/soul, it had been going on for a while but was underground so my friends and I tried to bring it to the surface & by 1979 it was kicking off big time, I was having my girlfriend travel to new York three times a year to bring fresh vinyl home, this helped keep it up front. I then played all over London and Kent doing my thing as it were and latched onto Champs in Depford se8 where I stayed for 11 years,1984 saw the closure of Dr Jims a sad demise, but we carried on as Dr Crippens in Bromley, by now the whisky is back in my life after 4 yrs on the wagon but it is well under control & in 1992 moved to Northampton where I have done a couple of clubs and gigs but the music is not appreciated, so I play around in my studio most of the time, and this is just part of the story, I have not touched on the pirate radio bit yet, do you really wish to bore yourself some more.
