Notting Hill walkabout

Maybe you weren’t in London this year, and are unlikely to go in the future. Let me, if I may, recommend a route through Carnival, which will help describe the experience a little for you. The history I have narrated is based on reliable sources and all that. But from here on in, it gets subjective.

Start in the south at Notting Hill. I usually take a bike, but you can use the good tube and bus links to get here. I usually walk up Ladbroke Grove, because once you crest Notting Hill you can see all the way down to Harrow Road: the sea of people is a thrilling introduction.

You can then, if you wish, walk with me all the way North – to soak up the flavour, acclimatise to the seething crowds and get a glimpse of the parade. If we are lucky we will catch up with it halfway up, and join in the crowds following. We can also pick up a drink here. (Of course, as every year, we have promised ourselves not to drink beer, because of the lack of toilets for 2 million. And every year we are tempted by the Red Stripe.)

Half way up the grove we can jib right down St.Charles Square to our first sound system – Mellotone, the only all-women sound at carnival, playing roots reggae pure and simple. Round the corner is Saxon, another long established roots sound. But to get there we have to push through the ravers clustered around the Latin Rave Street Jam- moving spasmodically to the house and trance.

Up the Golborne road (‘Another can?’ ‘Don’t mind if I do’), over the red iron bridge that spans the railway, and we are in the insalubrious northern tip of the festival. Why? Because tucked away at Carnival’s very north pole is my favourite sound system. Past Sir Valdez and Tko – reggae and dancehall- we reach an apparent impasse: the road blocked by a huge gyrating crowd. It’s all good clean fun at the Sancho Panza sound- happy house and dippy disco- but really not our thing. S’cuse, me, mind your step (mind the discarded rice and peas and chicken bones scattering the floor)… and weave with me up to the top of Southern Row.

Already we can see the crowd – bigger than any we have yet seen. And grinning, everyone is grinning. This is Good Times – DJ Norman Jay’s sound system, in their twentieth successive year at carnival. Norman, who received an MBE this year (for services to the funk?), is the prime advocate of multicultural London – and you can see it in his crowd. And hear it in his music. Rare soul and funk, new house and drum and bass, reggae, hip hop and booglaloo. It’s across-the-board dance music for a mixed up crowd.

Now some serious street dancing and whistle blowing…

It’s best to leave Good Times before the end – if you can pull yourself away – because the police start closing down the roads, we might not be able to get back in, and we’ve a few places to visit yet.

Hurry back South…cut down Portobello road, under the Westway. Left on Westbourne Park Road and bang- we’re here at the heart of carnival. Take your pick. Over there is Mastermind – one of the first London sound systems to mix hip hop and house with reggae and funk, a real hardcore sound. Over here Rampage- smooth south Londoners who are always followed by huge packs of girls. And they play it smooth. R&B, hip hop, and UK Garage. Very upfront, very slick. Crowds so thick, you could take a kip standing up. Perhaps we’re too old…

Just up there is the jungle sound system Trouble On Vinyl. Close up, the bass is so deep you can feel it massaging your kidneys. Can’t believe the energy of the junglist crowd, bouncing up and down at 160 beats per minute. But it’ll soon be finale time – now that the police shut it down at seven. So round the corner.

First to Gaz’s Rockin’Blues. He’s John Mayall’s son (of the Blues Breakers) and has been running his Soho club for longer than anyone else in London. He’s dressed as a red Indian for some reason, as he plays his selection of rhythm and blues, old soul and ska to the hardcore Notting Hill Bohos: they made this carnival too.

Then as the night and police in fluorescent vests draw in, it’s to Jah Observer – set up old school style in the back of a rented truck. Strictly the best roots and culture music – righteous reggae. We are literally dancing on the street corner. In fact I think we’re on a traffic island in the middle of the road. Carnival, like Mikhail Bahktin says, reverses the power polarities for a day. For a while, the car does not rule here.

The only problem now, is how to get home. It’s seven o clock. That’s it isn’t it? Well, time for one more tune, and another drink. Perhaps we’ll walk home…