Lets face it, the prospect of a rather shady private members club in the bum-end of an industrial estate doesn’t sound like the most tasty of places to spend a Saturday night. Come on though, this is the Soundhaus! The Soundhaus is not nearly as filthy as its reputation. It’s actually rather lovely and the portaloos aren’t so bad really.

Undettered, Student Underground headed down to Chakra for a night of debauchery. What we found was something utterly essential and mind-blowingly brilliant. A club with a party ethic that has more in common with a carnival than a club: flamboyant and hedonistic, nothing can stop us now.

This month Chakra celebrate their 1st birthday, and if last month is anything to go by, it will be the kind of underground event that legends are made of. Yet most people in Glasgow have never heard of it. “I'd rather get 200 lovely people through the door than 400 punters”, says Carol, the club's promoter. And she means it. For the past year her and her boyfriend Charly have put their hearts and souls into creating something radically different to everything Glasgow has to offer. And now it’s all fitting into place.

Run as a non-profit making collective, Chakra has six resident DJ’s who are joined by a wide range of musicians (a la Manumission) including a trumpet player, saxophone, guitar and live percussion. Great idea but there’s a reason why most clubs don’t do it: it can all go horribly wrong. But at Chakra, not only does is not go wrong, but it wouldn’t matter too much if it did. As Carol puts it, “it’s more about self-expression than anything else”.

One of the ways in which Chakra encourages self-expression is through fancy dress. Not the kind of naff fancy dress that you get on hen-nights, we’re talking serious dressing up for the occasion. Every month there’s a theme; this month it was Fairytales and Fantasy. Past highlights have included nights with names like ‘Wild West’, ‘Pink’, and of course ‘Rocky Horror’. And yes they do have a large gay following.

One of the most peculiar aspects of the Glasgow club scene is that people of different sexual orientations hardly ever party together. Most Glasgow clubs are either fiercely heterosexual (think Shagtag), or completely focussed on the music, at the expense of any kind of self-expression beyond ‘appreciating’ the music. The gay community seems to be completely cut-off from the rest of the Glasgow club community in a way that is to the detriment of everyone concerned. Chakra attempts to fill this void, a mixed crowd and quality music in a club that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

The themes extend beyond the dressing-up box. Video artists create images that are projected onto huge screens on the main dancefloor. The creativity that goes into these projections is striking, and together with the strobes and lasers, make the club feel like one of those clubs you get on films that look amazing but don’t really exist. At the Rocky Horror night they erected a stage and acted out the play in the middle of the club (Manumission anyone?). Elsewhere, intricate home-made decorations are suspended from the ceiling and the long passage that links Chakra with the outside world is floodlit with fairy lights giving it the appearance of the yellow brick road that it is.

The main room offers a musical journey from tribal and funky house through to deeper, darker and more hedonistic rhythms. Basically it’s unselfconscious acid house. Even more acid house is the second room where you can hear everything that you loved when you discovered dance music: FSOL, Massive Attack, Candi Statton, Underworld etc etc. It’s an old formula and it works. Music at Chakra is a soundtrack to the experience; it’s not the main event.

And if it all gets a bit much, the Tchai Ovna tearoom is on hand for a bit of ‘chill-out’. Yes, the west-end’s most treasured tea paradise regularly host Chakra’s chill-out room, which is complete with rugs, cushions, wall-hangings and an atmosphere of pure tranquillity. Lovely. It all fits in with the prevailing attitude at Chakra, that partying should be a positive experience, that creativity can dance on the same table as hedonism.
So what clubs have influenced you as a promoter? “The inspiration for Chakra comes from festivals far more than clubs... I remember going to Tribal Gathering a few years ago... I wanted to take that festival feeling back to Glasgow”. This is reflected by a crowd that transcends age, sexuality and levels of inebriation that’s more in keeping with Jarvis Cocker’s field in Hampshire than a club that’s only ten minutes from The Garage.

With so much going on, not to mention the antics of Chakra’s resident fire-eater (pictured), can they fit any more entertainments into the club? “We’d like to work with more VJ’s [video-jockeys]” says Carol. “Then there’s the pyrotechnics show we’d like to get in, a laser show - oh - and a hippie market!” She continues, “basically we’re always looking for people to collaborate with. Chakra is a space where local artists, musicians and DJ’s can express themselves.”

Chakra is still in it’s infancy, they’ve only recently started being able to afford to pay the DJ’s, some of the ideas are eccentric to say the least, but if the ideas keep flowing like they have been up until now, then who knows where it could lead. You heard it here first.

Chakra is held on the last Saturday of every month at the Soundhaus (private members and their guests only). Info: www.chakra-club.co.uk