So are Britain’s clubs at a turning point? Is now the time to get phones off the dancefloor and people’s minds back on the music?
Sacha Lord, night time economy adviser for Greater Manchester, thinks so. “These phones are killing the dancefloor, they’re killing the atmosphere,” he says.
“DJs hate it. To look out into a sea of phones and no-one’s dancing is really demoralising.”
Smokin Jo, who has been DJing since 1990, remembers when the rave and club scene was burgeoning in the late 80s and early 90s.
“Everyone’s got their hands in the air, there’s joy, there’s happiness.
“Now there’s these videos being posted of people standing still with their phone in the air. It’s so sad,” she says.
But Dr Lee Hadlington, senior lecturer in cyberpsychology at Nottingham Trent University, says for those clubbers, “part of their enjoyment is to document their night in terms of photos and memories”.
