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SWANSEA: Three school friends turned a Princess Way corner shop into a nightclub. Next up, a coffee shop

A Princess Way convenience store became a nightclub for four hours last month, and the friends behind it have booked a coffee shop next.

LibertySounds, started by three school friends from Swansea, filled Hello Asia on September 12 with around 80 people, and more than 40 on the waiting list, the organisers say.

The shop’s usual shelves of Asian snacks and drinks, soju included, stayed open while DJs played house and UK garage from 7pm to 11pm.

Hello Asia owner Mallie Kumar backed the idea from the start and has since joined the team, which is now run by Elliot Kiernan, Josh Baugh, Ben Norling and Kumar.

The queue outside Hello Asia on Princess Way on September 12 (Image: LibertySounds)Hello Asia kept its shelves of snacks and soju open through the night (Image: LibertySounds)

An idea from the pub and a first set in a Pontardawe beer garden

Baugh said: “We were sitting in the pub one evening talking about music and events, and we all thought putting on events in unusual venues would be really fun. The more we spoke about it, the more we realised there was a genuine opportunity to create something different in Swansea.”

Their first outing was an informal beer garden set during Pontardawe Festival, before the Hello Asia night became the first ticketed event.

“What started as a slightly ridiculous idea between friends has quickly turned into something people have really connected with,” Baugh added. “The response to the convenience store event showed us that people are genuinely interested in experiencing familiar places in completely different ways.”

Basekamp becomes a club for one night on November 14

The next takeover is Basekamp, the coffee shop on Kings Lane at Urban Village, off High Street, on Saturday November 14 from 6pm to 11pm.

Basekamp on Kings Lane at Urban Village, off High Street (Image: Basekamp)

Deep Cut Grooves headline, with Baugh, Ceri Hopkins and Harry Mayberry in support, and tickets are £5 to £7 through the group’s Instagram page, the organisers say.

For one night the cafe gets club-standard DJ equipment, dedicated lighting and visuals, with numbers kept deliberately small, according to the team.

Basekamp on Kings Lane at Urban Village, which LibertySounds takes over on November 14 (Image: LibertySounds)The coffee counter at Basekamp, which gets club-standard DJ kit, lighting and visuals for one night (Image: LibertySounds)

Kiernan said none of them had heard of Basekamp before this chapter of the project, which showed how many interesting businesses people were missing across the city.

The venue matters as much as the line-up, the group says: businesses are not being turned into permanent nightclubs, and the idea is to let people experience them differently for one evening before they go back to normal.

Baugh said: “We’re trying to build LibertySounds into more than just an events company. We want it to become a community project that showcases independent businesses across Swansea, supports local artists and gives people a reason to discover places they might never have visited otherwise.”

Bakeries, clothing shops, arcades, music shops, barbershops, rooftops and waterfront spaces are all being explored for future nights, Kiernan said, though nothing beyond Basekamp has been confirmed.

The council’s draft culture strategy, criticised by residents last month as under-funded, warned that grassroots venues are particularly exposed and floated pop-up culture in empty shops; in August Amplitude filled the Singleton Park amphitheatre with twelve bands over two days.