Welcome to the Club: The Life and Lessons of a Black Woman DJ

Hacienda resident and Manchester legend DJ Paulette celebrates the highs, lows and lessons of a thirty-year career with help from famous friends and legendary peers.

Welcome to the club offers a remarkable view from the DJ booth and the music industry from a black woman's perspective. Part personal account, part call to arms, it is an exploration of the exclusivity of the music industry and an attempt to do justice to the often invisible women who keep its heart beating. Starting out as one of the Hacienda's earliest female DJs, Paulette has scaled the heights, having police escorts through the streets of Paris to play to thousands along the Seine and playing in some of the biggest clubs in Europe, and descended to the lows of being unceremoniously benched for 18 months by COVID-19 with no chance of furlough and little support from the government.

This book tells that story, whilst drawing on the voices of other women in the industry and pointing to a path through for any aspiring DJ or musician who doesn't fit the mould. Behind the core values of peace, love, unity and respect, dance music is a world of exclusion, misogyny, racism and classism
but it is also a space bursting at the seams with powerful women, where vital work has always been done.

From 1992 to today, Welcome to the club brings together the technological, political and cultural developments behind this unprecedented period for music.