Today we want to remember the O2 ABC and the club nights that made the venue what it was - one of Glasgow’s biggest and best nightclubs - as news comes that the historic Sauchiehall Street building is set to be redeveloped.
The ABC wore many hats over the years - beginning life as a Victorian picture house in 1875, before going on to become an indoor skating rink, a circus, a cinema, a dance hall, and then a cinema again.
The name ABC stuck around the longest, from 1929 to 1999 during it’s final function as a cinema. It wasn’t until 2006, after six years of laying unused, that the venue found a new lease on life, Glasgow nightlife boss David McBride turned the space into a music venue, costing millions of pounds.
The O2 part was stuck on in 2009 adter Academy Music Group took over the ABC. When it wasn’t hosting some of the biggest Scottish and international artists visiting Glasgow, the O2 ABC would run club nights.
If you were a student you’ll remember them well, Jellybaby Thursdays, Propaganda Fridays, and Love Music Saturdays. Today we wanted to focus on Jellybaby Thursdays, arguably the biggest and best student nights of the 2010’s. Running from 11pm to 3am - people would file out in their hundreds from bars up and down Sauchiehall Street to line up in the queue outside the O2 ABC.
Jellybaby ran a ‘hefty blend of pop, indie, electro, rock and dance’ music from resident DJs every Thursday night - running from 2009 right up until one of the greatest modern Glaswegian tragedies, the second Art School fire of 2018, brought the O2 ABC to ruin.
Posting on June 16, 2018, the Jellybaby Facebook page posted: ”Thank you to all the JellyHeads. Stay safe Glasgow. 2009-2018. RIP”.
It wasn’t quite the end for the club night however, as it ran nights at different venues for special occasions like halloween right up until 2019, although it could never reach the heights it hit back in the days of the O2 ABC.
Today we’re looking back at Jellybaby Thursdays at the O2 ABC.
1. Jellybaby Queue
Jellybaby was incredibly popular amongst young Glaswegians - sometimes the queue could stretch right up Scott Street to the Art School. | Contributed
2. Jellybaby Freshers Fest 2011
Incredible scenes at the freshers festival at Jellybaby in 2011 | Contributed
3. Jellybaby Freshers Festival 2011
Club nights were massive in the O2 ABC - the massive eponymous jelly baby could be seen from across the hall, who knows where the big green fella’s gone now. | Contributed
4. Jellybaby 28/7/2011
Back in the day you could grab drinks in Jellybaby for £1 | Contributed