Hugh Metcalfe

Hugh Metcalfe is a musician and filmmaker from London and Suffolk. He is best known as the promoter of The Klinker Club in London, which he has run in various venues since 1982. He plays guitar, violin, hi-hat and gas mask. He performs in several bands including Bicycle Clip Sex, The Small Faeces, The Cross-Dressed Quartet and Fuck Off Batman. He also performed with noted sound poet Bob Cobbing, saxophonist Lol Coxhill and dancer Jennifer Pike in Birdyak, up until Cobbing’s death in 2002.

Metcalfe’s experimental film work began in 1978, and uses 8mm film methods to produce silent films, often used later as a springboard for free musical improvisation, either by Metcalfe himself or other musicians. During some of the 1980s, Metcalfe ran a record label, ‘Klinkerzoundz’, releasing records by Metcalfe, Cobbing, the Bow Gamelan Ensemble, and more.

The Klinker has, in over 30 years, acquired a reputation as London’s leading forum for free improvisation and marginal music and performance.