Shakey's secrets of sapphic sisterhood

IN From the Closet to the Charts, Jon Savage compiles a series of hidden gay anthems from the 1960s and early '70s. It's a bizarre slice of social musical history, a mostly obscure collection of tracks that range from the musically inept to the odd notable curio, released at a time when homosexuality was largely illegal and the idea of toying with notions of sexual identity (which today is a marketing device) was unheard of.

Savage, of England's Dreaming fame, has included what is generally regarded as Britain's first explicitly homosexual song, Do You Come Here Often?, which was the B-side of a single released in the mid-1960s. Produced by Joe Meek and recorded by The Tornados, the single attracted no attention over its lyrical content. If ever mentioned (which it rarely was) it was viewed as a "novelty" song.

There's nothing novelty about others songs here: Kay, Why? by The Brothers Butch, White Trash Hillbilly Trick by Peter Grudzien, Ain't Nobody Straight in LA by The Miracles. What's missing , though, is a massive gay anthem - which has been recorded by more than one famous singer and still gets a fair bit of radio play without anyone knowing what the lyrics are really about.

The song is about someone trying to get into a nightclub but being refused admission: "Saw an eyeball peepin' through a smoky cloud behind the green door/ When I said 'Joe sent me' some- one laughed out loud behind the green door/All I want to do is join the happy crowd behind the green door."

Green Door was a huge hit for Shakin' Stevens, but even before his version the song went top 10 in both Britain and the US (by Frankie Vaughan and Jim Lowe, respectively) back when it was written in 1956. The Joe is Joe Meek, who produced the Vaughan version. The green door refers to the entrance of a basement club in Chelsea called The Gateways. It was Britain's first lesbian club. Hence the lyrics of the song - it's a man trying to get into a women-only venue: "There's an old piano and they play it hot behind the green door/Don't know what they're doing, but they laugh a lot behind the green door/Wish they'd let me in so I could find out what's behind the green door."

The Gateways club was used in the filming of The Killing Of Sister George (1968), the lesbian-themed film starring Beryl Reid and Susannah York. The film was released years before Shakin' Stevens's hit song, so he wouldn't have been so perplexed about just what was happening behind the door if he had bothered to rent the video. A 15-minute sequence shows exactly what went on behind the green door - which, remarkably enough, was a bunch of women enjoying themselves in a nightclub.

There can't be that many doors out there that have been responsible for a song charting in the top 10 on three separate occasions. And there can't be another song such as Green Door which has been played so widely without anyone knowing what it's really about.

The Gateways continued merrily along as a lesbian club until it closed in 1985. If you take a peek around the green door now, you'll find that it's a storage space for a dress shop. And the shop isn't even called The Green Door.

From the Closet to the Charts is published by Shellshock