Afrobeat@Po Na Na, Magdalen Street, Oxford Richard Bell feels that Afrobeat could be a top night out – if only the music was up to much.

ARRIVING at Po Na Na on a Thursday for new night Afrobeat was an unsettling experience for me.

It’s never nice to be the sole focus of the doormen’s attention, and there really didn’t seem to be another soul in sight.

Unfortunately this didn’t change much when we got inside. Aside from a lovely, if bored-looking, girl at the entrance, a couple of bartenders and the DJ, we were joined only by a couple of other people – all with that same bewildered expression on their face, wondering where everyone else in Oxford was.

Po Na Na never seems to have had consistency in attendance; they’ll have nights which are thumping, rammed with people from wall to wall, clambering over each other to get to the bar, and they’ll have nights like this, faintly reminiscent of the last few humans alive in a post apocalyptic world.

In fact, as a club night it’s not bad, and sports an excellent price for beers which certainly helped me get over any reservations I had about spending too much money, which always feels like a concern whenever I visit Po Na Na.

However, no amount of lovely cheap beers could really block out the fact that there wasn’t anyone else there.

The flyer for the night adorns all the tables in a misguided attempt to persuade us to go to the event we’re already at, and boasts a range of music styles, most of which are peculiarly absent from the DJs set.

Supposedly we should be hearing Funky House, Old Skool, Hip Hop and even ‘Bashment’! (Answers on a postcard if you know what this is, because I’m afraid I haven’t a clue.) Sadly the DJ is stuck playing pure R’n’B, presumably because it’s the most popular sort of music and will act as some sort of siren song coaxing the masses in with its sound.

This, I feel, is one of the things they will need to adjust to make this night a success. Everywhere has R’n’B nights, and clubs like Lava Ignite, the Bridge and Mood have almost entirely cornered the market in the Oxford city centre. Unfortunately it turns Afrobeat from being a challenging and potentially interesting night into something really rather dull.

Afrobeat has the potential to be a good night, and I hope that as the weeks press on it turns into one, but at the moment it’s a same old same old type of thing.

To make an impression, and to make a new night successful you need to branch out, give people something fresh and new. Rehashing the same old things under a new name just isn’t good enough.

Other venues already have this night under a different name, and already have their crowds for it. If Afrobeat want to survive they will have to become the night their flyer promises.

In short, play some Afrobeats, and I’m sure the crowd will come.