When ‘Shaky’, Slade and Björk all came to town
DID EWE KNOW… in the years before fame swept them onto the world’s biggest stages, the humble Paget Rooms in Penarth quietly played host to an extraordinary roll call of talent.
Long before his string of chart-topping hits made him the UK’s best-selling singles artist of the 1980s, Shakin’ Stevens cut his teeth here, honing the rock ’n’ roll swagger that would soon become his trademark.
Slade too, still on the cusp of their glam-rock dominance, brought their raw, boisterous energy to the small seaside venue, shaking its Edwardian walls with the same anthemic spirit that would later fill arenas.
And in the early 1990s, when the idea of Björk as a global icon seemed improbable to many outside her native Iceland, she took to the Paget Rooms stage with The Sugarcubes, their off-kilter art-pop offering Penarth a glimpse of the fearless creativity that would soon redefine pop music.
Looking back, it’s striking to think of these names – now etched into popular culture – once performing for intimate audiences in this unassuming Welsh town hall, turning the Paget Rooms into a quiet witness to the making of legends.