{"id":148450,"date":"2026-02-28T16:23:06","date_gmt":"2026-02-28T16:23:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/148450\/"},"modified":"2026-02-28T16:23:06","modified_gmt":"2026-02-28T16:23:06","slug":"how-shelter-a-legendary-nyc-dance-party-has-kept-going-for-35-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/148450\/","title":{"rendered":"How Shelter, a legendary NYC dance party, has kept going for 35 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

Timmy Regisford embodies a certain kind of New Yorker for whom dance music\u2019s life force is second only to oxygen. The DJ\/producer \u201cgrew up\u201d going to the legendary club Paradise Garage, dancing to DJ Larry Levan\u2019s mix of disco, house, pop and more every Friday night. New York house music titan Tony Humphries taught Regisford how to mix records in the early \u201880s, and by 1985 he was an assistant music director for the R&B radio station WBLS, which was known for its championing of dance music<\/a>. After the Garage closed in 1987, Regisford sought to fill its void and opened his club Shelter in Tribeca in March 1991. In doing so, he preserved a space for the community of dance enthusiasts that filled the Garage and fortified New York\u2019s robust house music culture.<\/p>\n

DJ Erick Morillio, who threw a party at Shelter, told the New York Times in 2002<\/a>, \u201cIt’s a club by and for music lovers. You don\u2019t get the packs of drunk kids on weekends looking for a frat party.\u201d Shelter moved to midtown and then bounced down and around again before losing its physical form entirely and becoming a roving party. In a Robin Hood-like maneuver, Regisford took money he made in A&R at various mainstream record labels (Atlantic, MCA, Motown) and invested it in dance music\u2019s underground to finance Shelter.<\/p>\n

This month marks 35 years of Shelter. Depending on how you look at it, you could consider it one of the longest (if not the longest) nightlife parties in New York. To celebrate, Regisford is throwing two parties \u2014 one on Friday, March 6 at 3 Dollar Bill<\/a> in Greenpoint alongside New York club staples Joe Claussell and Ron Trent, and Shelter co-founder Merlin Bobb. The next night, Regisford will take to Gowanus\u2019 Public Records<\/a> (where he has a monthly residency) to play an hourslong classics set, which he says is the first time he\u2019ll do that Regisford said he will DJ for up to nine hours at the latter party, but \u201cthat\u2019s nothing\u201d for a DJ whose sets reliably clock upwards of 12 hours, sometimes extending into the 18-hour range.<\/p>\n

Gothamist talked to Regisford about Shelter\u2019s legacy, the upcoming parties, and what modern DJs are getting wrong. An edited and condensed transcript of that conversation is below.<\/p>\n

Rich Juzwiak: You opened Shelter because you wanted a place to continue the spirit of the Paradise Garage. Did Shelter achieve that?<\/p>\n

Timmy Regisford: I think we achieved something different. The Garage was the pinnacle of the place that everyone knew. With Shelter, it wasn\u2019t just dance music. It was African, Latin, jazz. I opened up the floor to all different kinds of music.<\/p>\n

Was that your M.O. from the beginning, expanding sonically?<\/p>\n

Not at all. It was the members. They\u2019d come and say, \u201cCan you play this record?\u201d I\u2019d be like, \u201cNo!\u201d And then one day, I said to myself, \u201cThat’s being very shortsighted. They come to the club every week, they spend their money, and I\u2019m playing from midnight to 3 in the afternoon. I should listen to them.\u201d So at 1 o\u2019clock in the afternoon, you might hear a Fela Kuti record, not just dance music. It was a little bit different.<\/p>\n

It’s quite a balance to strike as a DJ, right? Because you need to bring what you do, but you\u2019re also there to entertain the crowd.<\/p>\n

As much as I love what I do, the job is providing a service to people who want to dance. It’s not personal. I learned that no man is an island and to always listen to people who are coming up.<\/p>\n

The reason why I came up with the name Shelter is I wanted to have a safe haven for people that had a hard working week to come out and release themselves. That was it. Come in, let yourself go, and Monday starts it all over again.<\/p>\n

Did Shelter in fact become the shelter that you had envisioned?<\/p>\n

I had no idea what would transpire. What I did was come in and make sure, to the best of my ability, that I played music I love and that the audience wanted to hear. That\u2019s it. No drugs. No alcohol. Only music.<\/p>\n

But did that lead to a joyful party? I\u2019m trying to understand the vibe on the floor as you observed it.<\/p>\n

Look, I grew up in the Garage. It wasn\u2019t a vibe; it was a lifestyle. It meant people, community. It was about the music. You went in there and you danced and that\u2019s all you did.<\/p>\n

Shelter hosted some of club music\u2019s all-time legends: Larry Levan, Tony Humphries, \u201cLittle\u201d Louie Vega, David Morales. Was there anyone in particular whose set sticks out in your memory?<\/p>\n

Francois [K]. I saw him turn that room into something I\u2019ve never experienced in my life before. To me, Francois is the best technical DJ in the world. He knows how to play a system. He knows how to get a response from the system. He knows how to get a response from the crowd. It was my sound system and I never heard it sound like the way it did until Francois played on it \u2014 better than me.<\/p>\n

You\u2019re known for your marathon sets. What happens in your mind as you pass hour 12? Is it meditative at all?<\/p>\n

No. When I was growing up, I went to the Garage and I danced from midnight to 2 in the afternoon. It\u2019s nothing different. My thing is, I don’t want to stop.<\/p>\n

If it\u2019s not meditative, are you focused the whole time?<\/p>\n

Yes.<\/p>\n

What are you focusing on?<\/p>\n

The journey. Eras of music. Not moving all over the place. If I\u2019m here, I\u2019m here. And then we move on. If I have it locked here, then you\u2019ll understand where we are going.<\/p>\n

How much of your sets do you plan in advance?<\/p>\n

I never plan. Let me tell you something: I have never done a classics party before in my life. I can honestly say on March 7, it\u2019ll be the first time I\u2019ve prepared myself for a party.<\/p>\n

How are you preparing?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m going back to all the old songs I know. I\u2019m bringing them into the studio, I’m remixing them, I\u2019m updating the sound so that when you hear it, it doesn\u2019t sound old. The lyrics are the same, the melody is the same, but the music is up to date.<\/p>\n

Are you DJing off vinyl at all?<\/p>\n

No, CDJs.<\/p>\n

What is lost when you don\u2019t DJ on vinyl and go digital?<\/p>\n

Nothing\u2019s lost. I was working with Stevie Wonder, and I sat down with him and I said, \u201cStevie, you\u2019re using all these computers. Don\u2019t you miss playing live?\u201d He looked at me and said, \u201cListen, I cannot help it. It\u2019s my audience that doesn\u2019t want me to rot.\u201d And I understood. You have to change.<\/p>\n

What is a classic to you?<\/p>\n

A definition of a classic is a song that, for generations, stands the test of time. You could play it back then, you can play it now \u2014 it doesn\u2019t change. People always love it.<\/p>\n

So we\u2019re talking \u2026<\/p>\n

Earth, Wind & Fire, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye.<\/p>\n

D-Train, Evelyn \u201cChampagne\u201d King, the Peech Boys?<\/p>\n

Yeah, all of that.<\/p>\n

In terms of the \u201990s stuff \u2026<\/p>\n

Kerri Chandler, [David] Morales, Louie Vega, CeCe Peniston, C&C Music Factory.<\/p>\n

Do you go to clubs when you’re not DJing?<\/p>\n

Yeah, all the time. I go to Good Room, Knockdown Center. I go to Elsewhere. I go out. I listen to who\u2019s playing. It\u2019s not an experience because the time that we\u2019re in, all the DJs play for two hours. They don’t understand what they’re doing. Everybody\u2019s playing the same because they want a response. For your generation, the attention level is not that long. If you hear something you don’t like, automatically, you\u2019re automatically on the phone. They\u2019re not tapped into the party. Those days are over. Nowadays is smart. They tell their audience, \u201cNo phones on the dance floor.\u201d Once you pull out that element, you have a chance of having a party. If not, not happening.<\/p>\n

Is that your rule for your parties: No phones on the dance floor?<\/p>\n

No phones on the dance floor.<\/p>\n

Does getting older make your job more difficult at all?<\/p>\n

Not yet. I’m in the gym every morning at 5 am.<\/p>\n

Are you listening to dance music?<\/p>\n

I’m listening to [my DJ sets] while I run seven and a half miles every morning. I record myself every party and I listen to myself and I say, \u201cOh, I could have done this better.\u201d \u201cI don\u2019t like this; I like this.\u201d<\/p>\n

One of your signatures is DJing shirtless. Do you still do that?<\/p>\n

Yep, always have, from when I opened the Shelter.<\/p>\n

Why is that?<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t need to show my body off. It\u2019s hot!<\/p>\n

Do you feel like you have been able to maintain community for all these years, going back to the opening of Shelter?<\/p>\n

When I play out, people that have been going to the club for 35 years still show up. I\u2019ve watched them have children, I\u2019ve watched them get married, I\u2019ve watched them pass away. It’s a lot.<\/p>\n

When you opened the Shelter, did you feel successful immediately?<\/p>\n

No. I don’t feel successful now.<\/p>\n

I think a lot of people would call you a legend.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t even know what that means.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Timmy Regisford embodies a certain kind of New Yorker for whom dance music\u2019s life force is second only…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":148451,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[9,56,63,65,64],"class_list":{"0":"post-148450","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-ny","10":"tag-nyc","11":"tag-nyc-headlines","12":"tag-nyc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=148450"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/148450\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/148451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=148450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=148450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=148450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}