PLEASE Please You gig promoter Joe Coates is teaming up with Basement Jazz Club host Harkirit Boparai to start a new project in York.

"It's called Ouroboros and will be a dancefloor-focused thing," says Joe. "Our first guest is Don Letts this weekend, which is kinda cool too."

That's Don Letts, as in BBC 6Music's Sunday night Culture Clash Radio presenter Don Letts; Big Audio Dynamite musician and co-founder Don Letts; punk and reggae cultural historian and author Don Letts; Grammy Award-winning documentary and feature filmmaker Don Letts; and, crucially, 1977 dub reggae DJ at The Roxy, London's first punk club, Don Letts.

His "punky reggae party" continues to this day in his national and international DJ sets that are still in the spirit of his Roxy nights, celebrating the history and legacy of Jamaican music in his mix of old and new school dub reggae. Saturday night brings him to The Crescent Community Centre in York.

"In the 21st century, my big thing is collective events that bring people together, which is more important than ever, so when I get a call, I always do the event, especially when it involves music, as music is a good starting point," says Letts. "It's good when you have people looking each other in the eye, and as it's a small space, they've got no option but to do that. Music is kind of a good way to have a running dialogue and it keeps a young head on old shoulders!

"Music does seem to me to be like the elixir of life, so when you're stuck with someone saying music was better in the old days, by having a job on 6Music it's my duty to seek out new music and move things along, paying respect to the past but looking to the future."

His DJ set list on the road contrasts with his Culture Clash playlist on 6 Music. "My DJ sets take in all Jamaican music – like ska, rocksteady, reggae, dub, dancehall – and the thing about Jamaican music is that it's become part of the fabric and the look of music today. My thing is to get people moving on the dancefloor, rather than receiving the approving nod of the purist," says Letts.

"The set is made up on the spur of the moment; it's what a DJ calls 'reading the crowd', and I try not to be too clever, so you never play three tracks in a row they don't know!"

​Ouroboros presents Don Letts, The Rebel Dread in a DJ set at The Crescent Community Venue, The Crescent, York, Saturday, 8pm to 12.30am. Tickets cost £10 from Earworm Records, Powells Yard, Goodramgate or at seetickets.com/event/don-l or £12 on the door. Ouroboros's next show will be Nightmares On Wax [DJ set] on April 7; 100 tickets have sold for that night already.