Picos Gemeos

I get the feeling the next big flash-in-a-pan trend with (straight) hipsters will be voguing. I say straight because with the gays it's something that never really went away, even if only as a panto move you make in the club, encircled by your friends.

But the whole 80s house sound keeps getting re-explored by ever more artists on the wake of Hercules and Love Affair, to the point where i think that voguing is the only way kids can go these days with their dayglo and moustaches. There's even a book just out on voguing and the House Ballroom scene in NY in the 80s.

I had this thought about voguing last night at 2 Many DJs Xmas gig at Brixton Academy. They were accompanied by guests - the fantastic DJ Paul Chambers and some other nameless DJs - but, more interestingly for me, Azari & III, who I had never heard of and who I really took to. Essentially, they are two singers who sing very catchy house pop in the style of Hercules & Love Affair accompanied by a band/DJs. Oh look, they have an ace single coming out soon!



I was with loveinsuburbia, who kept wishing they'd bugger off the stage; but I think she was just incapable of truly appreciating their goodness thanks to the constant flirting between her and the boy across the way we nicknamed Superman.[1] We had tickets for the Circle at the Brixton Academy, which meant dancing in front of your seat and being distracted by ushers going back and forth trying to stop people leaning over the railings to gape at the downstairs crowd.

There was this really cheeky, tiny Irish bloke completely off his head who kept sneaking past security and dancing right by the rails, his hands raised to the stage, a big grin on his face. Then he'd turn around and high five us. When we'd see security coming, either us or Superman and his mates would pull him away until security were gone.

It was a great night of dancing, and I was happy to realise that I could stay up until 3am non-stop moving without the need of MDMA. Just a couple of pear ciders, gin and tonics and water did the trick for me. 2 Many DJs set was great but the next time with them will either have to be in a field or a proper club.

For those of you who don't know what voguing is, here's the trailer for Paris is Burning (1990).

[1] The flirting got so silly that I had to actually give Superman a thumbs up as I walked away (without loveinsuburbia's knowledge), to see if he'd finally make his move. But the silly bugger was either too shy and fried or he really thought I was her boyfriend, despite me camping it up to dissuade him of the idea. A pair of good looking guys later introduced themselves to loveinsuburbia and again, as they chatted to her, they kept looking at me with that "are you her boyfriend?" look. Good manners still exist, people.

If you're ever feeling depressed or sick - life's getting you down - there's one easy and inexpensive thing you can do that will heal you immediately. This antidote costs less than £10 - one payment only - and you own it afterwards for the rest of your life. It is 100% guaranteed to fix you.

The only possible side effect is that you might get addicted to it, but research has shown that the likelihood is minimal and that most users experience only good effects before recovering their health and spiritual wellbeing.

I fully support this product and can vouch that it's healing powers are awesome. I'm currently using it and life finally feels so much better. I'm looking forward to using it on a fairly regular basis from now on.

( And I think you should too. )

My novel for this year's National Novel Writing Month is called Jason Voorhees Is Dead. I wrote just under 20.000 words before I had to give up due to repetitive strain injury (an ongoing problem since then.) However, Jason is not dead. I plan on taking up with him again sometime in the holidays, when my fingers are relax'a'licking good.

By the way, next time you slag off Jason because he's ugly or he killed scores of horny youngsters, just remember that he was a victim first of all. Of bullying, of his wacky mom. Have some compassion.

Some weekends ago, at Warp Records 20th Anniversary, I was sitting in The Coronet's bleachers resting my feet when my friend Natallica asked if I had a mild form of OCD. Yes, I replied. I think I do. Because when iTunes' Genius and Amazon's Recommendations tell me to listen to something, I make a Spotify playlist out of it. Because what's random to others is synchronicity to me. Because, like I said, I haven't given up on Jason yet and will make those 50.000 words squeal by the finishing line.

A mild, mild form of OCD.

I've been posting my NaNoWriMo ramblings over at Succès de scandale because Wordpress has this neat system that tells you what people type in Google to find you. From those searches I create new posts - a type of spiral that feeds back into Google and pulls closer ever more people interested in those topics.

I also have Google Alerts for anything to do with succès de scandale. Over a week ago, a story came up about the American artist Ed Kienholz and how an exhibition of his in the 60s was particularly scandalous. I was suffering from insomnia that night so I took the opportunity to write a short piece about it. As I was finishing, my brasilian friend B woke up and found me in the living room. The piece wasn't discussed between us.

Later in the day, when I got back from work, I found B sitting in our living room checking his e-mail. He was coming down from a LSD trip. He told me he'd been downtown and visited the National Gallery, but an art piece by Ed Kienholz freaked him out so much that he had to find refuge with Van Gogh's Sunflowers. Do you see the beauty in this synchronicity? Now, I have to of course visit the National Gallery and see this piece before it leaves. I'm hoping that new doors will open from the visit.

Feeling Gloomy played Umbrella-ela-ela last night.[1]

That is all.

[1] OK, so it was the Manic Street Preachers' cover. But it was still pretty cool. I danced all night, with a little help from my friends. And I left an important part of my brain in a field somewhere in Hampshire, alright.

Hi there!

It has been long time since we did not meet. I hope everything is okay with you. I found a great medicine shop on the net. I ordered some meds and got my orders in 3 days to my postbox.They are cheap and quality. I thought that you may be interested.Here is their advertisement :

- Man's Health, Anti-Depressants, Antibiotics, Cholesterol, Diabetes, Diuretic, Pain, Sexual Health, Erectile dysfunction, Sleep Aids and Weight Loss medicines
- Worldwide shipping
- Always fresh discounts
- Always full anonymity
- Always making you a happy customer!

Choose us and you will feel well: Always!

Cindy22

I'm crushing your head! I'm crushing your head! Your head is flat now.

On my flight back to London I had a stopover in Frankfurt. As I was getting off the airport bus, a dishelved man standing by the arrival gate walked over to me and started talking in hushed tones. I told him I spoke English and he looked a little flustered. He hadn't shaved for a few days, his eyes were nervous. He wore a trainspotter winter coat. He showed me a badge and said in his broken German accent that he was a customs officer.

"We are doing a training exercise today. Could you help us by carrying this bag?"

It was early in the morning, Frankfurt was covered in snow and I was still half asleep.

"We are training one of our sniffer dogs. It's over there," he said, pointing in the direction the other passengers were heading to. "You need to carry this bag past the dog."

You hear stories of innocent people made into drug mules, rotting away in some prison because they accepted this kind of request. The guy laughed nervously and explained that I only had to carry it with my left hand and wait to see what the officer with the dog (indeterminate, large breed) would say. Other passengers walked past us, some looking curiously at me as if I was an illegal immigrant that had just been busted.

I took the plastic bag with my left hand and joined the queue. Up ahead stood a female officer with the dog, sniffing everyone that walked past her. I looked back but the man was nowhere to be seen. Other passengers gave me some space, probably because they had witnessed what had happened and thought I was about to be arrested.

It came my turn to go past the dog. It sniffed the bag and immediately moved in front of me then shoved its snout in my crotch. The woman took the bag from me and fished a test tube from it with some kind of clear liquid. She threw it on the ground and the dog leapt on it. She laughed and said thank you for participating in the exercise.

When Kevin and I left the apartment yesterday evening, we thought we'd meet some friends in a downtown pub for a quiet night of beer, trays of nachos and chit chat. Never in our wildest dreams would we guess that by 5am we'd be wandering the empty streets of London, pupils so big they took up half of our faces, bodies still warm from dancing at Planet Angel.

We nearly didn't go, but rosamicula is very good at changing people's minds and making them see the light. So, after a few hours of mellow pub conversation with the patsy_social, we headed back to Rosamicula's - courtesy of sarcaustick and thirstypixel who were in town and willing to drive us - for some food, wine and outfit changes.

Planet Angel doesn't have a fixed address. Every month they throw a party in a different London location. Yesterday's was in Vauxhall, in a venue decorated like a 60s sci-fi film set smoked with hundreds of incense sticks. Bouncers and "carers" wandered around, through a mostly young crowd, smiling at everyone and making sure people were having a good time. Rooms played hard trance, drum and bass or happy house. The latter was my favourite, but it was played in a tiny room used as corridor for the other two main rooms, so one couldn't get lost in the music without someone pushing past on their way somewhere else.

The crowd was mostly young. Really young. As in, I saw groups of 14-year-olds and I wondered how the hell they'd got in. rosamicula seems to think many were freshers, and she's probably right. I think it's very precocious of 6th form freshers to party like this these days!

Once in a while, in the sea of smooth torsos, pouty emo boys (oh, how sushidog and naturalbornkaos would have loved there) and tiny girls in angel outfits, you'd glimpse someone in their 60s, clearly making time there until the outdoors festivals return. A giant poster on one wall, with paint on the floor, encouraged revellers to scribble messages or decorate their own faces. And if anyone felt like getting some rest, there were couches in chill out rooms, videogames, lego and toys to lose oneself in. They even sold food and tea, and occasionally bar staff wandered around with trays of strawberries and grapes.

But despite all this, Kevin and I didn't have enough energy to dive head-first into the night. We tried our best in each room, finding briefly some fun in New Order's "Blue Monday" on the happy house dancefloor, but the feeling never remained. Men kept approaching Kevin and asking him for drugs or lighters. Rosamicula disappeared because she wanted tea and a podium to pound the night away (plus, she seemed to know half the people in there). I was still wearing my work clothes and didn't feel 100% comfortable. So, at 4am, Kevin asked if we could leave.

Outside, London slept and the streets were deserted. We walked past a silent House of Parliament, and it suddenly struck me that I was peaking. I asked Kevin if he felt anything and he jabbered for about 10 minutes on how he wasn't high at all, and how he really could do with some chips, and how there were various places we could catch the night bus, and how he wanted to do some drawing on Saturday, and how he might come to Sushidog and watch X Factor and on and on and on. So cute.

Today, we have been completely useless. We watched Beautiful Thing and Horrible People, and we ate easy fare like oven chips and fish fingers. My lower back has gone to pieces and I keep forgetting what I want to do. I'm surprised I managed to write this post. It must have taken me about two hours, but I can't be sure. What I do know is that the X Factor and some hearty winter food from Sushidog's kitchen will be the perfect way to ease me into the night.

Soho's Curzon hosts midnight movies once in a blue moon. Like last night, for example, with Fantastic Planet (1973). Kevin and I nearly didn't arrive in time (11.40pm) thanks to drinks and a game of Scrabble with our landlords that went on for too long. The nights have been balmy and there's nothing better than sitting outside a pub (such as the Royal Inn on the Park - too bad they are soooo ridiculously expensive) after the week has come to an end. Fruity beer is my thing.

I saw Fantastic Planet for the first time 9 years ago. Kevin and I were visiting Canada's east coast, staying with some of his friends in Halifax.[1] We were all a bit drunk, and after a fat joint was passed around, our host Chris decided to put this film on. I didn't pick up at the time how much it influenced the french band Air; just the horror, the cruelty of those bug-eyed giants towards the humans, tripping me out as I lay on the carpet. Very much like Planet of the Apes, but far creepier and sci-fi-ish; far more beautiful and eerie than any other animation I've seen since. It was good to finally watch it sober and slip inside its world, unemcumbered by paranoid thoughts. There was a short film beforehand, I Met the Walrus, based on a tape interview between a student and John Lennon. It's great and you can watch it here. And here's the trailer for Fantastic Planet.

[1] They lived in an apartment right below Rick Mercer, one of the main stars of This Hour Has 22 Minutes, one of Canada's most popular TV shows at the time. One morning, Rick and his partner were in the garden, just in their bathrobes. We said hello and our hostess had a brief chat with them. I was all starstruck..

I think it's safe to say that my first trip to Slimelight was a success. What I thought would be a club filled with attitude and unfriendliness turned out to be a darker, campier version of Popstarz when it was housed at The Scala. I danced to The Cure's "Killing an Arab", Depeche Mode's "Enjoy the Silence" (EBM version) and a whole bunch of other stuff that I can't name; had a death metallist offer me his lap; bumped into various LJ people (even the kind I only know through icons); was offered drugs (which I declined - but won't next time); had boy-on-boy action with dj_alexander in the toilets (with an audience); drank a lot of Red Bull and Vodka served by the very friendly bar staff; was wished a good night by the coatcheck people (who made a point to look for my lost scarf); and didn't take too long to reach home after a solitary wait in the freezing cold and two nightbuses.

I'd been craving a club night in ages, and things got off to a nice start at sor_eye_ah and fross's place, where we drank vodka and cokes, ate nachos and listened to Equinox (a Front Line Assembly side project which I'd never heard of before, and which was quite good). Once the girl was booted, corseted and ready to go, we took the No.43 bus and were deposited a few metres away from the club's entrance (which is just behind Angel tube station.) sor_eye_ah was my side-kick for the night - passing on the job to others the few times she needed to venture into the foul-smelling toilets or grab a drink.

We were one of the first people to arrive (10.30pm) so she gave me a tour of the place. Immediately after the entrance is a little bar and a door to a room that plays trad goth all night (it's actually quite a boring room, with most of the songs being too slow and lacklustre to bring out the people standing in the sidelines to the dancefloor.) I heard my first recognizable song of the night in this room, The Creatures' "Gecko". From there, sor_eye_ah walked me through the cinema (a freezing corridor with chairs, at the bottom of a staircase, facing a screen playing Bugs Bunny), up to the middle floor (where most people spend the whole night, and which plays EBM to a sea of weaving glow sticks.) On the third floor is where they supposedly play more industrial noise and experimental stuff but I actually didn't hear anything of the sort the few times I wandered through - it was pretty much the same type of music as the second floor, with some abstract variations. It was in the girls' third floor toilet that we spotted the night's first casualty - a pair of legs and boots stretched out on the floor, security surrounding him/her.

Back on the second floor, I found bottled_cat, kixie, denalyia, zenithed and Tom-who-turned-out-to-not-be-brasilian, sitting on one of the leather couches facing the bar. You know those American high school films where the nerd shows up to a houseparty thrown by the cool kids? It felt a bit like that when they recognised me underneath my neon dreadlocks, goggles, moon boots and PVC terminator suit. It was really good to see them and for the rest of the night we bumped into each other, discussed the club and its people, gossiped about LJ and so forth. Surreal moment of the night goes to the individual who showed up as a Star Wars stormtrooper, clearly confusing Slimelight with Torture Garden.

I forgot what it was like to be in a club filled with stick thin, pill-popping kids. It was a nice nostalgic trip, on a carriage lane I'm not used to taking. My biggest surprise of the night, however, was that you can bring your own drinks to Slimelight?!? I've never heard of such a thing, especially since the venue also sells alcohol. There was a high rate of good looking girls and not-so good looking boys (but all the girls are mentalists so it's not worth it, according to dj_alexander). I lost track of the amount of girls with their asses hanging out, which certainly shatters my pre-conception of goth girls only wearing big frilly dresses. Some of the people dancing were so thin, they practically had no energy to turn their bodies. I thought about opening a hamburger stand outside, for the early morning survivors, then changed my mind when I remembered how cruel London's winter nights can be. Once in a while, I spotted older folk like myself in the crowd, enjoying some dancing, watching this younger scene they no longer belong to, some lurking in the shadows like sharks, waiting to pounce on the first nubile 18-year-old that wandered by. My heart goes out to the ones, like myself, who still want to go out once in a while for the sheer joy of dancing, drinking and judging other people's outfits - no strings attached. It's the same in every club, every city, actually. Cursed be the day I stop enjoying night life.

Clatty Pat's - Also known as Cleopatra's, disreputable Glaswegian club to be avoided at all costs. Clatty (a glaswegian slang for dirty) is the sort of place where you can find men making love to their own reflection on the dancefloor's mirror, or covered in puke and begging for a kiss (so I hear).

Highland cattle - Mythical red cows with big horns, originally from Scotland's highlands but now found near urban areas (such as the Pollok House). Strangely reminiscent of club girls spotted at basement Darkhouse-fest Basura Blanca.

Hen - term used for any Glaswegian woman. Top Hen is the woman who organizes a hen party and who may, or may not, provide drugs afterwards.

Ned - Wee fellows that will clob you if you are wearing the wrong football T-shirt. Better not wear any blue or green when the Rangers and the Celts are playing against each other on a Bank Holiday Weekend.

Jakie - Fellows who enjoy their alcohol as well as screaming at each other on the street.

MDMA - powdery drug, the colour of brown sugar, which tastes like rat poison, to be taken in a nightclub's bathroom cubicle. A pinch is enough for smiles, but not enough to get the mojo going on the dancefloor. May cause lethargy the following day.

Blether - Chatty gossip you learn at 2 A.M., when joints are passed around and CSS is on the stereo: Paul McCartney married Heather because he liked getting her stump up his bum; Camilla Parker Bowles got drunk at her son's wedding and danced to Wham!; and David Hasselhoff said, on a phone interview to Star magazine, "you don't hassle the Hoff".

The West End - Area of Glasgow where students and the bohemian middle-class live. A ground floor apartment facing Glasgow's Botanical Gardens: the home of an academic (conveniently away for the weekend in Turkey) filled with books, paintings, mismatched furniture, dusty world music CDs, a black cat called Marley, subzero temperatures in the basement rooms, an overstuffed fridge and rarefied air that makes less than 10 hours sleep impossible.

McShite Airlines - easyJet, Ryanair and all the other craptastic airlines that have lost this customer. Better spend the extra £100 on a proper airline and deal with people trained not to be assholes.


Will Mellor, spotted yesterday wandering around Glasgow Airport, hoping someone would ask him for an autograph.

Volta - You are back home, lying in a warm bathtub, just one red candle flickering against the tiles; you have an airport CD for company; you are angry at low-cost flying, the weekend coming to an end, and your empty fridge; You are the Earth Intruders, you are the Earth Intruders...