:: The Blurst of Times ::

:: 4.30.2007 ::

Rediscovering Punk Rock, or I’m not Afraid of Dance Clubs Anymore

So it’s a pretty basic Saturday night in my life. No obligations, no work that needs to be done, no solid plans or appointments to keep. The only thing I got is that the Mets are on and for once I have the opportunity to watch all three games of the weekend. I watched them lose Friday night, and was hoping for a win on Saturday. In such a mindset, I mosey on down to the local watering hole.

I arrive and am greeted by several friends (one of the pros of having a local watering hole). The game’s on, we chat for a bit, have a few pints, a few folks take off and pretty soon it’s just me and C, hanging out.

[Not to deviate too far: C is a friend who I know through her boyfriend, who is also a friend of mine. She also happens to be the masseuse who explained the virtues of massage to me, introducing me to her fellow masseurs, who proceeded to crush and wrench my back into a “better” shape on Friday.]

So we’re talking massage therapy, getting high, and why she’s about to leave to meet some friends at BW3’s. I decline to accompany her to BW3’s but agree to call after the game if I’m in the mood for some smoke. She departs, I return to my game.

The game drags on in a 2-2 tie for an extra pint, until the Mets blow it open with four in the twelfth. I’m heading home, decide to call C, find out she’s still at BW3’s but they are leaving soon to go to Rick’s. [Another aside: Rick’s is a college student dance club / meat market. The ultimate stereotype of when a college club is like in my mind, replete with sex for sale and fratties with money. Not my kind of place in the same way that GNC is not my kind of place: there just isn’t anything that interests me there.] I meet up at BW3’s, introductions around, we hop in the car, head down to Rick’s. There’s a line and a cover, but neither matter to us because we’re with someone in Rick’s family, so we’re all in free. We head downstairs, it’s about as sweaty and Abercrombie as I thought it would be, but I just keep to myself, enjoy my corona (to the extent that one can enjoy a corona), watch the parade of flesh, and let C and friends dance.

After the beer, C bids adieu to friends who are all about clubbing at Rick’s, and we head over to her condo. In my mind the following will happen: We’ll go inside, fire up a spliff, rock to some Massive Attack or St. Germaine for a while, and I’m home and in bed by 1. Nein.

We get to the condo, smoke, and we’re suddenly back out the door. Apparently we’re going to Oz. I was already happily on my way to “Oz” sitting on the living room rug, but now we’re off to a new dance club. I begin emphatically tossing out reasons not to go. Frankly, bottom line is I don’t enjoy dancing. I like drumming my fingers and tapping my toes, I have no problem with others dancing, it has just never been my thing. So it doubly sucks to go dancing with just one other person, so the non-dancer (me) has nothing to do while the other dances with everybody. So I’m dragging my feet the whole two blocks to get there. And as we come around the corner there’s a line. I point this out and am told not to worry. I also notice that everyone in the line is looking thuggish. Again, I am told not to worry.

We get in the line and when we get to the front, C knows all the bouncers. She talks our way in, past the cover (for her, not me) but I can’t go in with my hat. So I leave it at the door, reluctantly, tucked behind a mailbox. A quick pat down and we’re inside.

[The last aside: I am not racist. So to me, race means nothing. I am against affirmative action because I don’t believe racial quotas are the solution to socio-economic issues; I am against special prosecution for so-called “hate crimes” because I don’t believe that murderers should be held to different standards because of the color of their skin. I’m sure on some subconscious level, race has an impact on my behavior, but if there was anything I could pinpoint, it would disgust me and I would eradicate it. As I have seen behaviors in my past that force me to acknowledge these subconscious reactions, I consciously strive to never repeat them.]

For lack of a better word, this club is a rap club, as in there are people on stage rapping. Like the erstwhile Cog Factory was a punk club, I would say this is a rap club. Also, the vast vast vast majority of people in the club do not share C and my melatonin counts. In fact, after entering the doors I did not see another white male. Not that this bothers me, but there is this nagging thought that it might bother some people there, and the last thing I want is to be trouble.

We move through the lounge, C dragging me by the hand, into a different lounge area, into a third little lounge area, and finally into the dance floor, or whatever one might call the dancing, writhing area in front of the stage. With each step, I toss a little more caution to C and then into the wind. No longer am I concerned for myself, but I am concerned for this pretty drunk person I am with who is not only a friend, but the ladyfriend of a friend who is out of town. More than once the Travolta/Uma scene from Pulp Fiction enters my mind, and I have no pajama-wearing, cereal-eating dealer to turn to should things go pear-shaped in Oz. And I’m baked. Blazingly, blissfully, eloquently baked.

With one last plea for remaining stationary, I am danced through the masses and over to the other side. We get to the stage steps and thankfully, stop. C begins dancing, I am mostly standing, bopping a little and gathering my thoughts. I start to look around. Masses of people dancing, more dancing in the middle diffusing out to the edges, people up against walls, dancing, standing, talking, dry humping… Pounding base, poor lighting, unfinished ceiling, concrete floor, everybody’s rocking to the music… and it hits me. This isn’t like the Cog Factory: this is the Cog Factory. Reincarnate, at least. And just like that, I’m at ease; 100% carefree ease. I can close my eyes and compress to the beats - I feel the pulse, the movements, thousands of words, spoken and unspoken mingle with ideas in my head and beyond. I get it.

It’s a new scene, but an old scene, too. There’s the music, the cover charge, the building, the drinks, the cliques, the fashion, the dancers, the hardcores and the fringes, the who’s-in-who’s-out… It’s all there, and it’s all the same. The style is different, but the message is the same. And it’s a message I’ve already heard: respect. Respect the scene and the scene respects you. I needn’t be concerned because I was there to move within the scene, not bounce against it, and no matter what scene you find, as long as you can respect the scene, a good time will be found. I was invisible and in such a state one can be free.

So that’s what I need, that’s what I’ve been missing. I didn’t like punk because of the anti-establishment nature of it, though I certainly enjoy that aspect as well. It’s the newness of it, the novelty, crashing punk rock ideals with my own existing ideals and finding a third in the wreckage. Crashing new ideas into my own, new scenes, new issues and realities. Moving through the ether, watching and observing, absorbing that which I see as new but has played out for years if not millennia before I ever saw. This is what I’ve been missing, this freedom.

“Thank God for granting me this moment of clarity, this moment of honesty, the world can feel my truth…”
:: Freddy F. at 3:14 PM [+] ::

Comments:

Awesome post, dude. Must admit, though, that wasn't where I thought this was headed.

So is that where we're going after the ballgame?

# posted by  PL Underwood : 10:01 PM

 

Sure thought the one year anniversary would bring an update chocked full of pilleisms and insight. hmm...

# posted by  dave : 12:46 PM

 

So this had nothing to do with your post... BUT..

Happy Birthday!!! I haven't talked to you in awhile, Sorry! I hope things are going well!! I bet it is really cold up there?

I haven't talked to you since I got married. I have a new email with my new name... BreannePenrod@gmail.com. Right now both of us are laid off. So we are going to be living the dream as ski bums here in Vail to wait out the economy.. I think over five of my friends here got laid off this last month. Crazy.

Should be fun. Well, I hope yesterday was awesome. Talk to you later.

Bree

# posted by  Breanne : 12:50 PM

 

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