Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london nights…
Jarvis Cocker hands out quality street to the crowd at the Roundhouse – bless his little cotton socks.
#MYLDNites – The Elephant’s Head
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london nights…
This couple were rocking out at the Elephants Head in Camden on Sunday night and thought they looked so great, individually and as a couple and told them so too. They were full of beans and were up dancing to everything from human league to the sex pistols to rock ‘n’ roll. It was a good ole fashioned knees up and there were lots of great characters in there too and even though Camden has changed so much over the last few years it was great to see some of the old spirit and style still surviving…
p.s bit tardy today as festive season is affecting my time keeping…normal service might be disrupted…
MYLDNites Special – The Loft Party
I did a post recently on the demise of london nightlife so I am actually pleased to be able to completely contradict what I said by using the Loft Party I went to last Sunday as a wonderful beacon of hope to show there will always be cool shit to go to in this city. The Loft Party has been going a long time but it has just taken me an awful long time to get there. It was started by the legend David Mancuso who is now sadly gone to the great disco in the sky but he has left an amazing legacy that continues on in his absence and the fact that it exists without him with the same essence and crowd is such a great testimony to what he set out to create.
This event is all about good vibes and uplifting knock your socks off disco tunes. I don’t think I have ever been in a club environment in London where there has been such a friendly and laid back attitude. This was possiby because it wasn’t in a club at all, but in a very unassuming community centre on a quiet residential street in Dalston. Like all great parties you would never have known it was there unless you knew about it.
Walking in they gave you free sweeties, there was a free cloakroom, free soft drinks and a free buffet. It was like walking into someone’s home and you were made to feel like a most welcome guest. No searches. No excessive doorman bullshit. Up till 7pm (started at 5pm) even kids were allowed in and were bouncing around to the tunes & playing with balloons. I wouldn’t have normally chosen to have the underage in this type of scenario but it just made it feel relaxed and homely. In any case they soon disappeared and the floor filled and the dancing began and it never stopped from that point on.
The Dj, Colleen Cosmo Murphy was a protege of Mancuso and he taught her the ways of the force and she now carries on his good work delivering amazing records to a joyful and highly receptive audience. Like he did before him, she does not mix, she allows each record to play till the end and the crowd normally applaud at the end of each song, which, weird at first, feels very normal by the end. You are showing your appreciation for the music rather than praising the dj. It feels in keeping with the positive vibes emanating from all sides. There was nothing but happiness all around and everyone bust their moves till the very end which was at midnight.
And the sound system is phenomenal. Like in the tradition of the great disco parties of the 70s like the Paradise Garage sound quality is everything and it was crystal clear and heavenly to the ears. Like Despacio it was power without distortion and you could chat next to speakers and not have to shout. They had apparently spent a couple of days to set up correctly and it was pretty bang on perfect. The warmth of the system and the vinyl filled the room and super smiley faces all around showed it had all been worth it.
I was talking to a guy at the end and we were both raving about it and he said he never been before to which I responded ”me neither” and I then said I was never going to miss one again to which he replied “me neither!”. Its a total no brainer. Best night I have been to in a long time and proof that the nightlife in this city cannot and will not die. The venues might close, the areas might change, the demographics might alter but there was always be life in London. No matter how hard they make it.
P.s I thought after my negative tirade on friday it was maybe important to show a positive experience that had happened amidst the doom and gloom. Life is truly mostly drudgery with occasional fleeting moments of beauty and this was definitely one of them..
#MYLDN (1033)
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
There is an undeniable air of negative gloom hanging over the U.K at the moment and it shows no signs of abating. The writing is on the wall and its screaming “Run!”. It is indeed the shadow of Brexit that looms large across the country and has put most of us into an all pervasive pessimistic mood. Its difficult to shake as nothing but more shitty news seems to arrive each and every day indicating that everything is just going to get a whole lot worse. There is a distinct absence of hope for the future and everyone is feeling insecure about their work/life situation. There are those who have already flown the coop as Brexodus is in full swing (yes I mean you Lisbon lot!) but the rest of us who can’t/won’t leave are gonna just have to wait and see how far this fuckery is going to go.
So what to do? Watch as our elected bodies flush our country down the toilet? Pretend everything is ok whilst knowing it really isn’t and with no glimmer of hope that it is ever going to be? As inflation runs away in one direction and wages are being sucked back in the opposite direction there will come a time when life becomes unsustainable. There is a tipping point and we aren’t far from it. London is already piss take expensive. It is inconceivable that prices can be jacked up higher than they already are but that looks extremely fucking likely at the rate we are going. Our housing market (both rental and sales) is already beyond broken as everyone is paying through the nose for places not technically big enough for human beings to live in. Maybe when everyone else has been forced to leave the new population of this city will be rich hobbits who will be ok living in shoe boxes masquerading as homes.
We used to be called ‘Rip Off Britain’ and that was before Brexit and now I guess we are ‘Rip Up Britain’. It is an act of wilful self-destruction, country suicide, a relentless shit show that no-one in power has the ability or the balls to circumnavigate away from disaster. All aboard the slow mo train wreck…
Even non-political chat seems to be on a downer these days as the negativity seeps its way into everything and everyone. The general air of misery and uncertainty has permeated all aspects of life and all you hear are tales of woe and horror show after horror show and no-one seems to have anything good to say whatsoever. We are all beaten down. Depressed. Despondent. How can it get more fucked up than it already is?
I have no answers, no solutions to offer, not even a witty remark to add, there is really nothing funny about Brexit at all. Its just sad. What I really want is for this to be like that series in Dallas when Bobby Ewing woke up in the shower and the whole previous series had just been a dream…and Victoria Principle is staring into my eyes telling me everything is going to be ok. When your only hope is being saved from fictional characters from an 80s soap you know you’re in deep shit.
This week’s photographs are all part of my ongoing series “r u talkin to me”…
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
ouch
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
#MYLDN (1028)
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
Its difficult not to get to this time of year, as the dying leaves, beautiful as they are as they get the life sucked out of them, scatter everywhere reminding us that another chunk of time is almost done. It is virtually impossible not find yourself reflecting on what you had hoped this 12 month period would bring and what it, in fact, actually delivered. We use these imposed time borders to instill self-appointed performance related appraisals on all aspects of our life activities..personal, professional and now even digital.
The actuality of our yearly achievements are finally forced to compete with our yearly aspirations. The fantasy crashes head on into the reality. This generally instigates a dwelling on the shortfall, the gap between these two goalposts as we all always tend to aim higher than we can reach. But failing doesn’t have to be regarded as failure. In some ways it is impossible goals which forges progress. You don’t achieve what you wanted but you get closer than you would have if you had set yourself no target in the first place. This is what has fuelled human evolution since year dot although it does seems unlikely that early man would have over-complicated their accomplishment planning quite as much as we do…
Top 5 Homo Erectus New Year’s Goals (*these are totally real btw. I have a time machine and went back to around 300,000 years ago and did an extensive survey. Lovely lot the Homo Erecti. Very down to earth *)
- Don’t get eaten
- Don’t get killed by competitors
- Don’t get ostracised by tribe and left for dead
- Don’t eat anything poisonous
- Don’t get lost in the woods and die
You might notice a bit of a theme running through the choices. Strangely orientated around avoiding being dead. My favourite phrase at the moment is “survival is victory” (which I nabbed from the Dunkirk movie poster) as its simple observation gives you the ultimate perspective. It makes a mockery of anything we create that is more complicated than that. We live in an era beyond survival. In the absence of something trying to eat us or having to forage and hunt for food (which doesn’t include going up and down a supermarket aisle looking for pesto) we have found ourselves searching for purpose and meaning because our primary drive has actually been taken away from us. And so we have been forced to make things that don’t really matter…matter.
Maybe we don’t need to constantly judge our own achievements in life or make everything performance related. Does everything have to be marks out of 10? How well did I do? Could I have done better? Do we need to approval on everything? Either self-imposed or judgement by others. Maybe by virtue of actually existing we already winners. No matter what. And that is really all you have to focus on. Everything else is just details. So instead of wishing we were this, that or the other and maybe berating ourselves for failing to achieve our imposed goals at the end of each year we can actually just be appreciative of our current and continued success at staying alive..that’s all we are really supposed to be doing. So if you are still alive, pats on the back all round I reckon…
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
We constantly create stories, concocted by the ingredients we are presented with. An abandoned object is riddled with the myriad of possibilities we can project on to it. Soon, these theories become embedded in our consciousness and over time cannot be differentiated by the facts. We are constructing our reality at every given turn. We write the screenplay of our lives, part fact, mostly fiction. The storyteller inside of us gives meaning and purpose to our existence. We need it to create sense out of the madness, to give us a sense of control even though deep down we know we have none. We are at the mercy, not of the gods, but of chaos which if could, it would laugh at our attempts to instill order. And yet our stories give us strength and, real or imagined, should not be dismissed as just a defence mechanism. We all ultimately become stories one day, must as well get to writing them now….it was a cold and dreary winters morning and I found myself unable to finish off my blog with a…
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
4am – lone white loafer loitering in the middle of the road with no apparent occupant or owner in sight yet still strangely purposeful in its demeanour.
(p.s no shoes were harmed in the making of the photograph. Not because the cab didn’t run it over. It did but shoes don’t feel pain. Just like animals apparently…but only if they live in the U.K)
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
Looks like someone had a pretty sizeable balloon party….I wouldn’t haven’t thought nitrous oxide canisters were technically recyclable but there you go…it half looks like they tried to bury them at the bottom of the bag which if so is a bit of a dum dum as its a see thru bag. Incognito factor 0 out of 10. Clearly all that ballooning has made their brains go to mush.
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
#MYLDN (1018)
Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
This week’s photographs all feature glimpses of London nightlife which I have been moaning about a lot recently in person so thought I might as well do it here too. You possibly might have noticed I haven’t been saying much recently about this city because I try to follow the basic rule of thumb that if you don’t have anything good to say don’t say anything at all. However it is quite hard for me to keep schtum indefinitely so here goes…
London nightlife has perceptively diminished over the last few of years losing pubs, bars, clubs and music venues across the board. But more importantly it has lost people. There just aren’t as many around as there used to be. The places that are still open all feel a bit quiet and these days you kinda have to chase the party. This was never the case in central London. The party was everywhere. You just had to walk out your door and you would find it. Whole areas such as Camden, Soho, Notting Hill, even Shoreditch are pale comparisons of their former selves. But no people, no party. And the people have disappeared in their droves never to return.
Its weird because sometimes I feel like I am going mad because I remember it being so different, with the streets teeming with nighttime revellers and every pub rammed most nights of the week and there was just more of a buzz everywhere but that world is no longer visible and no-one is talking about the change, no-one appears to be acknowledging the difference so you start to think…did I imagine it? Was it really like that? Maybe I’m remembering it wrong? But deep down I know everyone feels the same way but just aren’t possibly admitting it for the simple reason that no-one wants to highlight the fact they are living in a worse version of where they used to live. And maybe nightlife just isn’t as important to them as it is to me. For me that is what makes a city.
Now, please assume this is an overall feeling and includes sweeping generalisations obviously there is still tons to do in London at night and some places are packed out all the time (especially at the poncy posh end) but it does not feel like the city it was to me. It has lost its buzz. Its edge. Its coolness. The era of Cool Britannia is most definitely over and its post-brexit replacement does not have the kudos or the coolness to compete. If anything it is the polar opposite. Brexit Britain ain’t cool, its cold.
This city has been victim to the ravages of gentrification as we all know and I have spouted on about many times but the bustling nightlife has been greatly reduced by a multi-whammy effect. High rents pushed everyone out so they literally weren’t living in the city anymore which naturally curtailed their city socialising. The ones that stayed had less money so they went out less. The developers bought and tore down so many of the nightlife venues which meant that people who did want to go out had nowhere to go and all this happened just as they introduced the night tube which they completed just in time for everything to close.
Its not just property investment that has reduced the vibe of this city. People’s habits have also massively changed. The drinking culture that dominated the 20th century has been gradually subsiding and this new generation are the first to drink less than previous ones as they do not feel getting wasted is quite as cool as former gens have considered it and would rather be connected digitally than plastered in person. They also don’t really have a lot of disposable income so they don’t really have the cash to go out even if they wanted. This combination of factors has had a huge effect in reducing the numbers of 20 somethings out and about at night who were always previously the dominant age demographic.
These days people are more likely to meet people in cafes and gyms than nightlife venues. People used to queue to get into clubs and now they queue for restaurants. Or they skip the reality middle man altogether and meet on tinder or other dating sites and apps. Is this worse or just different? I don’t think getting twatted and trying to pull in a club was the pinnacle of human civilisation, far from it but it was at least more exciting than sitting on your own swiping. If online becomes the only avenue we are going to feel very isolated very quickly.
I am a nightlife lover. Always have been. Ever since I heard the song ‘Nite Klub‘ by The Specials. All I wanted to do after that was hang out in clubs and go dancing and hear loud music and hang out with people dressed up for the occasion. I find clubs exciting and fascinating and a ton of fun and it never got old for me but I am from a different era and my world is crumbling around me and a new one is being born. I really don’t want to be the guy saying it was better in my day. Its way too much of a cliche but if I am honest that is how I feel. I can’t help the feeling that the party here is a little bit over. Every dog has its day and London’s might be done. There will always be fun to be had here, you just might have to try a little harder to find it.
Epilogue: I was once in a queue waiting to get into a club night at the Coronet in Elephant & Castle which has a notoriously slow security check and we waited outside for nearly an hour to get in. Obviously I had a bit (well a lot) of a gripe about it as we waited (there was nothing else to do) and once we were inside this girl came up to me and said..”oh, you’re the disgruntled queue guy” like I was the problem for bringing it up rather than it being a problem in itself. And this is how I feel when I bemoan the issues of London nightlife these days. Scorned for flagging it up. But it actually kills me the most because I was this city’s biggest fan and it brings me no joy to highlight its failings. So I guess maybe she was right…I am the disgruntled queue guy. I might get T-shirts printed. Or at least business cards: Babycakes Romero. Disgruntled Queue Guy. Kinda catchy don’t you think?
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Me and my camera in my home town, my capital city, my london
