Some london nitelife shots this week from my b’n’w MYLDNites series, all taken in a variety of clubs around the city. Different music, different crowds, different vibes wherever you go. Musical tribes tend to segregate into their own worlds and stick fiercely to their chosen genres and fellow folk who are all into the same tunes and vibe. We congregate with our own and feel that we are doing it as it should be and other versions of the same thing don’t quite do it as well. And yet, everyone thinks that so we can’t all be right…
I like to move between worlds and see how everyone is doing it, not just one corner. The more scenes you see the more you realise they are much more similar than they would believe. What they all have in common are the 3 ds: drinking, dancing & drugs, the holy trinity of nitelife which exist in some combination in every place you go to. We tend to want to hang out in crowds who like the same tunes because that makes us feel we are not only right to like this version of music but that we belong. When you cannot connect with the sounds you are surrounded by, you feel like an outsider and that immediately alienates you from those around you.
Life is tribal in almost every way and nothing more than music. I have just got back from Glastonbury and this festival which has every single strain of music represented shows this better than anything. Strangely the experience for everyone is largely the same but we tend to fixate on the differences even though the similarities outweigh them. I might delve into this more next week when I post up shots from Glasto as it is a great example of how what should unite us still managed to divide us.
(p.s sorry bit late today, blame Glasto)