Thursday, August 14, 2008

Hold me close young Tony Danza

So I live in a country where our gold medal count is just about tied with Michael Phelps, but to be honest, I haven't watched a lot of the Olympics, for reasons outlined below (and it's not like we pay Stephanie Rice to talk or make fascinating conversation), and in a state where the Metro people think smart cards will get people using buses again, which will only happen if the smart cards drive the bus and aren't rude and ignorant to the passengers. What did happen today though was that as I walking along holding hands with a snowman (it's very cold in Hobart at the moment, just in case you thought that was dodgy code for something) I heard some people discussing the state of the charts, and saying how bad they were because everything was either a ringtone or a dance track, and they had really mean things to say about Sneaky Sound System. Now, I did briefly consider the state of dance music in this country, and wonder whatever happened to Technotronic, but all this did was make me think of my own dancing, and how bad it is - I don't think it's entire reason I no longer pick up at Syrup (my elderly age has a lot to do with it, and I have to get into the place without getting a punch in the head) but it has a lot to do with the reason I'm never dancing on the pole (there's a stripper pole in Syrup, not Artur Boruc) with a young lass at 2am. Bluntly, I can't dance, I think I can, but I can't. One of my friends once took it upon herself at Montgomeries to stop and try and teach me how to dance, but all I can do is jump around like a Masai warrior, and I'm not a picture of fitness right now so my groove thing begins to be unshook by 2am, if not earlier. To be honest, I am to dancing to what Angry Anderson at the 1991 Grand Final is to singing. I blame my Dad for my lack of rhythm, as he struggles with dancing as well, and he moves like a giant block of wood. However, I don't think, especially at Syrup, I'm especially bad or stand out. I haven't seen many great Australian male dancers, but I have seen a lot of people who think they can dance. When I was standing bewildered at Isobar next to the girl spewing in the pot plant, I saw a young white gentleman in a Chris Brown style beanie attempting the splits out of a twist and spin. He ripped his pants. It was, as you would imagine, very funny, and really took the edge of the impending death of the pot plant.

My Dad, a school teacher, not only blessed me with a lack of rhythm, but he also once when I was at school (he taught at the same school as me and was about twenty times more popular) took charge of formal dancing lessons. It was really embarrassing for thin white gentlemen dealing with issues of acne and nervousness to be confronted in a formal dancing circle with attractive girls who plainly loathed them, never mind then having to two step and pivot. I was OK with the dancing, a bit clunky, but not the worst. Dad though one day (and I'm not ashamed to say this particular day, I wasn't feeling the most confident looker in the room, so I sat out, and did some homework...what? What?) had to not only take charge of the dancing, but the music as well. Some woman teacher was there as well, and she was one of those really artistic women with the shrill voice to match, the kind of woman who just claps her hands but doesn't tell you what she wants, you know, that kind of woman. Elderly, annoying, makes beads on the weekend, has dark secrets. Anyway, she clapped her hands every time she wanted my Dad to change the record, even though he nominally was in charge of the session, which in fairness was like putting Cathy Freeman in charge of reading the news. Especially as he grappled with the happening technology of the 1920s gramophone. It amused me no end that every time the arty woman with the clapping hands requested a slow song, my Dad seemed to play the theme from Captain Pugwash or the entrance music for Koko B Ware. Hard enough for a spotty youth to look a hot blonde girl with bogan tendencies in the eye without the pressure of doing a waltz to Captain Pugwash...

My first trip to a nightclub was when I was 12, oddly enough, so I don't know what the hell kind of nightclub it was - it sounds like an incredibly dodgy one I admit, and I can't remember the name of it to be honest, but it was in downtown Ayrshire, so you can imagine that it was heaps of fun. I was having myself a fun night, even though I was acutely aware that my lack of dancing ability meant I wasn't going to score a pash (or a neck, as we called it rather less romantically and more vampirically in Ayrshire) with any girl once Eternal Flame started playing. It didn't really stop me showing some youthful enthusiasm (thanks Christi Malthouse) and really getting down to some KLF classics. At that point, I saw a kid slumped in the corner, crying. Apparently what happened was, his mate said "Hey, when we go to this nightclub tonight, why don't we all wear bike shorts!" and he believed that that was what was going to happen, except of course his mate was a complete bastard, and turned up in jeans, leaving this poor kid crying in the corner. What had really set off this flood of tears was the otherwise benign dig from an older male of "Excuse me Miss", and he collapsed from that point on. As strange as that was, what I really remember was there were two bouncers idly stopping anyone from going downstairs. Being a cheeky youth, I asked what was going on downstairs. "Poker" one of them muttered. I went to look down, and the bouncer put his hand on my shoulder and shook his head. "You don't want to grow up to be a wanker like them" he said kindly, pointing to the room downstairs. And so, like the mysterious video at the video store in Ayrshire that simply was a blue case with "XXXX" on it, that lead to endless theories (was it a snuff film? Were animals involved? Was it Cop and a Half...that killed that joke in it's day) I never did find out what was going on in that room. But luckily, I wasn't a wanker...at least, until I bought a candy heart I thought was an E...sigh...

Of course, from time to time in Australia, a local community will have themselves a family friendly style of disco called a bluelight disco (or social as we call them down here, and these were not the school discos, which were mostly the same thing, but with more teacher based lameness and Freddo Frogs) where there are positive slogans about not drinking, a patently bored band or DJ who dreamed of respectively either groupies and shredding up the pub Barnesy style or turning their frustrated bedroom scratching into club hits, and not playing Kelly Clarkson songs off their IPOD for bored twelve year olds. The blue light disco is a moment of great local pride in some communities - it was in Penguin, where they were on all the time at the local Masonic hall - as families sent their kids off to go and have their first experience with the opposite sex. Naturally, there was an awkward mix of young kids too dumb to realise they were meant to crack on to girls and not pull their hair (and girls who learned the phrase "so immature" from an early age), boys and girls who had already had their first kiss and wanted more, older kids who said the whole thing was lame despite secretly loving it, and obviously much older kids (in some cases, the organisers) who were using the whole thing as a way to trim some time off their community service, take casual drugs and have casual sex in the alley. Into this awkward mix, dancing was expected, but with who? Could you ask a girl to dance, or did you have to dance and hope to attract? Was that older kid laughing at you or was he just high on candy hearts? Was that kid dancing across from you cooler or lamer than you, and should you punch him or befriend him? Wait, if I befriend him, is that gay? Wait, in the spotlight, there's a beautiful blonde girl with bogan tendencies, hair in a tight ponytail, blue eye shadow glistening under the blue spotlight, she's amazing, I'm in love, and if I can just be cool, maybe like a member of C&C Music factory I can w...no, she's gone to one of the older boys...

And just like that, through dancing, you are introduced to real life...so you think you can dance Australia? You can't...you better get ready for the big leagues though...Syrup is waiting...

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