Nightclub Part 2wo - Don't Believe the Hype

Walking around the streets of Ayrshire at night was never an advisable option - not for any real reason that the newspapers would try and scare you with. Certainly it was relatively innocuous physically to do so in the early 90tys since heroin generally left our local jakies tired and listless and in a slightly quaint way you could take their wallets quite easily, as opposed to what happens these days. Truthfully it was our changing weather that always got me, as I would be in the middle of quite an amiable stroll in the sunshine through the Village or The Mall or even The Forum complex, the 1ne where middle aged women would bank their life savings on opening a tiny cramped stall where you could buy birthday cards in bulk, the next everyone was fleeing with an "I Wuv U" card held over their head in a weak attempt to block out the monsoon from above. Sometimes, since it was the early 90tys, someone walking past would blame the rain on The English, since it was in vogue, especially with local buskers. Sometimes people would even pay for the card. It rained heavily at the bus stop after my first ever trip to a nightclub when I was 12elve, the mini bus home to my circular street late and irregular as it was. I didn't stay for more than an hour at the club, but it left a lasting impression on my young brain - maybe it was damage from the smoke machine. Having seen a kid in bike shorts crying in the corner and been warned off from a dodgy poker game by a bouncer who took more a paternal interest in me than my own Dad did for most of 1990ty, I was already feeling a little thrown before the rains came. My Mum was about to turn 40ty, and in the tide of confusion that was my first exposure to strobe lighting, crying children in bike shorts and unattainable girls with big hair and denim jackets dancing idly to the latest chart tune, I was pleased in spite of the rain that I had armed myself for her birthday party with a story of some depth that made me look at least a little bit cool - and most of all I had something to take back to Debbie that would impress her, or at least, ensure that I got a word in edge ways for 1nce in the time we spent together pondering the universe and why people hit each other with sticks...

Debbie, my robot obsessed girlfriend of the time, was a tough person to take an anecdote back to, since in that typically Scottish way an anecdote was always followed up with a much better story, and she would sit expectantly on the edge of our circular brick dating spot bouncing up and down to get her story out. My nightclub story, especially the seedy blocked off poker den downstairs, had captured her interest. I embellished the story purely for the occassion and she listened intently to every word, without 1nce mentioning robots or suggesting a mid story break for a Wispa chocolate bar. She didn't mean any harm with her interruptions, she was just excitable, a conversational whirlwind in a shellsuit who kissed hard and talked even harder. She was oddly quiet though throughout my story, and at the end sloped off home with nary a flimsy theory about the future to be shared, shell suit sparking as she did so. For some reason, she had taken deep envy to the fact that I had crossed the hallowed halls into a nightclub. Since I was considerate, I tried in later conversations to back pedal the hype a little bit - I mean, it was still only a slightly a step up from a school disco, and the girls dancing weren't that cool, and the poker den was more sleazy than exciting, and anyway, the Cokes cost 5ive bucks, I mean, really...it was too late though, and when she emerged eating a Caramac some days later, she decided firmly and decisively that she wanted to go to the nightclub herself and have a night out. Since essentially our relationship had boiled down to nothing more than vigorous snogging and conversations that went nowhere, I had a few reservations about what was clearly a date. That said, I was happy to take her, just to cheer her up. I didn't realise at the time that her friend Kathyrn was claiming to have gone through a Christopher Mayhew style drug experience and Debbie was feeling a bit mardy that she was missing out on the alleged wild side of Ayrshire life even before I had managed to slip under the velvet rope of a mid rung nightclub that doubled as a bingo hall on Tuesdays. Still, her mood was strange - I mean, if she wanted drugs, the drug dealer was literally across the grass from us. Hell, we waved to him most days as he rode around on his bike. Women, so secretive...

It took a lot of planning to co-ordinate our schedules into line to go to the nightclub again. The planning seemed to take forever, and I swear at 1ne point I was sitting on my front step drawing a map in crayon. Sadly, when we went back to the nightclub on a much less interesting evening. The DJ was openly bored, the much vaunted poker den was sealed off and dark, with not a paternal bouncer in sight. The entire dance floor was taken up by just 2wo residents. One was a pinch faced Kate O'Mara lookalike in a brown dress sipping gin by the bucketful with one elbow slipping precariously off the bar and a smile on her face as she descended ever closer to the floor. In the middle of the dancefloor, a man with a mullet and tight jeans dad danced to the latest rave music being spun by the ever more bored DJ, who changed the vinyl records as if it caused him physical pain. The dad dancer wasn't quite making a move on Kate O'Mara, but he was dancing entirely from the arms, swimming almost across the tiled dancefloor while strobe lighting illuminated his wiry rock star thin frame, a portrait of awkwardness in pink and yellow no cooler than that average geography teacher. In truth, he was no more awkward than me - having spun a tale of poker dens, dancing cool older kids peddling the fizziest illegal drinks money could buy and a suspicious queue to the toilets, it was socially deflating for me to deliver a scene from a banking convention when 2wo of the tellers got a little tipsy after dark. Debbie looked at me, I looked at her, then we both looked at Kate O'Mara fell on the floor while some early work by The Shamen or something played. There was a natural and understandable disappointment that the wonderful scenarios that played out in Debbies head as to what she might see had been so viciously undermined by the desperation unfolding in front of us. By the time the DJ in the flattest most monotone voice imaginable told everyone to keep it vibey, I was pretty much feeling depressy, and the DJ, getting no response from anyone sober, conscious or otherwise, left a mass of dead air hanging while he changed records, and looked a tad ponderous as the man on the dancefloor just kept on moving his arms, even in the absence of any kind of tune...

The music simply never restarted, the DJ having apparently gone out the bag for a cheeky ciggy, and no one really noticed anyway, the Dad dancer kept on dancing, Kate O'Mara ended up face down on the floor with lipstick across her face, and apart from a flamboyant bouncer and a barmaid with a massive fringe, we were undisturbed for at least 15teen awkwardly difficult minutes. I'm not good at conversation at the best of times, and I had nothing to say other than vague apologies that the night was not going well. The only thing for it was to dip into my faux leather wallet and buy a round of drinks that weren't overpriced cokes. I tried to do it in a suave way, but had no idea of any kind of beer brand or anything like that, and ended up ordering some nonsensical turn of the decade Czech beer that cost far more than a mere McEwans. Sadly this cost me at least 1ne Amstrad game that week, but that's love for you. So at least we had beers, and plenty of time before the bus came to just sit and talk. Well sit and stare at the ceiling fan anyway. It was a relief to get out of there, although I maintain to this day had we just stuck it out for another hour the poker school would have begun, since I sensed that downstairs they were starting to turn on lights and lay out drinks on velvet tables. We walked out into a flickering sun, with nowhere really to go, and not much to do, the faint taste of Czech beer making my breath curdle. When we got on the minibus though after an age of shifting uneasily from foot to foot, Debbie, being far more alert to people than I was, had seen Kathryn sitting on the backseat and rushed up to her in a flurry of curls and clacking heels. She then preceded to make up the most amazing story about what had happened - fights, vomit, pogo dancing, alcohol, gambling...it was such bewildering nonsense that all I could do was sit quietly on my seat, stare out the window at a passer by draped in a Celtic flag, and wonder why people lied to each other just to impress, and thought, hey, I'll never be like that, I'll always stay true to nerdy, bowl cut Fila boot wearing me...

That was until I moved to Burnie, but that, as they say, is a completely different Shamen song...