Well, I've found myself listening to Erasure. Now, this isn't something particularly to be proud of, but there you go, it's happened nonetheless. Of course, it's to do with a feeling, a memory, and in this case it's back in the late 80's, just before we kicked off acid house. A Saturday night down at Heaven in those days was quite the celebration, nevermind that we were in the midst of AIDS, and incidentally just about the worst period in British popular music since 1954. Being 19 and acceptably cute, I managed to stay out and party regardless of being broke. For example, I remember staying with Chris, but his girlfriend was coming over on Saturday night so I had to be out the house. No problem, I just went to Heaven and danced all night. I actually didn't go home with anyone that night, but fell asleep on the Circle Line about 7 AM. I think the most embarrassing moment was when I was fucked up on poppers and speed, amongst other things, and started chatting up this cute guy, only to realise after 10 seconds or so, that it was a reflection from a wall of mirrors. I looked around in semi-petrification, but nobody had noticed - it wasn't exactly what you'd call an observant crowd in many ways.
Heaven then was a world for me alone. I wasn't part of any gay scene, and even when I knew a few other bi's, and a few gay guys, we were in a punk world where there was neither money nor inclination amongst most of them to go to these nightclub decadent parties. It probably wasn't politically correct or something.
That's one of several negative points I can make about our scene - that they're very uptight about music. It has to be from one of the approved bands, or at least an approved genre, to be acceptable for playing in public. This is a very teenage concept, created from peer pressure, so in many ways it's an example of all the petty oppressions that anarchists are supposed to oppose. And one consequence of this peer attitude of course is that the music that's deemed acceptable is relentlessly straight. There'll be no Weather Girls in the Vrankrijk and no Marc Almond in the Binnenpret. You might get Bronski Beat once a year at a push, but only because Jimmy had such a tediously PC image.
I must admit, I thoroughly enjoyed my hedonist days. I remember going down the IT, which was Amsterdam's equivalent of Heaven, being not only in the unusual position of having enough money to buy a few beers, but also totally speeding off my tits direct from Dave's - at the time, the number one speed dealer in Amsterdam. He'd wished me a good evening, and proffered yet another swig from the bottle of Jameson's and off I'd tootled with my ill-gotten gains (and I can't remember where the money had come from. We're not talking alot here, but I probably had a geeltje in my pocket, which was rare back then). So stood in the queue to get in and pay, I noticed a line of boys around my age walking in a line in another door. They were all cute and knew where they were going, so at the spur of a monet, I tagged on the back of the line. I've read that tagging on the back of a line trick in loads of books, from Lord of the Rings on down, and never believed it would work, so wasn't expecting anything but a knockback, but I got let through. Up some stairs and down some corridors we went, and I never got a chance to talk with anyone. I think we ended in some VIP area. Frankly, I didn't hang around, and went to check out the masses., down the stairs on the dancefloor. Of course, I could have missed a night out with some boybands and Hollywood producer. But frankly, it looked more like another cheap pimped night, and that was never my scene.
A pimp once tried to sell me to a News of the World reporter, and to this day I don't know if it was to fuck me or to give an interview about the Poll Tax riots. Frankly, neither was appetising, so muttering some obscenities about Wapping, I got out of the taxi and went back to the squat.
