Well, the days just roll into a blur... |
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Well, the days just roll into a blur... |
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I saw Fatboy Slim on Friday and that was a weird one.
His appeared at The Warfield, an SF venue more suited to rock gigs
and basically was up on stage with two turntables DJing. It was odd
for three thousand people to be in a trad rock venue moshing to one
guy and a box of fat tunes. It's also amazing how many people didn't
know who the f**k he was. When they caught the British accent,
a lot of people asked me who he was and expressed bewilderment that
it was just one guy DJing - they expected a band. It hits home how
underground a phenomenon dance music still is here in the USA compared
to "back home". Seven year old British kids have Fatboy
Slim posters and he's rarely out of the tabloids - here he's just
another geeky Brit with a catchy beat. Halloween is a *totally* different proposition in the States, the main thing being that it's not just for the kids. Adults go for it bigtime too. San Francisco is a freakshow most days of the week but October 31st sees it all go just radio rental. So to celebrate this ancient pagan festival, we decide to take the Disco Boat into the Bay - five hours of funking house, darkside drum&bass and way too much alcohol. The boat plots a course under both the Golden Gate and Bay Bridges and around Alcatraz Island and fortunately it's a warm night and you can sit on deck and watch the fairy lights of the city twinkle in the distance. Back inside, it's rocking on the dancefloor although in all honesty it's the people that are more important than the music. Everyone, apart from a couple of squares, was dressed up. And I mean dressed up. We're not talking a funny wig and a smile, we're talking full-on costumes, many of them hand-made and all totally outrageous. Some came as film stars or superheroes, others as more obtuse American cultural figures and yet more as just plain weird people. Here are a few of my favourites: DJ Wade Hampton who came as drug-munching gonzo journalist Hunter S Thompson (from "Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas" fame) complete with cigarette holder, Stone Roses-style hat and nasty Hawaian shirt. AND he had his Samoan lawyer in tow too who of course had a briefcase full of Grade A pharmaceuticals, dishing out pills, powder and od-knows-what-else to the boggle-eyed hordes. Hampton was, you'll be interested to hear, on the tail-end of a 72-hour bender. The guy who came as a generic geeky bloke from "American Grafitti"/"Porky's"/"Revenge Of The Nerds" - think Rick Moranis (from "Little Shop of Horrors"). Anyhow, he had taped spectacles, a side parting, an awful striped shirt and pressed white shorts with the shirt hanging out of the zip. A bit hard to describe on paper but I'm sure if you saw him you'd know who I mean. A guy wrapped entirely in cellophane and wearing Bono-from-U2 style
sunglasses. I asked him who he'd come as and he replied "I'm
the man wrapped entirely in cellophane and wearing Bono-from-U2 style
sunglasses." One man as some sort of bible-bashing telly evangelist - Billy Graham esque. Pressed cream linen suit, lots of Brylcreem and the New Testament in hand. Plus a scantily clad angel on either arm... A guy from Birmingham called Felix The Dog who had taped circuit boards, electronic wires and other gizmos all over his body. He MC'ed for most of the night. A bloke who came as a web page - this is San Francisco after all. It's too hard to describe it though. A woman who was a "blood sucking record company executive". Two oxygen bottles of the red stuff taped to her back, large fangs, a mock record contract where you sign away your soul for fifteen minutes of fame and a slab of warped vinyl. Clever. A bloke as an FBI agent who had a black radio earpiece and walked around the boat suspiciously talking into a walkie talkie. I think it quite likely that he was on drugs. The more obvious film/TV stars included Steed & Ms Peel, Elvis (twice), Lolita (three times!), Elvira the Vampiress, Huggy Bear and various pimpish mack daddies. There were also loads of just plain sexy girls in rubber nurses', doctors', devils' and S&M outfits. I took particular interest in the activities of the two lesbians making out on the sofa next to me. I have resolved to actively encourage more of this sort of behaviour in the future. Back in the real world, it's not all been sunshine and roses. America is mourning Walter Payton, one of American Football's greatest ever players, who died of a rare liver disease at the age of 45. (Indulge me for a few moments here - the girdiron season only last four months.) I suspect not many of you know who he is but I remember watching him when US footie first crept onto British screens in 1983 - he led his team, the Chicago Bears, to win the Superbowl in 1985 alongside outsized team-mate and hamburger fetishist William "The Fridge" Perry. Payton was a running back - the man whose job it was to run into a wall of six-foot-six beefcakes - and broke most rushing records. To watch him was entrancing - he used to twist and turn and duck and dive his way out of tackles, conjuring up space on the playing field just when you thought he was going to get thumped. He was likened to a ballet player - they nicknamed him "Sweetness" for his graceful and elusive moves and retired his jersey, number 34, when he quit the game in 1991. There's a palpable air of shock and bewilderment about the country. Anyhows... it's off to Windsor (Ontario, Canada) on Thursday via Detroit and Chicago for a bit of techno action baby. It's all good. Kieran PS My sister emailed me from deepest India yesterday. She'd just seen the Dalai Lama. Which was nice. PPS And I've just heard that THE GREATEST ROCK BAND IN THE WORLD (ie The Cult) are seeing in the new millennium with a special show at the *Harley Davidson Hard Rock Café* in Las Vegas. Tickets might be $300 but I am sorely tempted...I kid you not. Work like you don't need the money. |
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