Saturday 23 May 2009

So, my club virginity was stolen last night

I say 'stolen', like it was whisked away from me in something of a frenzied attack. Whereas, in fact, I voluntarily walked into this club in London, apparently renowned for the large number of sexual assaults that occur there, and is under threat of closing down due to the above fact.

So, you walk in a fairly inconspicuous looking door, and find yourself in a well-lit vault. You walk further, and find you are not - you then have to walk about 200 metres down a corridor of vaults that have little or no lighting, and explain fairly well the above reasons for closure. You are then ushered round to the right, arriving in what I can only describe as a hippy cafe set in the vaults under London Bridge with pounding music - chairs, tables, all mismatched, and tankards with tealights.

There was an art installation to the right which had a screen projecting a set of images, which took about a minutes to scroll through, and infront of that screen were balloons filled with helium, with bits of card attached, printed on them were those short adverts that read like this, or similar: 'You were the girl with the blonde hair and pink scarf. We smiled at each other at Cockfosters tube station. I'm fairly sure you fancy me. Drink sometime?'

Other art installations included a guy who was giving people a chance to talk about their grandparents, and then writing it down, in what he called The Grandparent Archive. Oh, and offering them absinthe, as well. In another place, there was a girl being paid to lie in a coffin all night with the European Union flag draped over it, while in front of the coffin were photographic portraits of all the dictators of the last 150 years. There was a scary looking man just at the entrance to this exhibition, and I couldn't quite work out whether he was a diehard communist, or a diehard facist. So difficult to discern in a club environment.

I was overwhelmingly surprised at the drinks, where I paid only £1 for a half pint of lemonade, which, by London terms, in astonishing. Although, slight confusion when buying my first drink. The lady behind the bar had an accent, and there was loud music, so when I asked for a lemonade, she asked if I wanted vodka and lime. I didn't understand her, so just left it, and she proceeded to put vodka in. I swiftly corrected the error, and all was well. She was a little perplexed at the non-alcoholic nature of the request, but oh well.

We spent the majority of the night laughing at people who were playing with the shadows on the back projection of the aforementioned art installation. Drunk people and shadows an interesting mix, make.

So, in sum, a nice 'club', as long as you're not after dancing/pulling, and you are into bizarre art, political statements and scary underground vaults with no signal on your mobile.

6 comments:

Moonstruck said...

Sounds like a club version of Forest. Was it as overly pretentious as it sounds? I want one!

David said...

Forest is the closest comparison I can find with it, except slightly scarier. Aren't all clubs pretentious to some extent? But yes, it did have an air of 'yeah, we're a cool alternative club, 'cause we don't care that we're a cool alternative club...'

RH said...

You need to come clubbing in Mumbai. With Es. To a real club.

Moonstruck said...

All clubs pretentious? Heck no. I'd be so tempted to educate you had I the tolerance for such things, but I'm all clubbed out after the past 2 nights & the stench isn't quite scrubbed from my skin.

Phil said...

Sounds awesome, where can I find this place?

David said...

Turn right out of London Bridge station, and it's essentially right in front of you.