Event Review: Fuck Shit Let's Dance at Deco

Our second installment of FSLD matched the first in terms of numbers, though the energy was a bit different and the presence of gay boys somewhat diminished. The compensating factor was a crossover of "straights," which, along with a conversation with Baron von Luxxury on the history of disco, helped me refine my idea of what I'm trying to accomplish with this night. We also learned that we can function with great agility in the face of the, um, challenges that club promoting presents. We still have a few things to figure out about this particular space and event, but I think that's what makes throwing a monthly party an interesting experiment in party logistics and mass psychology.

First, the numbers: the clicker showed 126 when we closed out, which is nine short of the last time. There were some people I was expecting to see who didn't make it out, which would have filled in a good chunk of that. In the further game of "who are these people," we had one group of five young Asian couples show up, and during Lord Kook's set he had the rapt attention of four young women who let out with a periodic "wa-hoo!" while grooving to his set - though a rather unusual situation for him, he did seem to enjoy their enthusiasm. There were several male/female couples, including the very hip DJ Candy (Bender, Heat) and her husband Twig (artist-in-residence at Heat), and another couple that I swear were tripping tits, since I couldn't understand a damn thing they were saying to me all night (I later had reason to believe that she was the ex-propriertress of Jezebel's Joint, the club that had previously been in the Deco building, though I couldn't find anyone to confirm that). The gay guys who did show up were of a pleasingly diverse variety, though I was especially happy that the neo-tribal and punkish alternaboys were well represented. Among our scenester stars were Johnny Cocksville, who wandered the club with a crop, looking for a suitable object upon which to apply it, Dan Karasic and DJ Donimo of Lucky Pierre, and DJ6 of Lucky Pierre and Bender. I would be remiss if I didn't also mention the giant pink and green rabbit, and Superboy.

As for the challenges, they ranged from personnel problems to blown speakers. Kitty, our coat check girl, called me at 5.30 and told me he'd had to go in for a root canal during the morning and was in no shape for a long late night. I was able to find a substitute, but then when we arrived at the club it was pointed out to us that one of the main suspended floor speakers, a JBL 15, had a completely shredded cone. We all scratched our heads over how this had happened (Kiko, the security guy, said it was like that when he showed up for work on Wednesday, and the club was closed on Monday and Tuesday), since those things are pretty indestructible, but there was only one thing to do: I got in the rental car, came home, loaded up one of my own JBLs, and got back to set it up fifteen minutes before we we were supposed to open. This still left us with the tasks of setting up the downstairs and cleaning up the coat check area, but all was ready on the dot of 9.

Though we were ready to go at the appointed time, it still took a while for things to take off. At 10.30 I was wondering where the hell everybody was, but by 11.30 we had a solid dancefloor. Neonbunny played a great set of harder electro to an unfortunately mostly empty room, and when Baron von Luxxury and Johnatron came on after Lord Kook they too had moments when the dancefloor seemed to thin out. This seemed to be another big difference from the first FSLD, when the dance floor was packed the entire time, though we also had a lot more in and out traffic this time as well. I was scheduled to go on at 2.00 when the Baron and Johnatron came off, but the dance floor energy was fragile enough that I decided it needed a more confident and able guide, and turned things over to Lord Kook again.

During a smoke break outside the Baron and I had a long conversation about disco music (broadly defined), and though our tastes run in somewhat different directions, we do share an interest in the social/cultural implications of the disco experience. This, along with a conversation I had with a gentleman at the end of night at the coat check, really made me put some thought into what I would like to accomplish with this night. He seemed to be a Deco regular who decided to come check out the party; in kidding tones he said he was suprised at the way the upstairs was set up "without glory holes." He then asked me when the next Starfucker was going to be, and I told him that it was done as a regular night, but would be back for Pride (taking over our fourth Friday, in fact).

What these conversations did was make me realize that, though we don't have a lot of the features you would associate with a gay night, like go-go boys, baby oil wrestling, wet jockstrap contests, or glory holes, I am more interested in the possibility of creating a night that, by virtue of the music that was played and the energy that was put forth, had a crossover appeal that could bring all kinds of people together. Sure it's important to me that our emphasis is on "a dance party for queers and their friends," but I want the friends as much as the queers. Something I realized later was that, despite having a sign on the door that advertised the night as exactly that, there were many non-queers who came through the door and hung out anyway. To me, that epitomizes the disco spirit; something that's associated with queers, but is also about openness and respect for everybody. I know we could get more gay guys to show up if we had go-gos or some kind of performance to appeal to prurient interests, but the moment we begin to do those sorts of things, I think we'll also begin to lose that crossover crowd. It's important to me that we don't do that because I do have this idea that, if club nights are about creating culture, I want to create something that enables people to transcend the barriers that exist between us, rather than something that closes us off in an insular world.

FSLD is pretty clearly going to be a work in progress for a while; aside from the abstract philosophical issues that need to be considered, there are very practical matters as well, like how to get more people through the door before 10PM (I'm open to any suggestions you all might have in that regard), working out the timing of the DJs for the different phases of the night, and what we can do to bump everything up a notch. I think there's a lot of room for us to grow, but as long as we can keep a steady crowd coming for the next few months, I also think there's the potential to do something we can really be proud of.

Event Review: Lucky Pierre at The Stud

After two extremely busy weekends, the boyfriend and I decided to take it easy this past weekend and do something different, like go to a movie on Saturday night (The Golden Compass, mainly because the boyfriend wanted to see the talking polar bears). After the movie we did stop into Drunk and Horny for a sociable drink with Big Red, Sparky, and Gary, but our real going-out experience for the weekend was Lucky Pierre on Friday night where we found a very fun dancefloor and the boyfriend got a little adventurous playing strip poker.

It's always satisfying to see a club night that you like grow and develop; we first checked into the Lucky Pierre scene back in August on the occasion of their six month anniversary, and in the past four months it feels like the scene has definitely grown. DJ6 and Donimo continue to spin crowd-pleasing electro and indietronica (including original remixes, something you almost never hear at other clubs), and this seems to be bringing in not only a diverse and pretty cute crowd of alternaboys, but also a fair number of sexually diverse clubbers who simply seem to be looking for a good time on a Friday night.

In addition to a fun dancefloor, Lucky Pierre also offers some of the "playful" hanky-panky for which SoMa bars in general, and The Stud in particular, have been infamous for over the years. This time the boyfriend got in on a round of Artemis Chase's strip poker, and while I won't say just how far the boys stripped - I think there are some laws about that, or something - I certainly got to see a loin-stirring variety of physical proportions and attributes. It's even better when you realize that most of these guys have never played a hand of five card stud in their lives, leaving it up to Artemis to determine the winners and losers of each hand. The boyfriend didn't last very long through the poker playing, but he was extremely popular afterwards.

Lucky Pierre shows signs of only getting better with age, and it's certainly your best bet for a $5 cover on a first Friday. Keep in mind that these are also the same guys who bring you Heat on third Fridays at The Stud, and that DJ6 and friends are behind Bender on second Fridays at The Transfer. There, something to do every Friday of the month leading up to Fuck Shit, Let's Dance at Deco.

Mixes and Remixes from DJ6 and Donimo

Just found a link to Discoclique, the blog of DJ6 (Lucky Pierre, Bender, Heat) and Donimo (Lucky Pierre, Heat, Substance), where they're putting out monthly mixes and occasional remixes of their favorite electro/dance/indietronica tracks. This month's mix from Donimo is particularly pleasing for all us ex-goth types who loved us some synthy mixes back in the day, leavened with a little neu-rave and electro to keep us from feeling like fogies. Check it out, and don't forget that they'll both be spinning at Lucky Pierre at The Stud tonight.

Event Review: Lucky Pierre at The Stud

Friday night the boyfriend and I made it out to The Stud for the sixth monthly installment of Lucky Pierre, and despite my knees being blown out from a solid day of moving, toting, and arranging, the scene re-invigorated me to such a degree that I not only danced, but was able to forget for a while about transferring utilities, mollifying past and potential landlords, and pondering existential issues surrounding co-habitation with a boyfriend for the third time in my life.

We arrived around eleven and the crowd was already pretty lively; a round of strip poker was going on in the side room, in the back curtained room there were casting couch auditions for Factory Video, and Coco Chanel was everywhere doing her best to convince attendees to follow her into one room or the other. That Coco actually knew how to be a hostess, instead of just having her name under "Hosted By" on the flyer, was one of the things I enjoyed best about this night; twice she came over and talked to me, once to try and coax me onto the casting couch, the second time she handed me a dollar and told me to tip one of the dancers on stage and "smile pretty" for the cameras (more on that in a minute). As her partner in Pierre, Dan, told me, the goal of Lucky Pierre is to have a "playful sexuality," and in that regard Coco is the ideal hostess, helping the guests to feel comfortable and inspiring all sorts of naughty behavior. There are plenty of opportunities for interaction beyond the usual club standing and posing, whether it's tipping go-go boys, playing a couple hands of strip poker, or just getting out onto the dancefloor and sidling up to a cutie.

The crowd reminded me of the boys who would show up for Jeff and Gary's Reform Skool parties; more on the alterna side, more of what I've come think of as SoMa boys, though there were a few older SoMa queens around as well. We were accompanied by our friends Matt and Alex, the latter a habitue of The Lone Star and Bearacuda who was of the opinion "there are a lot of cute guys here," while I spotted a ginger-haired lad who works out at my gym and who I will now definitely be watching more closely as he uses the Roman chair. It was overall the sort of crowd that is into witty and artistic t-shirts, but who will probably take them off with very little prompting.

DJs for the night were Donimo (Substance) and DJ Six (Now Hear This) spinning indie electronica and electro. and over two hours we heard tracks from the likes of MIA, Depeche Mode, Justice, and New Young Pony Club, as well as the classic homodisco track, "You Spin Me Round (Like a Record Baby)" from Dead or Alive. The music had enough motive force to get me out onto the dancefloor after thinking I wouldn't even make it out for the evening, which is really all that needs to be said.

Lucky Pierre is definitely a scene; there are lots of camera flashes throughout the evening, and all it takes is one look at their myspace page to see that winding up in a photo or video clip is one of the highlights of the evening. Ordinarily this would bother me, but in this case I think it goes hand-in-crotch with the spirit of the evening; this is a party where anyone who shows up is a star and part of the action, rather than just certain scene kids. Next month's Lucky Pierre is Hair Do's (or Don'ts), and I'll definitely be spiking up the mohawk for it - after all, I want to look good for my close-up.