Current mood: YEAH....
Category: YEAH.... Music
In the summer of 1998, I found myself working in a rather shoddy nightclub called Martines.
Martines had been the only nightclub in my hometown of Eastleigh, until a new place called Charlie Parkers had opened in 1997.
It was the kind of smalltown dive most people would be troubled to work in, but I was extra annoyed to be there, because I should have been in France watching Marco Pantani win his one and only Tour De France.
My good friend Mike and I had been talking about making the trip to france throughout the year. We were going to cycle down to The Alps and watch the race, but we didn't make it because I'd spent all monies and was in no fit physical state to do a round trip of 1000 miles on a pushbike...
I was in bad physical and financial condition because I'd spent the year, until starting at Martines, at Ruskin College in Oxford doing an HnD in Economics.
Ruskin College is a 'second chance' college that was largely funded by trade unions in order to give those who had insufficient opporunity to educate to do so later in life...
It's method was a misnomer for me, because I'd had ample chances to get academic, but hadn't taken them because I didn't much fancy the idea of being taught anything and considered university to be a complete and absolute waste of time.
However in the late nineties, Ruskin was having problems filling their quota of students, and because I had a good background of protest and social conscience activity, and nothing much else to do, I got the gig...
Overall, despite it ruling out the Tour, my year at Ruskin had been a very good one.
I'd spent the vast majority of it smoking pot, drinking and then playing around with acid, inbetween which time, I'd relearnt the economic basics, seen loads of gigs and met a good few very interesting people.
In spite of this social life, or perhaps because of it, I managed to graduate with 72% and a commendation, which, due to Ruskins links, was enough to get me into Manchester College, Oxford for a full degree. But having seen plenty of how Oxford University worked, I knew it weren't the place for me, so I didn't apply and instead returned home to live for the final time to sort some money out and work out what to do next.
Working at Martines was OK, even though it clearly wasn't going to last for long.
In the mornings, I started at whatever time I liked and I worked through until the job was done.
The first task was to clear away all the glasses and bottles from the night before. I wheeled the bins to the lift, lowered it and then deposited them in the correct bottle banks.
Next it was restocking the bars.
I was basically left alone to work all day, surrounded by booze and smelly carpets.
I've had many jobs that have been far worse than that - clean jobs, with vicious and idiotic supervisors who love power more than Hitler ever did.
Anyway, the crux of this was that there was a girl working at Martines, who's name escapes me - we'll call her Clare.
I quite fancied Clare, mostly on account of her having red hair and being the best looking girl on the staff.
Clare was however clearly completely inappropriate for me in every way, if only because she had a queue of men and no obvious regard for me. But even when you know this from day 1, you often find it takes 1 demonstration and sometimes 20 to put you right off the scent of such a pointless and potentially damaging crusade.
In this case it was just the 1...
It happenned one night after we'd booted the last punters out into the night.
The TV's were on and they were showing either the Reading or Leeds festival highights on MTV, whilst we all had a wind down drink..
As usual, I was sitting in the corner, talking to no-one and occasionally looking over at Clare to try and lure her over with my eyes in a facile and fantastically ineffective way.
That was until Iggy came on, wriggling and writhing about the stage, thin muscley and sinuos and bursting with energy..
It was about the time of Iggy's Trainspotting inspired comeback - when he went from being a relative nobody, to being loved by every student in the country.
For me, it was one of the very first times, if not the first time, I ever saw Iggy perform and I was immediately enraptured
"FUCKING HELL!!! he looks in great shape for a man of his age!!!" I thought, marvelling at how a 50 year old could look so unlike a 50 year old.
It was a truly incredible sight!!
At more or less the very same moment, Clare looked at the screens and said:
"God that man looks awful!! Can you imagine looking as bad as that, at that age???"
Her retinue of sycophantic boys and girls agreed - like they knew what the fuck looked good and what didn't..
Well, what in the hell she and they were looking at I will never know??? I mean most 50 year old men are carrying more pies about thier waist than a bakers shop - their faces ruined and their eyes fading to nothing with stress and years of idiot jobs like working in Martines.
And there was Iggy gyrating and squirming his way around the stage like a ball of dangerous litten crack.
As Iggy swished and burned, I immediately and cleanly realised Clare was absolutely and completely thick, and was therefore utterly undeserving of my or anyone elses attentions...
And therein (like a flash) ended my interest....
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