Archive for September, 2003

My cat has it in for me at the moment. She’s turned evil. When I returned home from my gig tonight I half expected to catch her sitting in a big black leather chair, stroking a small mouse and planning world domination whilst instructing her henchmen to do her evil bidding via satellite link.

Tonight I played the annual ‘Sleaze Ball’, a gig at a straight venue organized by the students at the W.A Academy Of Performing Arts. Most of them have names like Jeremiah, Briony and Aria-Jane, and they spend a lot of their time talking very loudly about the theatre whilst wearing a lot of knitted things and generally flouncing about. Having been a performing arts student for eight months (many moons ago) and having spent most of my time doing all of the above, I relate completely to these guys and have a huge soft spot for them.

My set started at half past twelve, so I packed all of my records at eleven, had a shower, and got dressed. When I got to the club it was packed. The theme for the night was ‘Jungle’ so the dancefloor was filled with half naked Zacharys and scantily clad Clairette-Portias, all smeared with paint, glitter and what I assumed were feathers, but may have been small pets that didn’t get out of the way in time. After the next song it was time for some shows, which generally involved lots of Melody-Anastacias and Zane-Tobias’ gyrating about to tribal techno whilst pretending to lick each others privates. I put it all down to it being a powerful statement against monolithic oppression in today’s totalitarian, consumerist society, and applauded politely.

With the shows over, it was my turn to play, and I launched into the album version of ‘Theme From S’express’ which received a great response (thanks Mark, you never fail me!) and we were away. Over the next hour I played a mixture of breaks, tribal and electro, and had a great time with the crowd, who were so fantastically responsive it made me want to run out there and hug all of them individually. Well, the attractive ones, anyway.

But then I noticed it. You couldn’t help BUT notice it.

It was really quite warm in there, and I usually sweat a lot. Being that I was quite nervous and excited, I was really beginning to heat up. I was sweating like a pig. Well to be honest several pigs. In jumpers. Laying on sunbeds. In the desert. Eating chillies. You get the picture. So with me getting so warm, my t-shirt and vest had heated up too, and they suddenly began to release an unmistakable smell. Cat pee. Lots of cat pee. It was as if my cat had saved up a weeks worth in a bucket, and poured it over my clothes while I wasn’t looking. And now my heated-upness had released it. In giant clouds.

I was suddenly the smelly kid. The one that reeked and had meatball and gravy sandwiches at recess. Oh the shame. Luckily no-one had come anywhere near me while I was playing, and the dj box was raised enough so the crowd were unaware of my sudden change in stature from superstar dj to musically inclined cat tray. The only problem was that at some stage someone was going to turn up to play after me, and they would have to stand in the confines of the dj box with me, and my newly discovered flair for fragrance.

I wasn’t sure who was next, and being such a huge event it could have been anyone, but of course, this being my life, who should turn up but the one guy I have a really hard time talking to. There’s no problem between us, he’s just hard work, and despite several gentle attempts on my part has yet to bother giving me any acknowledgement beyond a slightly annoyed look every time I open my mouth. So there he is, and there I smell. There couldn’t be a worse person for me to have to do changeover with.

The best way for me to deal with this was to keep him on one side of the box and me on the other, so I immediately feigned interest in an empty shelf to my far left and shuffled over there, nearly choking on my headphone cord in the process. He stepped towards me and asked what I had played. I stayed rooted to the spot and stretched to pick up the pile of records he needed to see. Then without moving my feet, I leaned as far back as I could whilst stretching my arms toward him and handed them over, giving myself a rather lovely looking double chin in the process. He stood in the spot I needed to occupy to play the next record and started flicking through them. “Scuse me dude!” I yelled, with a big grin on my face. He looked up to see me gesturing wildly at him, my arms flailing like the Wicked Witch of the East releasing the winged monkeys, teeth flashing and feet rooted to the spot. God knows what he thought, but it scared him enough to back away. I shuffled back over, still leaning as much as I could away from his direction and played my final record.

As soon as I had mixed it in, I unplugged my headphones and leapt back to my side of the dj box, where I packed up everything in record time, ran behind him with my cases and jumped out. Sure, he probably thought I was a total freak, but I was pretty sure that he’d entertained that concept before tonight. At least he hadn’t smelt me. I don’t mind being regarded as weird, as long as no-one refers to me as “…You know, the tall one. Gay. Reeks of piss.”

So, tragedy averted, I carefully ran around the edge of the club, away from the people, and headed straight for the front door. But of course, halfway to freedom a gorgeous muscle boy in a loincloth lunged at me, threw his arms around my waist and yelled ‘Awesome set!’ in my ear. I tried to wriggle free but I had a record case in each hand and he just grabbed me tighter. “I hear you at the Leederville all the time! Great Tunes!!” he continued, before suddenly letting go of me. He had a puzzled expression on his face.
“Um, have you..”
“I know!! I spluttered. “It’s Giorgio Armani! I can never wear it, it changes on my skin. Smells like cat piss!!”
Then I scuttled straight past him, down the stairs and out to my car.
I sped all the way home, where I’ve spent the last half hour giving myself a ‘Silkwood’ style shower scub while soaking my clothes in boiling water. Strangely enough, Pussycat is nowhere to be found..

I’m trying to look on the bright side. Out of all of the people there, only one totally hot sexy shirtless man that rubbed up against me knows that I reek of cat pee.