On Nightclubs and Clubbing

Hey Readers,

Sorry about not updating yesterday but after the two mammoth posts dealing with a rather heavy subject matter I needed some time to think about what I was going to write about next. I've decided upon the next subject worthy of my ire, nightclubs. Yes, nightclubs, those establishments that take it upon themselves to provide young people with a place to listen to terrible music, drink overpriced (and lets face it, often watered down) drinks and generally make complete idiots of themselves night after night after night. I'm sure my descriptions (and forthcoming complaints) aren't any different to many other people's but still they annoy me and I need to vent.

So, lets examine the anatomy of a typical night out for many around my age up and down the country. First you resolve either by yourself or with a group to go out. This stage of the process may take place as early as a week before the festivities, or as late as mere hours prior to going out. Then, you have to work out where to go, (this stage is more easily accomplished with early planning, which is often itself initiated with the news of a particular event or promotion.) But, in the event that a night out was a last minute idea it requires either trawling Facebook for hints as to where people are headed that night, or myriad texts/phoncealls which often result in different answers from different people, so then upon completion of this a discussion will inevitably erupt about who wants to go where and why which usually goes something like this 

"We should go here, the music tonight is always awesome" 

"Nah man, that place sucks, -blank- is way better, plus -girl I fancy- is gonna be there tonight"

Then someone else will jump in and the various virtues of certain clubs/bars and who's going to be where at any given time will be debated to a point where either the night falls apart before it's even begun, or consensus is reached.

So for the sake of argument let us assume the latter option is the outcome, great! You've decided where you're going, now what? Well you can't show up when the place opens, it'll be 'dead', you'll be sober and how boring is that? Also you'd look like twats. So... predrinks! Great idea, who's having them? One of your housemates mentions that a friend of his is having some, but you don't know him, should you go? Will it be awkward? Where is his house? Turns out it's miles away, 2 cabs in one night? Screw that, lets host some! OK then, predrinks. That's easy right? Invite a load of people round, have some drinks then go to a club, simple. So you post the event on facebook, drop some texts and make some calls, its going to be awesome! Here with have two scenarios again, scenario 1: no one or hardly anyone shows up, you try and have a good time until eventually you give up and shuffle dejectedly to the club whereupon you will meet the people who were supposedly coming to yours who will then proceed to make awkward excuses for not attending... Or 2: LOADS of people show up, even people you didn't know were coming, or... don't know at all. Do you have enough glasses for everyone? Of course you don't, and some are going to get broken! What about booze, did everyone bring some like you asked? No of course not, those 8 corona's you've got in the fridge for yourself? Grab those quick or, oh no too late, “whose had my coro...” you begin to shout but then suddenly,  there's yet more knocking at the door, Fantastic. Where's the guy that was supposed to be looking after the door? Oh he's getting on that fresher you've never seen before. Good for him, but now it looks like you're going to be door guy for the rest of the night. Now you're phone's going off, oh it's your mate, actually, weren't they supposed to be here by now? You pick up the phone, they're extremely drunk already:

“Alright maaaaate! Look where the **** is your house? Because i'm in a cab right now and we can't seem to find it...” etc. Eventually you direct them to where they need to go and venture outside to wave at them frantically when they step out the cab. Right that's that dealt with – you breathe a sigh of relief, except now, the music's changed! Someone else has put their ipod into the dock and no one knows what happened to yours. Wonderful, to top things off  someone (you) has got to get all these people out your house and into town. Which goes something like this:

“Alright who's ordered a cab? No one? OK how many people have we got? 30? What? Who's missing? OK 33 right, so who's ordering cabs? ...There's one outside already?”

So eventually everyone's accounted for and you've managed to successfully order enough cabs to ferry everyone away from your house except some people have had far too much to drink, there's no way they're getting in... ah the hell with it that's their problem not yours. Also it turns out someone your housemate invited has passed out, so now they're going to stay behind to deal with them. Right, fine whatever. So you all pile into the cabs and make your way into town, everyone seems to be having a great time and even you are starting to feel slightly less stressed now you're out the house. You arrive at the club and the cab driver calls for the fare, So who's got change?

“I've only got a tenner”

“Sorry, need to go to a cashpoint”

“I'm not going to break a twenty for a cab!”

Aaaaaaaargh Jesus! So after some rather frantic negotiations and bad drunken maths, a deal is worked out amongst the occupants and the fare is paid, or one person ponies up all the money upon promises of repayment, likely never to be acted upon. Now all that's left is to get into the club and get on with your evening, except there's a huge queue, damn, now those incessant guestlist invites on facebook don't seem half as pointless or irritating... (Who doesn't like an endless barrage of event requests clogging up their notifications box day after day after day?) And not bringing a coat because 'cloakrooms are a rip off' doesn't seem as smart as it did a few hours ago either. As it happens some of your group are already inside by virtue of having signed up to one, so now you're fragmented oh well no matter, you'll all meet up inside anyway right?

Some time later you've made it into the club, you've managed to get past the bouncers (your ID was in your wallet after all) and paid your entry. Sweet! The music is... the same as what you were listening to in your house just an hour ago but at least you can get a drink right? Except there's a ten minute wait at the bar. Oh well c'est la vie, as you're standing there however some guy stumbles and spills half a pint all over your brand new shirt, at this point he will either a) drunkenly apologise so awkwardly it takes five minutes at which point you'll have missed a free barmaid, or b) angrily demand to be brought a new drink... good luck with that. You paid £5 entry for this?

Yeah, you did, and therein lies the problem, modern clubs are in essence, a massive rip off. You go through all this enormous hassle to get to one only to be confronted with endless displays of drunken idiocy taking many forms, you'll inevitably lose many, if not all of your friends though either them paring off, going for a smoke, or simply using the bathroom (which is often an odyssey in itself), the music is usually terrible and samey (thanks to the majority of chart music being geared towards clubgoers today) you'll stick to the floor, endlessly queue for the bar, likely endure an obnoxious DJ that's too busy yelling stuff to actually concentrate on doing his job and generally have a miserable time and that's before you go home and wake up with a trashed house, a huge hangover and the bitter residual taste of tequila in your mouth.

OK so I’ll level off here, yes this is a caricature of a typical night out (although mostly written from an amalgamation of real life experiences) but be honest with yourself. How many times have you been out, had it all go smoothly and genuinely enjoyed yourself? How many times have you heard a friend talk about a club and not say 'yeah... it was a bit shit to be honest.' Sure you might stumble in and type some status about how good a night you had, but you're drunk for god's sake, you're in no state to make a rational judgement!

You're only young once, and its precious time, we should all stop wasting so much of it in such a manner. Its stupid.

Thanks for reading

Wheelchairman2