Diary of A Wasteman: Bank Holiday

I’m charged as fuck and drinking the dregs of a warm can of Cranberry vodka. It tastes like when you put your tongue on a battery after downing half a packet of castor sugar. My girlfriend is whining about needing a piss and is too scared about getting id’d at the Wetherspoons so we both go into Nando’s. What a weird place Nando’s on a Friday night. For some reason it feels like someone has sprayed me with table cleaner as soon as I step in the door.  

When we get to the door it’s only midnight, and the bouncers are looking at punters with that weird mix of lustful eagerness and forced aloofness. They just can’t wait be be cunts but they don’t want you to know that. They look like a horrible mix of The Only Way Is Essex and bad guys from a Vin Diesel film. 

The actual night is pretty good. Corsica Studios is the kind of dark and dingy rave cave that made things like The End and Fabric so good back when I liked DJ Hazard and sweating a lot. But now they’ve realised they can take all the people who used to like going to Fabric every weekend, play some more eclectic music and suddenly no one’s embarrassed to be there anymore. It’s very reassuring somehow but I can’t put my finger on why.

Clubs like Corsica Studios always provide a reliable and well trusted mix of sweating out in to good music then chatting rubbish to all your mates in the smoking area. Vast swathes of fashionably dressed people looking confused and excitable sit in groups drinking Red Stripe and chomping away on cigarettes. Then once you’re tired of telling everyone how much you love their t-shirt, you pop back in for more boogies. This is where I come back in, just as Norwood Soul are doing a cheeky Diana Ross session. They played Love Hangover and Upside Down back to back! Take THAT DJ Hazard! 

It was so good that I sang the whole lyrics to Love Hangover. I think it was so good that I heard my girlfriend compliment someone on their dancing in that enthusiastic shouty way you do in raves. I didn’t even care though because I was too busy singing the whole of Love Hangover in that enthusiastic shouty way you do in raves. 

They were easily the best DJ’s I’ve heard in ages, banging out loads of disco classics, even if their singer just awkwardly stood outside the booth in amoungst all the punters that didn’t care about her singing in the slightest. This basically continues throughout the night, dancing till I get too sweaty and not high enough then complimenting peoples t-shirts till I get not dancey enough. 

When I get home my girlfriend suggests we buy a bottle of red wine and we drink until we pass out. It’s like being covered in warm peanut butter and rolled into a giant soft sandwich. Lovely, delicious sleep. 

Unfortunately when I wake up I feel like Oliver Reed’s ghost fighting a giant sandcastle, and my mouth is so dry I want to write several poems entitled: “I’m Sad, and Feel Quite Sandy”. Saturday gets deleted pretty quick. 

But then we come to Carnival Sunday. Oh Carnival Sunday, you crazy diamond. People seem to love Carnival like a first born child, and religiously attend every year even though really it’s bit like getting into a wrestling match with the entire population of London, in a hotboxed room, in slow motion, whilst drinking Red Stripe. and lathered in hot pepper sauce. Every girl mate I know loves to dress up all nice for carnival and then proceed to slowly unravel hours of preparation in an instant by spilling rum punch all over themselves whilst furiously twerking. 

The atmosphere is good though, and the systems are always good fun. After struggling past streets of police covered in chocolate and paint stains (???) and mothers pushing prams past piles of chicken bones, we come to the NTS Soundsystem where they have easily the best line of people including Giles Peterson and a suprise appearance from Mark Ronson. 

The music is banging, people are vibesing, and every 15 minutes someone really hench would approach my girlfriend with comically strong advances whilst usually wearing a shit pair of sunglasses. Suddenly some ‘wacky’ individual tries to steal my beer, then says “Sorry bro…I’m Ben, nice to meet you”, and instantly proceeds to climb the tree next to the system. The music stops whilst the emcee tells him to fuck off. Poor Ben, he only wanted to express his individuality through tree climbing.

The only problem really is that it finishes so early. We then are faced with the fact that we are really high and far too drunk on increasingly strong mixes of rum at 7pm. We make a mass exodus, looking for an after party that never quite materialises. I’m pretty smashed anyway though, and technically it is a Sunday, so we head back to crack on till about 3am then call it a day. 

A jolly jape was had by all.

William Wasteman