“This so-called community will not rescue you from a k-hole.”
I hate clubbing in Brooklyn, raving in general, and electronic dance music of all kinds.
A few weekends ago, I stumbled into a nightclub in Brooklyn where I’ve spent a fair amount of my twenties. It’s one of those places that is not technically a warehouse but is designed to look like one, even though it is in a very nice, expensive neighborhood and where, immediately upon entry, your senses are overloaded with fog, strobe lights, techno beep boops, and the sweat and body odor of gay men for some of whom the musk is actually a turn-on. To be honest, I’d had a couple of glasses of wine and also a martini and a shot of tequila, but my immediate response was one of deep despair. I started crying. Bawling, actually. Squealing, to my poor friends in tow something that has become increasingly clear to me lately: “I hate this, I hate this, I hate this,” and by this I meant clubbing in Brooklyn, raving in general, and electronic dance music of all kinds –– so pretty much everything that defines what nightlife means in this city nowadays.
Nowadays! Have you ever been there? It’s another faux warehouse out in Ridgewood, which, despite the fact that it is predominately a den of sin, has the gall to pretend it is some kind of glorious community center promoting artistry and diversity and where, at the door, they force you to listen to what they call their “safer safe” spiel which, among some other more understandable things, warns you against “staring” at people “nonconsensually” on the dance floor. If this happens to you, you can just alert one of the “safe space monitors in the glowing wristbands,” who might as well be called the dance floor police (but this crowd is way too ACAB-friendly to think about it that way).
Don’t get me wrong. I’ve had my fun as a wannabe raver. I’ve stayed on the dance floor, for hours and hours and hours, until the sun comes up and the bar closes down and Nowadays starts serving up bagels and oranges to all the strung out partygoers… and then gone home and woken up in the evening to go straight back to the club for a Sunday day party. I’ve traveled to other states to rave. I even fell in love at the club with one such proponent of this lifestyle.
And now I’m fucking tired. I’m tired of putting on sensible shoes so I can last as long as my friends do. I’m tired of forsaking cute outfits for what might as well be workout gear when I go out. I’m tired of dancing to music that, to me at least, all sounds the same and which I can’t even enjoy unless I’m on a copious amount of drugs. I’m tired of paying $50 or more just to get into one of these things. Not to mention another $100 or so on said drugs, then also the $15/a pop for liquored up yerba mates and the $30 on the Uber home from some godforsaken neighborhood and the $9 on a bacon, egg, and cheese and a Perrier that, god willing, will bring me back to life. I’m tired of sleeping until noon the next day and then realizing my whole weekend has been wasted on … what? A decent workout, I guess. Most of all, and I realize this is not necessarily an original sentiment, but I’m tired of talking to or listening to other people talk about DJs. Have you ever met a crowd of more self-important, pretentious assholes? They’re always taking over the aux at the pregame or in the Uber and forcing you to listen to the same music you’re going to listen to at the club, all the while once again trying to inject some kind of greater meaning into what these “tracks” (barf) mean for the world and our identities. Can we all just talk about this culture for what it is? Being sloppy and dissociating on ketamine and occasionally, occasionally, in the process, meeting some good people and having a good time?
Speaking of DJs… I’d like to take a quick moment to talk about another scourge on this city’s young and pretty Brooklynites: the aspirational multi-hyphenate. Just because your Instagram bio says you are a DJ, an editor, a documentarian, a sculptor, a furniture designer, and a model does not mean you are any of those things. In fact, if you describe yourself with 3 or more artistic identity labels, chances are that you actually haven’t succeeded at any of them. Being delulu isn’t cool. Faking it till you make it is not impressive. That chair you designed does not look like a Donald Judd. That short film you made will never premiere at Sundance. Your Great American Novel about Dimes Square will sell no copies. You can’t be a DJ forever. AND NO ONE FOR GOD’S SAKE SHOULD EVER DESCRIBE THEMSELF AS A STORYTELLER.
Anyways…
Being forced to participate in rave culture makes me want to move to a bumfuck state where there is nothing going on during the weekends, except maybe hitting up the Waffle House and drinking out of a keg with people from high school who are all getting married. I may have a couple of drug dealers on speed dial, but at least those losers have realtors, accountants, and backyards. At least if I was partying with them, we could talk to each other. Know what else they frown upon on the Nowadays dance floor? Talking. Dancing there usually means spending the majority of the evening stuck talking to myself in my head. No fun.
To make it worse, my friends make me feel crazy for not liking any of this. I’ve taken to pathologizing myself. But I live in Brooklyn, I say! I’m queer, I say! I’m not even close to my thirties, I say! Is there something wrong with me? Am I deeply lame? Am I prude? Have I gotten old? Is this what they call a “vibe shift”? It’s not that I don’t want to drink and do drugs… but why doesn’t anyone want to come over for a house party? We can do lines on the living room floor and smoke cigarettes inside and listen to Kate Bush or something? Is that so wrong? I’ll make a cheese board! (Maybe I am lame.)
Recently, some friends told me I’m not a very good dancer. I wanted to drown myself in the puddle of sewage collecting outside the club restroom.
None of this means I don’t want to rave anymore. I just want to diversify my nights. And call this kind of nightlife for what it is: a good way to spend some weekends. Nothing less, nothing more. This so-called community will not rescue you from a k-hole. That DJ in the gas station sunglasses who thinks they look like a Balenciaga model will not save your life tonight. What’s that song by The Smiths? I’ll leave you the lyrics.
The music that they constantly play
It says nothing to me about my life
Hang the blessed DJ
—Lexi Featherston
chile where do I even begin.....this text is oozing with so much self-inflicted misery. Every third line highlights the exact steps this person took to dig themselves into this culturally ignorant, pretentious, pity hole. This rant stinks of so much misdirected apathy it's almost humorous to read; like, do they not know they're insufferable? That people are most likely avoiding them?
Short films are only good if they make it Sundance (?) DJs must be DJs ONLY and for their WHOLE LIFE or they're not "real" DJs (? I wonder who's gonna play music at their sad little cigarette house party) & don't even think about making a chair, it won't impress them! The only people thinking like this in 2024 are scourged Republican soccer dads observing the world from the passenger seat of a mini van...
$204 per outting for them to stand on the wall in their Skechers and realize that maybe the space Just Might Not Be Made For Them...I gotta print this one out and hang it "beware of ogre" style around Brooklyn bc wow!
Man, this one was a bummer, and I don't even like raves. The problem here is clearly not raves; it's that this person is forcing themselves to engage in activities they don't enjoy to fit in with "friends" they have nothing in common with. This person further tells on themselves when they decide to punch at people who identify as multiple things. Who cares? Why the cheap shots at their work/hobbies? Grow up and get some therapy. You're just making yourself look bad here.