Wednesday 4 July 2012

Manumission


Eldest grandson came round last, bringing with him this photo of him actually posting the card he sent to me, which I featured in a blog-post a couple of days ago.

No, I don't know why he took that picture either, but it's the sort of thing I would do, so I almost understand.  Maybe he was going to provide proof that he really did send me a card, in the event that it got lost somewhere between France and here?  I don't know, not did I ask him.  I like it, though.

The rest of the 175 photos (yes, I counted - or rather the camera counted for me) were mainly of him and his beautiful Swedish girlfriend star-jumping into a swimming pool, or eating good-looking food prepared by her parents.  The poolside pictures made me wistfully wonder why skinny-dipping seems to have gone out of fashion with young people these days.

I was up at 4.30 a.m. this morning, to take his sister and three of her friends to the airport.  Driving along with a car-full of 18 year-old girls almost made the 6.00 a.m. departure worth while, but their gratitude did - as it turns out - know bounds, and besides which they had a plane to catch.

They are going to Ibiza - as I helpfully pointed out - 25 years too late to catch the party.  All the pill-popping, all-night ravers are now about 48 years old, and running the clubs themselves.  I am told it costs £70 to get into Manumission these days, so I doubt if the girlies will do much more than stand on the outside, begging to be let in for free.  I really hope they don't let them in, but I know my girl refuses to take the ghastly amphetamines that some of her peers are fond of, and her mates look like sensible things from the outside - mind you, don't we all?

FACT:  A friend of mine was the main lighting technician for Manumission (the biggest and most famous night-club on Ibiza, in case you don't know) when it was at it's mad height, and the 'lighting' also included massive video back-drops which added to the chaos produced by the D.J.s belting out 120 beats per minute music to about 2000 water-swigging dancers, all off their tits on Ecstasy and throwing themselves around until well past dawn every night.

He came back to England with his Spanish girlfriend, and they asked if they could take some film of me, in the dark and using a powered diamond-disk stone cutter, illuminated from behind with a powerful halogen lamp.  I said yes, and that's what we did.

About a month later, about 2000 water-swilling dancers - all off their tits on Ecstasy - threw themselves around every night with a giant image of me on the wall of Manumission, belching out clouds of stone dust in the dark and looking like some creature from Hell.

It's amazing what turns some people on, eh?

13 comments:

  1. May we see the Hell-film of you, Tom?

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    1. I haven't even seen it myself, Mise. You'll have to speak to about 50,000 retired clubbers to get an idea.

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  2. Since the 70's, every time I've visited Ibiza I've headed directly for the port and taken the ferry 'Jumbo' over to Formentera. A better class of hedonistic island altogether!

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  3. Sounds great.
    A bit like the welding scene in Flashdance.

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    1. you work lives on!
      albeit in a club of drug addled , sexy looking, half dressed, young things
      how apt!

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  4. The more I read your posts the more I realize what a sheltered life I have led.

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    1. The more I read them, the more I realise that most of my youth and money I spent on drink, drugs, women and fast cars (ok, the last bit was a lie) - the rest (as George Best once said) was just frittered away.

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  5. Wow, I didn't know you were that famous Tom. Can I have your autograph?

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    1. See me by the stage door at midnight, and I'll see what I can do.

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  6. I hope you hear enough of the girls' adventures to tell us about them. I know a couple of French teenagers who visit around Europe and the US. They are very nice but oh so more cosmopolitan than any American teenagers I know. We call them the Frenchies. They love it.

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    1. They used to call me 'English' ("Hey, English!") in the USA. I won't tell you what the French called me, even if I could understand it. I get my own back - behind theirs.

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