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'why is there this difference?'
because places that play loud music and serve booze till the early hours and have a large space that can be danced in, fulfill a whole load of different functions for different people.
Clubs aren’t some single entity that should provide for once type of experience, as people on this thread seem to think. People have different relationships to music, for a start, they pretty much all presumably want to have a good time, but have very different priorities/requirements to make this happen.
simple as that.
Eg .friend of mine, a great dancer (and personally i think the only criteria for that is that you're having a good time) and personally who pretty much will only go to clubs if she’s going to want to dance, who when the mood takes her, will shimmy all night on a couple of vodka and cokes, likes to dance to words, lyrics, the rhythms of vocals, so although she does like dancing to/being exposed to new stuff, she also likes stuff where she can sing along, know what's happening with the words.
Tyrone wants to be exposed to new stuff (presumably though of a genre he's already has some familiarity, as he's picky about what 'sort' of club does it for him) Or to hear the music that makes him crazy with excitement when dancing to it. The music being challenging/surprising/ a distinctive experience seems important. But then he’s a DJ as well as a music fan, so this isn’t surprising.
Is probably quite fussed about a decent soundsystem because of this, and wants space to dance (and drink and flirt?) Is likely to end up somewhere with all the cultural baggage that goes with that, eg, a devotion to a scene that strikes outsiders as pretentiousness and can be bloody intimidating to said outsiders. But to someone for whom those priorities are familiar, comfortable, it feels like 'home'.
But dance clubs (and yeah, that is a crap generalisation, and do these points about being exclusionary/pretentious apply to indie/goth/metal/salsa clubs, for example?) can be dead accepting and joyous. Clubs where there isn’t some obvious cool look or dress code, where all ‘sorts’ of people are leaping up and down together and getting off on dancing in their own ways, on being around and enjoying the music together and singly.
Although it can be a bit annoying having people hug you and grin manically at you while leaping up and down sweatily, I don’t find it pretentious or poseurish, or intimidating.
But again, that’s probably just familiarity speaking. I have in the past, found 'dance clubs' to be full of ‘cool’ people and therefore intimidating. A lot of this is about your own headspace.
Mr. Y doesn't particularly want go go clubbing, but doesn't mind somewhere that doesn't have such a strong subcultural identity to it, somewhere that presents itslef as being about drinking, dancing to old favourites, an avowed lack of pretension, a 'laugh', somewhere that might be about the social thing of drinking and hanging out with mates, flirting etc Which again is cool if it's something that suits you, but can be equally intimidating/uncomfortable if you're unfamiliar with it.
Personally for example I tend to find places filled with people who are into copping off with someone (which in my experience tends to go more with clubs where alcohol is the primary drug and a music/scene isn't particuarly a motivating factor) really intimidating/annoying, as i'm bad at handling drunk lecherous men without punching and/or ending up stuck with ‘em all night, and immediately resentful of having to deal with this stuff when I’m trying to have a good time. So the guy (and it’s usually, but not always, a guy) who takes dancing as an entrée to flirting/grabbing is just an annoyance that’s stopping me from dancing/hanging out with friends, which are my priorities.
(which means of course, according to the law of sod that despite being no Audrey Hepburn/Chloe Sevigny [insert personal sex goddess here] , I always get the attention, I get the one guy in the entire club who’s come to a Kevin Saunderson night to cop off and is oblivious to the fantastic music and great dj’ing, except insofar as they provide a soundtrack for him to dance around me  sorry, tangenting..
So clubs that attract people who are really into the music, and dancing being a way to interact and enjoy it, suit me much better, as people are usually much more into this than checking each other out. (although I could be missing loads of action, I guess  ) Personally, haven’t found it particularly a problem at clubs where the populace are on Es, never really had that ‘grope’ syndrome outside of ‘cheesy’ clubs.
Which is pretty much the only reason I don’t do them, like quite a few of my female friends I’d love to find somewhere that played Duran Duran and Abba and Tracy Ullman and Chic without the dancefloor being an assualt course of wandering hands. It gets old pretty quickly.
The assumption that people who want to dance to things they know or that don’t seem to match their ‘good’ taste in listening music (and that’s such a stupid notion, I’m not even going to get into it.) aren't 'really' into dancing or music, is daft, and typically clubsnobbish. Maybe they just like dancing, as moriarty says or the music that presses the dancing buttons is different to the music that presses their listening buttons? Really obvious point, but music shapes the atmosphere of a place/our own moods hugely, and sometimes its fun to hang out in a different v.different club atmospheres. Maybe it’s not that much about the music, but a place to hang out?
Lots of people like clubs because they're good/easy places to have a few drinks, have a giggle about music that makes them laugh, do silly dancing, flirt with people they do and don't know. Don’t go to clubs for the incredibly stringent musical criteria, but to fling themselves about to music that makes them laugh/is familiar and therefore breeds a comfy atmosphere. Especially useful if you’re not that used to clubs, makes the whole thing much more ‘your’ space to hear music you recognise.
Conversely the assumption that people who are really into particular scenes are all really pretentious is equally reactionary and dim. Why does being passionate about music and dancing make one pretentious or exclusionary in itself?
Diff’rent strokes, people, is it that hard to understand?
jees. spot the girl stuck at home with flu on a saturday night. |
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