Pretty Lights: Inside Club Land

By Nathan Kirk

Nathan Kirk is a fish out of water drowning in the dark. A memoir of nightclub life under a glittering mirror ball sky, with every cliché dialled up to eleven. Nathan is a voyeur to the sex, drugs and violence. It’s hedonism chaperoned by danger, in an absurdist play where nothing good happens after midnight.

It’s gallows humour with a great soundtrack; Caramello Koalas, Cobain and Camus, pet sharks, abortions and baseball bats. Press play for soccer hooligans and gangsters queuing up to take a swing; drop the needle on pierced genitals, guns and doof doof till dawn. His partners are a comedy cavalcade; the vaudeville of the Mastermind, the slick moves of the Player, the vile misogyny of the Lizard and the brutal proclivities of the Hustler. Nathan’s mental demons play a starring role in this cabaret, anxiety his toxic companion, hissing insults in his ear. But Nathan sails on, a ship in the night, with an undertaker’s smile and a devil may care quip.

Beyond the booze and blow it’s a journey from wide-eyed ambition to world weary cynicism. Self-loathing his reward. A tale of compromise, lost innocence, and principles sold for fool’s gold. The lonely love the pretty lights so no-one wants the night to end. Nathan must maintain the illusion of glamour to keep the money tumbling in. There’s little redemption, just the getting of wisdom, getting hit and sometimes getting laid.

‘Pretty Lights’ turns the spotlight on a shadowy world that is shrouded in mystique and exposes the grime behind the glitz. It ain’t pretty.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tellwell Talent
• Release date: Aug 18, 2020
• ISBN: 9781922440266

Nathan Kirk

Nathan Kirk is a Sydney native who studied literature for a moment before swapping his allegiance to the dollar. He sold advertising badly, didn’t sell real estate at all and once owned a seafood business called “Prawnography.” He has spent most of his life lost in the dark world of nightclubs but saw the light and kissed decadence goodbye. He now splits his time between his beloved inner city and the tranquillity of the beach, with a girlfriend who could do better and a cavoodle who doesn’t know any better.

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This is an IndieMosh book

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Copyright 2020 © Nathan Kirk

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Disclaimer

All characters appearing in this work are fictional. Any resemblance to persons living, dead, corrupt or high are purely coincidental. If you see yourself in these pages, it is a sign of your wishful narcissism because I have no idea who you are. If you persist in seeing yourself in this narrative, I can only extend my sincere commiseration to you for your life choices. There are plenty of parts I wish I wasn't in too.

I should warn you that this book also contains graphic depictions of sex, violence, corruption, stupidity and poor taste. Often at the same time. I wish someone had warned me.

The youth gets together his materials to build a bridge to the moon and at length the middle-aged man concludes to build a woodshed with them.

Henry David Thoreau

For T & S

the odd couple

sunday 1.55am attic nightclub

It stares at me impassively, without judgement. A bad actor amidst the smoke and laser lights; hanging with casual arrogance against well-worn jeans. Flesh on denim. A particularly tasteless cut of meat.

The Brad Pitt of cocks, shouts its owner, struggling to be heard over a banging house tune.

He is a gangster of fearsome repute, and has just taken a piss against our mosaic tiled bar.

I pry my shoes off sticky carpet and squint at the dribbling phallus before shouting back; It looks more like Walter Matthau.

But there is a fate worse than cock.

A glassy is knee-deep in puke, cleaning the urinal; one toilet bowl is cracked and overflowing, blocked with broken glass, dunny paper and faeces. Empty ‘baggies’ litter the floor. No flashing lights in here.

Cock Pitt and his co-pilot saunter into the toilet, and the glassy asks if they can wait until he’s finished cleaning.

No dramas, buddy, says the gangster, as he whips out Brad and pisses all over the kid’s head.

The glassy’s noisy protests are silenced by a quiet fist, and he is left face down in the yellow prick’s road.

We aren’t in Kansas now, we’re in Kabul.

I deal with this outrage like any responsible employer would. The glassy is hidden, lest he be smashed (again) for disrespecting the actor’s work, and an air of belligerence dissuades me from mention­ing the riot act.

I need the ‘Eye of the Tiger’ but I have the nerve of the poodle.

Is the kid hurt?

Yes.

Is Brad (or Walter) kicked out?

No.

Do I call the police?

Of course not.

How the fuck did I end up here?

caulfield without a cause

History is written by the winners, this story is for the rest of us.

Born in St Ives, on Sydney’s north shore, my childhood is a post­card of unbridled privilege. I can still smell the eucalyptus and the money, most of it other people’s. Kamahl was our neighbour. You haven't heard of him? Don’t worry, he hasn’t been heard of in a long time.

As children we explore bushland, build cubbies and ride bikes until sunset signals tea time. We watch Happy Days on a bulky box, play ‘bands’ on pots, pans and racquets, belting out glam rock by The Sweet and repetitive tunes from Status Quo, long before prices are down. My primary school teacher, mistakenly believing I’m smart, gives me a copy of Animal Farm.

I devour the classic, dismissing it as a story about farm animals.

Her affections turn elsewhere.

With The Angels shadow boxing on my Walkman, acne infiltrates my teenage years. The boys at my elite college torment me with nicknames like Scabby Natty and Jerk Kirk, but the crueller tag of Banana Face stings; a testament to a severe underbite; my jaw jutting out like a pergola.

I wouldn’t wish bullying on anyone, but better anyone else than me.

Being battered by the ugly stick doesn’t help my chances with the girls either.

I know nothing about sex except that I want it, but a face full of pus sees clumsy fingers spend their time alone in a single bed. Sadly, when clubland later offers gratuitous sexual opportunities, my desires are greatly extinguished by age, medication and respon­sibility.

I have my moments, but I never truly embrace the excess.

Graduating from the follies of the KISS Army to the strict Mod edict, if it isn’t British I’m not interested, wearing winter clothes in sweltering summers, a hemisphere off the pace.

The Mod’s arch enemies are the skinheads; violent bald blokes in boots and braces, born in Australia, but miraculously blessed with strong English accents.

A group of ‘bovver boyz’ visit our family home of an evening. My mother answers the door.

Half a dozen hard boiled eggs are bathed in porch light.

Is Nayfan ʼome? asks one shiny head.

I’m hiding downstairs.

Mum shoos them away. Back then even gangs respect their elders. Confusing my family’s lapsed Catholicism for Judaism they spray paint giant swastikas on our garage doors, ignoring the irony of the Pakistani fella in their troupe. Punky see, punky do.

I run into the Panzer division again, at a party some weeks later.

Unfortunately, Mum isn’t around. A large skinhead tries to head butt me while my arm is in a sling, courtesy of a rare moment of rugby bravery. Thankfully, he’s so drunk he misses the stationary target and topples to the ground. He lumbers to his feet for a second shot.

Do I take flight or fight?

I take the third of two options. I freeze.

And down goes the skinhead again, sent reeling by his own mate, who charges into the fray shouting, If anyone’s goin’ to kill ’im, it’s gonna be me.

All things considered, the broken nose he gives me is a win.

The surgeon rebuilds my face, then a pivotal moment shapes my character.

I’m at The Clash concert, Capitol Theatre 1982, when an older, well-dressed guy stands beside me at the urinal. He has the post-Mod ensemble down pat. Hush puppies, Sta-Press trousers, a vintage Brutus trim fit shirt and a perfect French cut.

He gives me a filthy look, then verbally rips me to shreds; mocking my fake button-down shirt (buttons crudely sewn on the outside), the scraggy tapered jeans, Two-Tone badge and stained op shop tie.

Mate, you’re gormless, ya don’t git it. Mod culture is ʼbout bein’ sharp and stylish, rising from tha chaff. You look like ya crawled from tha pile. You ain’t real mate.

It’s short, sharp and not particularly nasty, but to an impression­able teenager it’s a mortal blow.

I decide then and there I will always be the real thing.

A pledge I breach shamelessly over the course of my working life.

I could-a-been a contender instead of a bartender; actually, I’ve never worked in a bar, but I’ve owned a few. Captivated by the classics, I enter Sydney University to study literature, but society values the bottom line over existential truths. Friedman triumphs over Flaubert and I switch to commerce.

My father continually tells me ‘no prize for second’ and I morph into a vacuous bloke, whose ambition, (and I cringe to say it) is to make the BRW Rich List and become a ‘Master of the Universe.’ (My Bonfire of the Vanities period).

In retrospect I trash the gilt-edged opportunities my background accords me; camouflaging my failures in rebellion. Self-conscious of being a spoilt brat, I reject the family business which is presented to me on a platter. The opinions of imaginary critics make the decision; they deserve the credit, not me; but I decide to do my own thing. A noble fool to be.

But the emerald city doesn’t warm to my get-poor-quick schemes, which are either ahead of, or behind the times, and unlike cheats I never prosper, a succession of ventures flopping like a post-coital cock. Extremes dominate my life. My weight, like my moods, fluctuates wildly, I’m a rusty pendulum lurching from one imbalance to the other.

Self-doubt starts stalking me, banging on the door and leering in windows. I tell it to fuck off, but it makes itself right at home: self-doubt knows it’s come to the right place.

Maybe fair to middling is who I am?

I put all my chips on red, destination London. Any dreams of success are tightly fastened to my hit and hope mission; convince a British music retailer to set up a megastore in Moscow. It seems an obvious play today, but back then, it’s truly a new frontier.

The rank outsider believes he can win.

The Berlin Wall is falling down, and President Gorbachev has gone Glasnost; peace, love and open government. CDs are coming into vogue and the popularity of vinyl is in freefall, with record companies and retail chains caught holding a generation of vinyl stock.

But here’s the kicker: under the Communist regime, every Soviet household was issued with a basic record player. What every starving family needs in a bitter Russian winter is to spin some tunes. Sorry, no milk or mutton, but here’s the Red Army Marching Band’s greatest hits.

It’s time for the comrades to rock.

My London bound plane banks and ascends, I catch a parting glimpse of Sydney, majestic and beautiful; will I return a conquer­ing … Do you want a snort mate. The bloke sitting next to me offers his hip flask. Think Barry McKenzie in a Rabbitohs jumper. I shake my head. Don’t mind if I do, he says, taking a long swig. Once the bar opens he gives David Boon’s record a nudge.

He is unconscious by Singapore.

A day later, I walk wide-eyed down the narrow, cobbled streets of Soho, London; where The Beatles, Stones, and The Who once trod. Staring in the windows of iconic Carnaby Street boutiques, I feel a warm glow; Twiggy, Michael Caine, Ready Steady Go! The excitement makes me tingle, this is my town.

I soak up the atmosphere, spending hours in music stores. I buy a suede jacket at Brick Lane Markets, a Happy Mondays t-shirt from a street stall, and attend a gig at the legendary Marquee. The winter chill doesn’t bother me, this is England after all.

It’s the morning of the meeting in Camden, setting for Withnail and the other guy. A generation later, Amy Winehouse will party and perish here. I grind self-doubt beneath Doc Marten shoes. Forget BRW Rich Lists, this will be the prologue in the biography document­ing my global ascension.

I sit before a sandy-haired Scot, the MD of the company’s European operations; he lounges behind a desk of blonde wood. A Ramones bobble head sits next to a classic Thunderbirds collectible. He’s rocking a Soul II Soul t-shirt, Chelsea Boots and a TAG watch. There’s a photo of him smiling with The Pet Shop Boys.

He looks exactly like what he is: casually opulent.

What am I but a young chancer on the dance? I present my homely marketing plan and a framed caricature of Gorbachev and his political nemesis Boris Yeltsin fighting over a t-shirt in Red Square titled, ‘The Battle for the Empire’s New Clothes.’

He gives the picture a mild smile and asks how many million my group will contribute.

Being a few million short, the meeting is brief. A sliding door mo­ment is slammed shut. Self-doubt slaps me down and laughs in my face.

This is my most majestic failure yet.

I’m a sad case in a deep funk, and I hit the nearest boozer to down a few Jack Daniels. The barman casually informs me the Marquee I visited is a new venue, trading on the cachet of its long-gone namesake. When I emerge it’s dark and the cold stings my face.

I retire to a West End theatre to stew.

It’s Chekhov and I’m sitting in the fourth row. Vanessa Redgrave is delivering a spot-lit soliloquy. Self-doubt is now assaulted by a new intruder.

Panic introduces itself like a stampede. All hooves and horns.

Gasping for air, my heart smashes my chest, sweat gushes, and I desperately need to piss.

I must get out.

Now!

Trembling and frantic, I struggle to my feet; angry shadows hiss and jeer at a whisper. I struggle to escape, knocking drinks into laps. The whispers become shouts as eyes move from stage to me. The sanctity of Redgrave’s regal tone is fractured, her concentration broken. She turns from her stage mark.

Her death stare impales me.

Stuff Vanessa Redgrave, at least I haven’t fucked the second worst James Bond in history.

Daggers pierce my bladder and I run for the exit.

Ushers close the door behind me. Don’t bother returning, orders one. I sprint to the bathroom and sit in a toilet cubicle for an eternity.

It’s a shakedown; fear and confusion roughly frisk me and throw me around the toilet.

My heartbeat finally exits the Autobahn.

What the fuck just happened?

I lost control of my body. My mind a voyeur to its actions.

A Beckett quote is graffitied on the toilet door, something about a finite volume of tears; when one begins to weep another stops.

I laugh at the highbrow vandalism and start to cry.

An uneasy calm returns, but something isn’t right.

I am not alone.

Panic has taken up residence in my head and is making itself uncomfortable.

The terror lives with me for the next twenty years.

Back in Oz, I talk at breakneck speed to outrun the monster, and sleep is a rare gift. Fitted clothes pinch and scratch, so I wear oversized garments, like a scarecrow. The demons fortify their position and I’m imprisoned in my home.

Panic attacks and the anxiety they nurture ignite dormant fears and trigger new terrors, as the infected computer between my ears opens all attachments, regardless of the source.

The irrational fear is overwhelming.

I can’t breathe,

I’m going to piss myself,

I’m having a heart attack,

I’m going to throw up,

I’m going to shit myself,

I’m going to fucking die!

Why did panic choose me? A childhood trauma? A pathological fear of failure or faulty head chemistry? Who knows? Eventually depression gate-crashes my party and I’ll die if I want to.

My trigger-happy bladder can’t be trusted, so I case every public place I enter for the toilets. Cinemas, aeroplanes, business meetings and restaurants are my ‘danger zone.’ I avoid them at all costs. Pissing myself is an overwhelming fear, a dirty little secret that Dr Freud would make much of. Anxiety incinerates calories and I waste away, living in a state of dread. The demons steal my joy and rip the smile from my face.

The doctors have no idea how to fix me. In another century, a priest may have performed an exorcism; if I were female they would have burnt me at the stake.

Morbid thoughts cascade around my head long before despair becomes the new black.

and so it begins

Kicking against my mental pricks I gravitate towards the night.

There’s no brilliant vision, no epiphany and no Faustian pact. It’s no journey into a Heart of Darkness, nor a dozen shades of grey. It’s a dishwater-dull decision. I love alternative music and I desperately need a job; one where my health foibles can be concealed as edgy eccentricity.

Things change as success and cynicism corrode my arteries, but initially my heart beats true. I’m going to be a nightclub promoter.

Of course, I don’t have a nightclub.

In less deluded hands this may be considered a problem, but I see only opportunity.

This is my life under Sydney’s mirror-ball sky. It isn’t always pretty or glamorous, sometimes it’s both. Genital warts and all track marks are on display.

Clubs are lonely rooms full of stencilled smiles, worn by those who don’t want to go home; morning casts a spotlight on the carnival so people hide in the dark, where no one can see who they really are.

Everyone wants to own a club because everything you’ve heard is true. Celluloid fantasies come alive, with beats, babes and all the friends a vodka lemon lime or line can buy.

So, if you love music, drugs and adulation, never invest in a club, because you’ll lose big time.

Clubs are constantly going in or out of fashion, the tidal changes are savage, and your diamond life can unravel to a bankruptcy tune. An empty club is the most effective method of losing money, after divorce.

Nightmares hide in the dark and customers and staff will be wasted on substances, both legal and illicit. The cops scrutinise your every move, and the gangsters do whatever they want, something you have little, actually, scrap that, no control over.

It’s a blueprint for a clusterfuck.

The flipside is turbo-charged escapism. Everything and anything goes, with everyone and anyone; shallow friendships consummated over pills and powder. Violence is an integral part of this late-night landscape, harm chaperoned by hedonism, dancing in an unholy tryst.

The boys crave sex but settle for getting plastered, the girls square dance around shoes and handbags, turning on the bedroom eyes after a cocktail too many. The gold-digger is chasing a monied catch, the girl next door financial security, and every guy just wants to get lucky.

But deep down everyone hopes they’ll find a ‘keeper’; someone to take them off this less than merry-go-round.

The weekend often disappoints; but no one ever learns, with expec­ta­tions rising again by next Friday. Drenched in possibility, with a gutful of grog and a head full of pharmacy, every punter is some­where and someone they’d rather be.

My job is to maintain this illusion.

My disinterest in club debauchery renders me perfect to run them, my public persona as contrived as the masks that greet me of an evening. A smiling game face geared to maximise returns. Over time I grow contemp­tuous of the clientele, but it’s myself I loathe most of all.

My life is a red herring, the reality too good to be true; privately it is just that.

I can’t recall who I originally was but I’m someone else now.

The first rule of nightclub is to talk about it all you want.

The second rule is always respect the traditional owners of club land, the gangsters.

The third rule is never call the cops.

The last rule; keep your fists up and protect yourself at all times.

Do I love the nightlife? Not particularly, but it takes a lifetime for the love to wane.

Now, there’s the small issue of finding a nightclub in need of salvation.

The first club I check out is a ‘doof, doof’ dance establishment in the CBD. Located near the Church of Scientology and a Masonic Temple in Castlereagh Street, it really should be ‘woof, woof’, because this dive is a dog. The décor is ‘tripping.’ Fluoro graffiti covers the walls and pile-driving rave anthems assault the ear; it’s the dance equivalent of Nickelback, a never-ending version of the same song, but with a crashing backbeat.

Panic begs to leave. It isn’t always wrong.

Without drugs, this club is as palatable as dry Weetbix. The dealers are plentiful, and the bar is the senile relative ignored at family events. A barman sits behind the deserted bar in the packed club. He wears bright green earplugs and a yawn.

I wander over to the bar, Quiet night?

Typical night, he replies, filling a tray of glasses with post-mix water. The kiddies are dehydrating. He dumps the tray on the bar and sweating punters guzzle the contents. Look at this tragic, he says, pointing at a cooked patron, he’s burnt.

Bot-tull. Wat-tar, mumbles the unblinking punter, making hard work of every syllable.

The barman serves him and resumes his seat. Water: my best seller, my only seller in fact, when they aren’t drinking it for free.

This club desperately needs help, but the location and feel isn’t right.

Next stop is Hollywood; in reality, Neutral Bay on the north shore. I hate crossing the bridge, it reminds me of Catholic school days in Wahroonga. The only good things to come out of my school were Mel Gibson and the Pacific Highway. You’re clever not intelligent, Brother McNamara told me, don’t confuse the two.

This club purports to be sophisticated but it’s a bloodied abattoir. A poseur’s palace with a seven-figure fit-out, crammed with freeloaders who would attend the opening of a cupboard.

I watch a guy in a tailored suit buying Moet for the Dow Corning implants. Once the fizz is gone, they move on to a new bubble daddy. The babes are dolled up like they’re working the street (or attending the Dally M or Brownlow), lots of leg and plunging necklines. They bump and grind to the hits as aging men ogle and feel them up.

No one wants to go home to a middle-aged rump of a wife.

Cradling my overpriced Evian, I bump into an acquaintance from university. Penny is a love-seeking missile, but any suitor will be strictly means-tested. She comes from a 2 bed, 1 bath in Ryde, but Penny is a big game hunter, seeking a 5 by 3 with harbour views.

The guy I’m chatting with has cash and a Ferrari, announces Penny, the accent concussing her high-street ensemble.

I see who it is and groan, Anthony Logan was a rugby playing rower at school. A prize prick, he made my life a misery.

Hey Scabby, he shouts across the room, How you goin’ Jerky?

My chest tightens, and my throat chokes at the memory; I’m back at school getting belittled.

I turn to Penny. His trust fund got torched when Daddy did nanny and Mummy found out. Divorce sees money go nigh nighs. The Ferrari is leased, and there’s kids from previous entanglements; you won’t see a penny, Penny.

Her face screws up like a prune. Kids may be Louis Vuitton to him, but they’re dead weight to me. Next.

She arches a contemptuous brow, pockets her charm and returns to mining the gravel pit.

This club isn’t for me, it reeks of a life I hate, and I can’t afford to play here anyway.

But the next venue is on the button:

A dying club above a late-night grease trap in Pitt Street, near the Quay. The smell of greasy chips wafts across the vacant dancefloor. The club has a rich history and poor present. I’m accosted by chrome, chocolate brick and garish neon. The staff are doing shooters and the owner looks glum as ‘Groove is in the Heart’ fails to excite the smattering of punters.

I introduce myself. His name is Gio which is short for something born in Madrid. A thick-set Spaniard with Carrera sunnies and a medallion nestled in chest foliage, Gio is a disco cliché, a brunette Barry Gibb with a deeper voice.

My nerves are rattling, but I hold panic at bay. Luckily, he’s des­per­ate. Little does he know, I need this more than him.

Gio has big plans for the club, but he’ll put them on hold just to do a favour for a young bloke like me. Translation: Gio thinks he can screw me and save his hairy ass, without spending a cent.

He will take the bar proceeds, my partners and I the door money. We have the enthusiasm of passionate newbies married to a false bravado that is pure private school bluff. We stumble on the right idea at the right time; our genius is in being lucky.

I initially have three business partners. The Player, the Poet, and Panic, who rides shotgun with me.

The Player is tall and slim, British of birth and stylish by nature. Fond of sharp clothes and martial arts he’s already promoting nights at the Sando in