London is a mad, bad place to be living. Expensive, dirty & dangerous. So no-one was that surprised when it failed to make it into Monocle’s top 20 cities list a couple of months ago.
But from time to time you happen upon something that reminds you why you persevere. She’s that girl you’ve been with for years now, she’s bad for you and you talk shit about her to all your friends, but then she goes and does that trick which completely surprises you…you’re not sure if you like it but boy do you feel alive.
Ahem. So on Wednesday night a hack friend of mine invited me to a record launch at Madame JoJos in Soho. It’s been a good five years since I set foot inside this old strip club so I thought why not. It’s Christmas and hacks are always fun to drink as they’re all alcoholics. They’re also liars by trade so ‘free booze’ meant 16 quid for a bottle of wine and while you’ve got your wallet out I’ll have 2 quid for the cloakroom. Cheers.
She was running late, nervous no doubt, so I settled down to watch the first band. They had a really beautiful double bass. That’s the best I can come up with.
So of course I sat next to the swingers. Lovely people no doubt but she was hot and chatty while he was quiet and eerie….bad combo. And they’re into fetish nights. And then the penny drops…everyone here is into fetish nights…this is a fetish night. They start using the word newbie and telling me I’ll be ok, I just need to work on my outfit. Next time I should wear jodhpurs and a frilly shirt - apparently Mr. Darcy is so hot right now on the London fetish scene. Copped. Half an hour later I’m starting to get chippy, too much red wine and I’m asking them about their predilections – pissing, whips or something new that I’ve never even heard of.
And then something wonderful happens. The hack turns up, the main act takes to the stage and I realise that, after ten years, I still don’t know dick about London. It’s like you’ve discovered your girlfriend used to be a trapeze artist. Musically Kiria wasn’t bad, not great, but not bad. But her backing dancers were superb. And just when things couldn’t get weirder my new fetish friend points out that one of them is one-legged. I’m in love.
I’m not sure Tyler Brule and his chums used ‘Fetish & Burlesque’ as one of their Top City criteria but if they had I’m sure London would have marched up to Munich, grabbed her by her nipple rings, beat her into submission and then triumphantly pissed all over her.
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