saturday, razzmatazz
black cat, backstage
10 pm, 5 dollars
21 to drink, 18 to dance

we at razzmatazz headquarters realize that your saturday night is
positively besieged with choices. roman orgies, impromptu handball
tournaments and human pyramid-building contests abound across our
delightful city these weekends, since fine venues like dc9, the rock
and roll hotel, napoleon and the royal palace began recalibrating
their fare to match the enormously jaded palettes of our fair city.

but this saturday, might i suggest that you come to the back room of
the black cat, say around a quarter-to-ten, relax a while in the red
room, and then slowly head into the backstage. there, you will be
greeted by our courteous staff, plied with incomprehensible amounts of
liquid refreshment of the adult-beverage category, and treated to some
of the finest musical compositions known to man.

of course, my burgeoning obsession with vampire weekend will become
evident in the early hours of the evening, as will the glorious sounds
of yeasayer, friendly fires, coral sea, ra ra riot, cut off your
hands, frYars, et al, will make themselves known to all. but this
saturday, unlike every other saturday at every other venue across our
fair hamlet, you will be inundated with the vocal stylings of one
Jarvis Branson Cocker, founder of a small act called "arabacus pulp"
that passed to very little notice in the late seventies at the city
school, stradbroke road, in sheffield.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/b2/JarvisJune2005bySamWhatmore.JPG

in light of the modest but noteworthy contribution of this gentleman
to the state of pop music at the end of the 20th and beginning of the
21st century, we will play such family favorites as barry adamson's
"set the controls to the heart of the pelvis," alpha's "this is where
i came in," michael polnareff's "le roi de fourmis," the all seeing
i's "walk like a panther," as well as some miscellaneous solo work and
other beloved songs recorded under the shortened name, pulp.

towards the end of the evening, the wheels will come off. people will
dance, sing, cry, laugh, get drunk, fall down, stand up, and fall down
again. some will fall in love, and some will get beaten up, and for
others - their faith in love will remain devout. the music will get
faster and faster, the room will spin, oaths will be taken; others
forsworn. shots will be purchased, drinks lost, drunk or spilled.
alliances formed, broken, reformed, forgotten. phone numbers and
email addresses will be exchanged (along with some bodily fluids and
the occasional hopefully treatable parasite), lost, and returned;
other will be faked, stolen, borrowed or burned.

if this is not to your taste, may i heartily recommend gavin holland's
excellent "nouveau riche" party, where you are imprecated literally, to party "without inhibition or dignity," at dc9, or
jason griffenhagen's "death by sexy" concert at the rock'n'roll hotel
(with rattler, dj hey sailor, and miscellaneous shirtless scaliwags),
or a more constructive pursuit than any of the three i have
aforementioned, such as learning to speak another language or how to
extract a large army from an unwinnable war without causing
catastrophe to your own and the invaded country.

all are well worth your time; and your time is precious. spend it
wisely. as mr. cocker would no doubt say:

"are you gonna go out? or are you sitting at home eating boxes of milk
tray? watch tv on your own? aren't you the one, with your razzmatazz
and your nights on the town? and now you're going to a party, and
you're leaving on your own. well, i'm sorry, but didn't you say, that
things go better with a little bit of razzamatazz?"