DIRTY SLUT @ SOUND SUMMIT - The Story
The next Dirty Slut appearance really set the level of something we all wanted to be able to recreate for further shows. A rare opportunity to showcase the concept, the gig came about through two good friends of mine, promoters for whom I had done a bunch of gigs both as Dan Coy and Ju Ju, when they took on organising the big end of festival showcase gig at the Newcastle Sound Summit in late 2002. Sound summit is an annual conference held in Newcastle every year under the 'This is not art' banner, which also includes, at the same time, Electrofringe, the young writers festival and a bunch of other interesting national arts forums. For a week all of newcastle is crawling with artists, promoters, Dj's, label people, etc... attending a staggering array of workshops, lectures, gigs, performances, exhibitions etc...
Stupidly, the date of this festival clashes (every year - any-one figure this one out yet?) with the wonderful Bellingen festival, so up until 2002 i had always been booked for Bello and had, infuriatingly, been unable to attend. This year, however, owing to a schism in the Bello crew, the promoters who I had always worked with up there, Pauline and Kite, were not involved, and instead chose to become involved in Sound Summit by organising what was to be called 'Hard-Ware-House' - the main big, end-of-festival warehouse party and showcase for a bunch of the internationals as well as a lucky few of the locals. Despite having never seen a show and having only a few (well two) official gigs under my belt, I made a pitch to Pauline and Kite about the show which they liked, and as a result I was booked for the gig. Prime time, 1:00am, in amidst all the internationals, in a huge beautiful old Newcastle Warehouse with a monster sound system and with full access to the three massive Video screens set up for the headlining international Video artists - XXXXXXXXX. Nice.
I would like to point out here, that the Dirty Slut show at this gig, and it's resulting infamy, would never have gone ahead had it not been for the vision and faith demonstrated by Pauline and Kite. The remaining internationals on the bill received a luke-warm response on the night, and, in my eyes, this was a case in point of the small minded snobbery that decries anything local to be lesser than some international act. I remain interested to see whether I will be asked to contribute anything to the next Sound Summit. I was one of the few locals that P and K had the authority to book, most of the remaining acts being having to be included as a result of being 'internationals' according to the Sound Summit organising folks. The timeslot Pauline and Kite set for me was hotly contested by the Sound Summit people, and it was only their dogged persistence that enabled the show to go ahead in the format it did. This particular aspect of the experience left something of a bitter aftertaste in my mouth. On the other hand it was nice hearing from some of the internationals ‘Who was that guy? He completely upstaged us!’
So. Anatomy of a gig:
Considerably worried about my shape considering the somewhat revealing nature of the Slut outfit - I got fit for this one. I was working at Fairlight at the time and living in Goulburn street and loving it. A wonderful full and inspiring time of my life. Michaela, the flatmate who later turned completely bizarre and I fell out with, was a total fitness fanatic and part time personal trainer. Under her guidance, and for a two month period before the gig, I began a training regime that included daily runs, typically from Goulburn St down to Hyde Park, then through the Domain and down to the Opera house and back again, before an hour or two of programming and pre-production in my bedroom accompanied by a low-carb diet and surreptitious weights, push ups and sit-ups in my bedroom. The rigid physical regime was wonderful for the pre-production of this gig. Accompanied by my new found (and short lived) experiment with celibacy (ironic I know) I am convinced it was this that gave me the energy levels i needed to maintain this degree of focus for this period as well as hold down a demanding full time job.
During this time Georgina and Sumu were working on the video component for the gig and cutting up footage and making stuff. On the night we would have a monster Video system to play with and we wanted to really brand the show with the Dirty Slut identity. Georgina also worked hard on getting ready the little radio transmitting spy cameras that the girls would wear, to be live vision-mixed in with the pre-prepared footage and the tethered camera on stage. Meanwhile, as the jams developed and the set took shape, the girls had meetings and we discussed the strategies and activities to take place on and around stage as the 'Dirty Girls' did their thing.
Originally it was intended to include a few other Slut outings whilst in Newcastle, even suggestions of going and bum rushing some hapless and boring laptop musician's show with the aid of the girls and really stirring up the Australian electronica intelligentsia, or perhaps presenting a full hardcore Dirty Slut sex action show announced to a few locals at an RSL, but these were not to transpire (probably a good thing.... maybe next time).
So for two months I trained, and programmed, planned, and organised this gig. Even in Newcastle on the morning of the gig, I went for a nice long run on the beach to clear my head. Focus. Focus.
The crew all travelled up more or less independently and we slowly congregated over about 48 hours in the Hotel suite booked for us by Georgina (and costing me a fortune), who was to prove herself (again) as a powerhouse of organisational and logistic effort. The Bug records crew were in the suite directly opposite us and the whole hotel was filled with the faces of the Australian (and indeed some of the international) Electronica scene. It was a great vibe and the opportunity for endless catching up chats, chance meetings and late night hotel room decadence.
On the Afternoon of the gig, crisp and sunny, Georgina, Sumu and I walked down to the warehouse to reccy the venue. A wonderful feeling, walking anonymously into the back of a huge and activity packed space, lighting being rigged, techs bustling and that slow, but purposeful gait that crew and organisers get working over long periods on big events, and knowing that in 10 hours or so your going to slamming this place away to a crowd of frenzied punters. The tingles.
The Space was cavernous and the stage way up high, with a little separate area down the front, as requested, for the girls to interact with the crowd. We dug up an old pulpit from the backstage and set up the sampler on it, festooned with plastic roses, as fitting structure for a manic cross-dressing preacher of decadence.
Once this was done and all the Lighting and tech cues and issues discussed we withdrew to the hotel. Again, a wonderful pre-show bustle as everyone donned stockings and make-up for prepared for the first round of engagement with Newcastle. Here we go...
We had booked a limousine for the early evening, around 7:00 o’clock, just after dark, and once the signal came up from the hotel lobby that the limo had arrived, The Slut, in all the finery, stepped into the hotel corridor with the girls in tow, hit the lift and stepped out into the bland and generic lobby. The slack jawed and astonished look from the Hotel Clerk gave us an early impression of what the response of the locals was going to be like.
Then outside to the footpath, The two ‘Dirty Bike Girls’ girls getting their matching black Yamahas roaring and spluttering. Whoops from High up on the Hotel balconies, and a leisurely stroll past the windows of the Hotel restaurant resplendent with astonished looks from happy Newcastle families at their Saturday night dinner before climbing into the Limo with the remainder of the girls. Ben (from Bug records) was up front next to the driver ensuring the Stereo was pumping the Slut jams into the cabin and we had John, an SBS producer, gathering footage also in the back with us. Champagne all round, the adrenalin of Pounding techno Jams shaking the darkened windows and then off to cruise through the streets of Newcastle.
Next followed a series of hilarious interactions with your typical Newcastle-on-a-Saturday-night scenes. The matching bikes with the girls in their hotty outfits rode behind and then, every stop, revved their engines and entertained the locals whilst the Limo purred and stopped here and there. We made very public appearances in front of a major liquor store on the main drag, where the Slut got out, wandered around the street for a moment, surrounded by the ducking and weaving security guard-like dirty girls before ducking in and demanding ‘Champagne, Champagne’ of the astonished young boofy sales clerks. The girls seeing to all the details involved of the actual transactions. Then on to the local porn shop in order to pick up some girly mags, much to the delight of a couple of middle aged women giggling behind the racks.
Then to the top of the hill overlooking the bay for a little breather and to sip champagne and look out over the lights of the ships coming in to load coal from Newcastle harbour whilst our friendly limo driver engaged us with interesting trivia about his lovely city.
An hour passed all too quickly (although not quickly enough for the poor girls on bikes who were being assailed by a varying mixture of occasional light showers, freezing cold in their tight little outfits and often over-enthusiastic attentions from the locals). We headed back to the hotel to relax, relishing the chance to sit down to a nourishing wholesome meal, the whole crew taking the time to engage and prepare for the real show ahead of us.
At 11:30 we reconvened and by 12:30 we were ready to go again. Again, the limo pulled up, this time with the girls on bikes in front, and we headed at a slow and stately pace the few blocks down to the Warehouse, by now shaking with the force of the sound system and the 1500 or so punters inside. As organised previously, we pulled up out front with the bikes facing the Huge Roller door at either end of the limo, which was parked parallel to the front of the building to allow a clean and public emergence from the limo to the door of the venue. For some minutes, the limo sat, throbbing of the footpath, with, behind the scenes, the usual chaotic and harried mobile conversations. We sat, anxiously in the back of the limo whilst the logistics of the beginning of the show were set into motion and then, finally, the signal. The roller doors groaned upwards revealing the party dwellers inside, who turned in surprise as the sound system in the venue went quiet and the unexpected apparition of the Slut emerging from the vibrating limo and with roaring motorbikes on either side, the dirty girls pushing people out of the way, strode into the middle of the throng.
Hilarity and Chaos. The walk-in music wasn’t playing as planned and so in the startling silence we improvised a stroll through the crowd ending up on the smaller stage where the girls took position before I lurched up onto the top stage and ground the sampler into distorted frenzied moans before launching into the banging kick drums of the first jam. Simultaneously the huge video screens behind flared into life with the Dirty Slut logo and then cutting between prepared footage and that of the girls in the crowd, as seen through the strapped on spy cameras, as they begin hauling people on stage, fingerprinting them, convincing them to undress, before pushing them back off stage – all in the aim of finding the ‘sexual deviant’ who will be taken up at the end of the set and ‘indoctrinated’ before being dragged off stage with the crew at the end of the show. What follows is of course, history. You either were there or you weren’t, but hopefully this particular little moment occupies a special place in your memories too. Either way, click on the links below for some photos and other paraphernalia from the Newcastle gig.
And as the Slut says, keep on Banging.
