re – like… retracing, again…
more like trying to re-establish…
it is funny – not too long ago i have revisited amsterdam, again. a city that has been
important in my life quite some years back – mostly due to gj, but then it was a good time for amsterdam, before the rise of berlin, when its easyness was at its peak, attracting all the interesting freaks and was definitly leading gay city…
and fast forward to 2009 – still beautiful – and sparkling. still a unique city, no doubt. but then it also has become such a european city, somehow gone the opposite way of johannesburg. gentrified, prettified and rather slick. it is strange how in that hard competition between cities all of them pretend to market their unique character, but just become more and more alike. forgetting in all the marketing frenzy that a city should may be first a place to live for its inhabitants?
but then it is silly to complain – i had long walks, was very happy to see gj doing very well ideed, d still going strong (but then i expect that from him) and finding – a new friend.. yes, it is not the city anymore where one goes alone with a suitcase full of party- and fetishgear. now it seems more a city for couples… long stroll along the grachten and all that…
it was just funny revisiting the old physical places – being amused about the smoking ban, and then visiting again argos, the remnants of a once flourishing harder gay scene, now sanitized, smoke free, well lit, not even the pinball machine is there anymore, but a big screen showing the obligatory porn irritatingly pretending to show hot hard sex. it brought memories back when it was dark, and smoky, and mysterious – but then i did change, too… what is just funny is that with smoke disappearing in most bars there are now slot machines – huh? slot machines? still don’t get it…
it was interesting since it suddenly seemed such a distance, giving many opportunities to remember… many days and especially many nights – but then i might not remember, eeer, everything. and maybe it is the ideal city to muse about the need for the gay community / communities to reinvent itself… but then this not necessarly city-specific, since i just have been at a fetish party in that other neat and slick european city, and i wonder when that scen became so aggressivly conservative in all aspects.. and all thsi ahas also been an occasion to ask oneself where one goes – and maybe first: how did i get here? yes, its’ always true that one hopes to travel and therfore to get away, but is thrown back even harder onto oneself.
what i find especially interesting is the that – and that introduces re. back into my musings: re: like re-surrection. yes, mister malenka started again the back in the days famous roxy hard nights. and so we can end my little musings with a musical trip back some years, when house music was still young…
so – below some rips of old cuts of the first series of roxy hard parties… enjoy!
roxy hard – amsterdam – the garden party – june 16 1992
roxy hard – amsterdam – some time some place – 1992
not sweating yet 