Friday night at Live - The Venue

It gets a 3 on the Kinsey scale. 

I had an amazing phone interview a few days ago with one of South Africa’s up-and-coming bands. These guys truly are amazing. Their music is amazing and the singer, I believe, has one of the best voices in the country. I just know these guys are going to be huge, and very soon too. My interview went wonderfully because the lead vocalist who I chatted to was an absolute treat. All too often the fame goes to the musos' heads and the band members walk around thinking they are Mr. Big Dick and they have no time for us little journalists. But not this guy: he was very polite, very sweet, and went as far as inviting me to be on his guest list for the band's gig this Friday. So of course I went – I would have gone anyway!

Saturday was my friend Chanelle’s birthday so naturally she was my plus one for Friday’s gig at Live – The Venue. Unfortunately I was a little late in meeting her at the Durban flat, so whilst I was getting my act together and driving down, she got stuck in to the Vodka. My fault really because I took so damn long. But by the time I got to her I had a lot of catching up to do, which I tried my best to do.  

By the time we got to the venue we had made best friends with our taxi driver, we sang him our favourite Zulu song, and had nearly got knocked over crossing the road, and then I nearly got electrocuted  when I walked into what I thought was a bank van, but what was actually an electricity station. Hot damn.

In the Taxi to Live.

We made our way to the bar, had a couple of drinks and reassessed our sobriety. I was ok, Chanelle remember had just polished of a bottle of vodka on her own. We decided to get meat pies. As fate would have it, we bumped into a rotti merchant at the door and he was good enough to deliver us the onioniest rottie ever. But it saved our lives. 

That face could melt the heart of a thousand warriors. 

The band started and we made our way to the front. Again I will say that this band is absolutely incredible. Their set is really tight, and let’s not forget that Live has got to be the best stage in terms of acoustics. That, combined with the voice of a baby angel and you get pure sexy magic onstage. We had a fab time.

After the set Chanelle and I went to say hello as I had promised to do. We waited patiently whilst all the lusty women and men did their usual gushing over the band. Once things had quietened down I approached a band member to introduce myself: “Hello, I am Alex with Media24. I did your interview last week. Thank you for coming so far to share your music with us”. I got a “Hello” and a grunt as he turned away from me. Yowzer! A little frosty for someone who had asked me to watch the band perform. Things got a little worse. I went to the vocalist who I had interviewed to introduce myself and left Chanelle standing with the other guy. She told me that after a while of standing next to him she said: “Hello you must be freaked out with me standing here.” “Yes I am,” he replied. So then the girl gives it here best; “It’s my birthday tomorrow – I’ll buy you a Jagermeister!” He moved away. 

I'll drink your Jagermeister!

This might sound a little silly, but if you are in a band, and you are doing well, there is a chance that you just might meet some girls who don’t actually want to fuck you. I get that there are groupies around, and in this band's defence they were being swarmed with pussay, but we were there as friends and as their guests. Yes we love you. No we don’t want you - just your music. Let this not tarnish their stellar performance and their absolute professionalism. I still think they are great, but common – it was Chanelle's birthday, let her buy you a drink for Christ’s sake!

But no, I still love you. After that we headed to Origin for another of my friend's farewell. But we ended up spending an hour at the hot dog stand instead where Chanelle got the biggest wors of her life. We ended the night on the couch watching The Banger Sisters, oddly enough, a movie about two groupies ...

Bend and snap!

4U Rage Intro - Rocca Bar Street Party

It's pure love between us! 

This weekend was probably one of the busiest to date – and it followed after one of the busiest weeks of my life. Slowly and happily my career is starting to take off and the sheer excitement of my wonderful life has left me in a crazy stupor. I really do mean crazy. I mean like bat-shit crazy.

After my busy week, my plan was to pop into three events in Durban for a couple of hours and then to go home to bed on Friday night. Then I heard that my wonderful friend Chanelle would be in town, so one thing lead to another and we ended up planning a whole night of partying instead. 

After a long drive we arrived at our accommodation for the night, both needing to pee really bad. You know the night is about to go south when you step out of the car at a gated residence and find yourself squatting behind a tree. Chanelle is the kind of friend you can pull your pants down in front of. As soon as we got inside our host said she could see everything from the window. She also alerted us to the fact that our heels looked like we had just run through a sprinkler.

Our first destination was an awesome club that I usually go to and I really wanted to party with my friend that night. But as soon as we got there I knew something was different. We were the oldest people there. It was crazy. We stood out from the crowd looking about a hundred years old. But being the positive person I am we decided to persevere and have a drink. Many Tequilas and a G & T later and we were still the oldest people in the club. So I decided to called up my wonderful friend Jay Tweek and asked him where the hell he was. 

I never could handle my tequilas!

We arrived at the Rocca bar Street Party completely overdressed. I was wearing a slutty dress with fantastic red wedges and, needless to say, my pretty shoes are now ruined. We found Jay and started ordering shots. I am not entirely sure what else we did that night besides drink, dance and party.

Rocca was really awesome – they should host outdoor events more often. The club has a really interesting design and when it is opened up like it was on Friday, it becomes a really fun maize of music. Chanelle and I ruined our shoes dancing to P.H.Fat. We realised that all the adults we had missed in the previous club were at this bar instead. Which is another reason I am so impressed because with the thousands of bodies all around, we had no problem at all getting a drink, perfect!

Jay Tweek doing his thang, take a look at those guns.

Jay was asked to play with Veranda Panda so Chanelle and I spent the rest of the night dancing. As soon as his set was done at around four, he gave us a lift home, but not before getting a meat pie at the local petrol station (this is getting to be a habit). Then Chanelle showed me how to TC (tactical chunder) which was just hilarious and didn’t work at all. Now that I am sober I realise that Jay is probably horrified at having to watch me behave so inappropriately. But at least he laughed! 

We woke up the next morning, watched Death Becomes Her and ate the world’s burniest pizza. Awesome weekend. Rocca aweh! 

So much love, and my ass is too big for that dress - White girl got junk yall!

The Colour Festival Durban

Sure looks colourful!

Saturday the 6th April saw the first Colour Festival to be held in Durban after recent success in Jo'burg and Cape Town. Now before everyone gets all up in arms and tells me that the Holi Fest has been around for decades ... I know. I said that this is the first, of many, Colour Festival's to hit Durban. The promoters of this event tout it as an electronic dance party which incorporates the coloured powders from the original Holi Festival in India combined with a "stellar line-up of local and international deejays". 

LEFT: Before Colour Fest
RIGHT: At Colour Fest.

Crowds.

Now forgive me for my negativity so early on, but I don’t recall any international DJ’s. However, I will give the organisers the benefit of the doubt because they were probably referring to the Cape Town and Jo’burg venues. The music was good and the general atmosphere was just incredible. I had so many people tell me that they absolutely loved the festival and they loved the concept. I think that it is really exciting for Durban to hold these kinds of events.

So what did I think? Not that it makes a difference, but here is my tale about this colourful event.

The queue at the entrance.

My friends and I got to the Wavehouse, Gateway at around 3 pm. On the way in I passed our official photographer for the newspaper who had earlier been so eager to do the event. He was leaving and had only two words for me ‘Sodom and Gomorrah’. Now when shit gets biblical you know that you are at the right kind of party.

Ronnie ends this video in an awkward way ...

I was so grateful for my media pass because the line for the entrance was crazy. Despite the thousands of people, it only really took ten minutes for my friends to enter the event. Once we got inside we traded our tickets for two packets of colour powder. This was when I got my first powder experience. What nobody told us - I guess because it is common sense - is that the stuff gets everywhere. My first dust cloud entered my mouth and nostrils. I was left coughing and spluttering - begging for mercy. Just as I took my second breath another cloud hit me. Thank god for my sunnies or I would have been blind as well.

You have to watch this ...

I was a bit annoyed with the powder packet people because they were not allowing people with R190 tickets to get any powder,  although their ticket stated they should get two packets each. Luckily my friends stood firm and insisted they get their powder. Forty minutes later we were off to the bar. Honestly I lost my shit. The problem with using the Wavehouse as a venue is that it actually does not have enough facilities. This is not just my opinion. There were not enough bar facilities and not nearly enough bathrooms. It took over an hour to get drinks at the bar. Not just because the bar was too small to serve the large crowd, but also because the bar kept running out of stock. We all just stood and waited for more stock to be brought in. Very sad. I had to be a snob and get us all drinks from VIP because it was the only properly run bar. 

Always with the mouth open -
No wonder I  am still coughing up purple.

As for the bathrooms, you know us girls and our bladders. After eventually buying our buckets we all needed to pee. Unfortunately for us we had to leave the Wavehouse and actually go into Gateway to use the bathroom. The whole of Colour Fest was doing the same because nobody wanted to wait in an hour-long queue. At one stage in the night my friend and I went to the men’s bathroom because we couldn’t wait any longer. Only to find ourselves ankle-deep in what we now know was urine. Desperate times... Also while I am on this tangent, the Colour fest website promised showers to rinse ourselves off ... I guess there was one in the heavily populated, unbearably overcrowded bathroom.

This is the only pic you will ever see of me on the loo.
As vulgar as it is, I think that it illustrates a point.

 I did have an amazing time despite all my whining. I think this is going to be a regular festival on Durban’s calendar and I will return. I love to dance and I loved getting colourful. Colour Fest Durban was over all too soon. But not our night...

Amy and I had got separated from our herd. So we decided to taxi back to Umhlanga, get some pizza, clean the powder from our nooks and crannies and head out to XS nightclub. We ended up sitting on the grass at Engen waiting for our taxi for ages – it seemed to be the common story for the night. So - and this is incredibly naughty of us, do not do this ever - we ended up asking some fellow Colour Fest revellers for a ride. Not the smartest thing I have ever done. Their car had a strange curtain up which separated the front of the car from the back. We told them we were going to Cotton Fields and as soon as they drove off we ran back to our hotel room at The Oysters.

I spent the rest of my night chatting to my good friend Jay Tweek as well as arguing with the owner of FITS about the article I wrote about him.

What an awesome weekend. I could not have had a better time if I tried. To everyone else who went to Colour Fest Durban, makeup remover is the only way to get that purple out of your pores ... it’s a pleasure!

The next morning we cured our hangovers with a Big Daddy beer at Hooters.

Splashy Fen 2013 - Part 2

Five minutes later I was face down in the brown ... At least I did not spill my tea.

This year’s Splashy Fen lived up to its name with a downpour starting on Friday night which cooled the Underberg Valley down after a scorching week of sunshine. The rain came back with a vengeance on Saturday night leaving me drenched, but it did not manage to dampen my spirits as I took to the various tents to stay dry, drink and listen to music.

This is the place where good clothes go to die.

After days of deliberation I had decided to travel down to Splashy fen on my own. I was really feeling good about this decision because I was going there to write so the fewer distractions the better. The night before I was to set off I got a message from my friend in Cape Town. He was on his way to Splashy and wanted to know if I wanted a ride. Considering that I am the world’s worst driver and have no sense of direction, I decided to change my independent woman attitude (to an extent) and become a co-driver. Anybody that drives from Cape Town to Splashy gets my company any day.

The beer tent became the host comedy
package on Sunday due to the rain
washing out the Splashy Fen Marquee. 

Unfortunately for my dear friend, we still ended up getting lost ... A good few times. I however call it divine intervention because by the time we eventually got there we had missed the torrential downpour.  My friend drove in his VW Caddy van – extra length, so we didn’t even have to pitch a tent. Once again I thank the stars because the rain meant that any actual camping - in a tent - would have sucked balls. Our ride had two mattresses in the back, two down duvets, blankets, pillows and all the comforts of home. Plus we were mobile so we could just pull up to the jol!

Besides the music -which was the reason I was at Splashy, my highlight for the weekend was spending the Saturday night downpour with one of my good friends in the beer tent. All I can tell you is that this man can drink. We started the night at the bar. He asked the bartender for a bottle of vodka and ten Red Bull’s. I know it is not good to judge, but if I were to guess, our bartender was about eighteen, she probably had never worked behind a bar and she was really out of her depth at this point in her life. Being the good girl she is, she asked her dad if it was OK. He said no. So my friend asked her if she could pour him thirty drinks instead. The look on her face made my night. We later bought a bottle of Jagermeister from her dad.

Some of our Easter entertainment.

Apart from the Easter eggs I got showered with on Sunday morning, I loved the ‘chill’ areas at this year’s festival. I spent hours in the smokers lounge, I don’t smoke, but it was fully equipped with couches, bean bags and the most amazing security man who kept fetching us tea and coffee. The Mobile Cafe saved my life, they sold over two thousand cups of warmth on Saturday alone and I swear most of them were sold to me. 

Food place ...

Aaand I am glad I didn't drive
my own car ...  

I have to thank so many people for my amazing weekend, you know who you are. But lets be honest, the music was amazing. Jay was charming, P.H.Fat broke me, Niskerone and Miki - Love, Veranda Panda, Paul Snodgrass killed and sharing Red Bull's with Phizicist -  the best.

And my yummy sponsored meals from Pasta Boys, I am sure that they know that I love them. Thank you Craig and Winton and that man from the Dominican Republic. I love you all.

I love Splashy