Homelands, Mosney
"I'm INvisible"
Making it to Homeland’s scored one for dreary arrivals; soaked through, it was still raining and of course totally muddy. There were guys prowling before the entry gates (likely scalpers/drug dealers), and when four of them confirmed she was on her own, from Canada, the f***ers offered she could sleep in their van if she just sucked all four of their cocks. Encountering the people initially on the inside proved just as bleak, the same complete avoidance of eye contact, a mill of everyone avoiding everyone where everyone looked shoddy. She always showed up at these things way too well dressed, in her best boots, which were going to get a s***-kicking, but the right footwear for dancing was of course important. The canteen was such a deplorable mess she’d never set foot in it, and there was a line-up of about 30 women for a porta-potty. And then in the first arena it was pretty much standing room only on a lawn mash, with so many beer cans and water bottles you could not move without stepping on them. In short it was everything she hated about dance festivals and raves. The lights and the dance music were great, though. In terms of standing room only, the next arena was even worse; the third had room because the music was crap pretty much, but thanks to the room, she duly packed her coat in her knapsack, put it in sight over the rail, and used the space granted to warm up, just ignoring the fact that she danced way different than everyone else. It was going to take a long while to acclimatize but tonight she’d have all the time in the world. In the beginning she was joined/hovered by a raver goth who would have been a natural fit performing with Sisters of Mercy.
When the music got too appalling she began to float, heading back for what she could now see was the Lush Arena, which was marginally less crowded. She liked it when the crowd wore off. By the time she made it “Home” there was room on the margins there as well, and she worked her way up to get a closer look at the DJ, where it was still standing room. She leaned over the rail, looked to the left and saw the Edge dancing off to the side in the VIP section. She wished she could have danced there just for the sake that it granted the space to do so. The consideration that Bono might be there bothered her even more. She wished she could show them her in action, but of course she couldn’t. The point of perpetually being the outsider was driven home by the succession of cute little tweeny raver nymphets she saw being let into the VIP section by security. She walked away in disappointment.
Next it was the Orb, and you had to enjoy their hijacking of Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven is a Place on Earth”. She laughed at Oakenfold’s hijacking of “Living on a Prayer” even more [though memory does not serve whether this was indeed Oakenfold or the Orb]. She settled in and began to enjoy “Home”, thinking in irony of the song by Depeche Mode, but the further the evening progressed, the truer it became. That was when someone offered her some hash, and she learned the hard way why the Irish always smoked it with tobacco; it was too harsh to smoke otherwise, besides which this Irish didn’t know how to smoke it, so she didn’t feel too guilty about abandoning him; he wasted more than he smoked. When the music got bad there she floated to Lush, which had a good female DJ. She floated to the third large arena, and on the way back found a perfect little space where she could hear the sound emanating and blending from all three arenas at once. -Great for indecisive types. She couldn’t make up her mind and hit a bad stretch where she kept ending up in each arena just when the music was about to turn bad, but back and forth and back and forth again, she got into a groove in each one, going straight through the center of the crowd in Lush, vibing out and engaging lots of them. It was actually good enough she felt she wouldn’t have minded if she missed Underworld.
When she got into a groove back at “Home”, she was startled when someone behind her cried out “Jesus!”, and turned to see a large set man who walked right up and hugged, her, which she didn’t mind at all, hugging him back. Then he back off and said, “Don’t Stop! –Don’t Stop!” which was very sweet. In Arena-3 she hit it off very well with a man named Richard, to the point that they were clinging and holding hands; they kissed. But on the difference that she preferred Home and he preferred Arena-3 (2FM), they parted ways. Ah, raves. And so it goes. The next encounter (he literally jumped and grabbed her to force a kiss) made her skin crawl so much the vibe scared him enough to make him back off. But in the course he’d interrupted she fulfilled her purpose in finding out what she needed about the Dublin Buses, that she could buy a return ticket, and that the last departure was at 3:00 am. Then she headed “Home” and stopped, transfixed by the moon, which had been full the night before and still looked it; it was a full dog moon. She then met another striking bloke named Eamon who was stoned out of his mind. They kissed too, went back to “Home” and danced together.
When she drifted off on her own and was sitting on a speaker platform she recognized Underworld; it was the opening of “Pearl’s Girl”, and that was when the night went through the ceiling; she actually felt like she was levitating. Oh yess. Once more, it was a totally different ball game in the moment. Underworld were a different entity live; with lots of changes and adjustments to the new songs from Beaucoup Fish, an album she hadn’t been quite sure what to make of at first. She loved all of the tracks here. And Karl Hyde was such an awesome stream of consciousness ad libber live. (He liked a slow shimmy that singer. Hips were in.) He injected crucial key changes that changed the consciousness overall of the songs. The view on the speaker platform was excellent and she danced there briefly before being ordered down. So she worked her away around the perimeter to where there was enough space to dance. She was floating in her own awareness, a completely different context borne by the shifts in her mind the day before, riding on her interior growth. She was one with this awareness in the knowledge that she bore it, and the moment she thought that was when “Space Cowgirl” started, with “I’m invisible”, repeat, repeat, repeat, and then Karl shifted that one word; he added, “I’m in everyone”, -YES!!! and she soared on the inner knowledge she existed beyond her body; it was truer in no one else. Exactly, that was it; that was the progression I just made in my thought.
And with that there was lift-off, because it was in the now. She knew she hadn’t been crazy to get herself locked up in USIT, that she was supposed to have written it all the night before, that she was here, now, developed exactly to meet this moment. The consciousness meets, revives, notches further. The man who was dancing just aft of her began to watch, and after observing her a while he said, “Dancing is the best, you know, it’s better for you than laughing even. There’s no better stress relief for getting rid of anger, tension.” She just looked at him grinning from ear to ear, and he said, “You make every move like it’s your last, you better be the best that you can be, ‘cause it don’t get better than this, and it ain’t gonna happen again, and you’re here, and that’s what you came for.”
And with that she cut absolutely loose. With “Born Slippy” there were subtle shifts to greater emphasis on being on your way to a new redemption, the advent of the angel, and she just smiled at you boy, something she felt she’d just developed on paper the day she arrived to hear the song. And then “Moaner” struck. “Sister Blue” began flashing on the big screen. After Underworld you couldn’t do better, and with that she headed for the bus.