So Crazy Right Now

photo by Rcstills

It was a Friday night and I was trying my best to hype myself up. I was planning to go see an artist I’d recently fallen in love with —  Mozart’s Sister — at an arts event downtown called Long Winter. I’d planned to go but couldn’t find any of my pals who were available to join me, so I went by myself, thinking that I’d eventually bump into someone I knew, or at least make friends with strangers.

It’s always a weird feeling standing in a room of people and pretending to be totally cool with the fact that you are not speaking to anyone. I was by the bar sipping on a rum and coke, trying to get the party started (party for one), eyeing the room for people who were in a similar position to me. Surprisingly, there were quite a few people standing solo like I was. The band that was playing were loud but endearing, the bass player was pretty cute and had a massive cast on his right foot. At the end of every song he'd punch the air with a fist and a grin, in a sort-of “tally-ho, we did it!” manner which I found adorable.

After wandering round the venue and checking out a bunch of different acts going on, I headed back to the main hall and bumped into Jill, a friend I used to work with at Audio Blood. She introduced me to her pal, Mark. I looked at the taller guy standing next to her and flashed him a smile as I shook his hand. There was a little *something* between us in that moment then. You know when you meet someone and you just think, this is a thing that is going to happen, even in that initial instant? Idk. Maybe I’m just a psychic.

We explored the whole venue together, which was a maze of rooms and stairs: projectors and banners and flashing lights and a secret party upstairs full of dancing light and balloons. Soon enough the time came for Mozart’s Sister to play in the main hall, and I made sure I was front and centre.

Mozart’s Sister is an artist I discovered in August this year, through a mention that Grimes had given her. She is a huge inspiration to me as she produces all her music herself, and she doesn’t need a band — it’s just her and a couple of boxes on stage: a vocal processor and a sampler. And she’s not some ethereal waif of a person — she just looks really real and her talent makes her such a magnetic performer. I was hugely excited to see her.

So she came out on stage, flanked by dancers. I was about three feet away from her, resting my beer on the apron of the stage. And when she started playing, I started dancing, we all started dancing. And we did not stop. The energy was incredible. As I was moving and singing along religiously, I could feel Mark’s hands on my hips. I literally did not care in the slightest. In that moment, nobody else existed apart from me and Mozart’s Sister. She was a goddess.

After the show I was left in a state of post-gig wide-eyedness, we all shuffled on our massive coats and went out to brave the cold. Mark and I started talking and realised that we’d both got each other’s names wrong the whole night. Turns out he was not Mark. Our group dispersed and I took Not-Mark back to my place.

At one point in the night we were talking about music — records in particular. Both of us noted that with some songs on older, dirtied up records, there’s sometimes scratches and skips in certain places, and it trains your brain to expect that mistake to actually exist within the definitive version of the song. I told Not-Mark that when the dawn of *questionable* music downloading on the internet first reared its head, my Dad downloaded Beyonce’s ‘Crazy In Love’ on Kazaa. I will always remember this song because during the introduction, its got some guy’s voice yelling “GO JAY-Z!” Every time I hear the opening notes to that song, I’m always expecting that yell. Not-Mark started laughing: “I know that voice! I knew exactly how he sounds!” Apparently he had a copy of that exact song as well, with the yelling guy. We both cracked up. Both of us had the same pirated version of ‘Crazy In Love’.

The next day I met up with my adopted big Canadian bro Robert to hop around St. Lawrence Market, which is sort of like a labyrinth of meats and cheeses and lobsters in tanks. There was a mustard shop called Paddingtons, which had a rip-off Paddington Bear as its mascot, but it looked less like a bear and more like something from that Nickelodeon cartoon, ‘Aahh!!! Real Monsters’.

what. is. this.

It had been getting very cold in Toronto as of late, winter seemed to be finally setting in. I bought a wedge of smoked applewood cheese and Robert bought a paper bag of caramel coffee beans. We went back to his apartment in Liberty Village so I could have a wee sit down and chill out before heading out to dinner with one of the girls I used to intern with at Audio Blood.

I headed out to Sneaky Dees — a Torontonian institution, for those of you that don’t know — and ordered cocktails with Sarah and her friend. Catching up was good fun, and we decided to head back to their apartment that evening to pre-drink a little before heading out to dance somewhere.

We were blasting Taylor Swift and drinking sherbet vodka, I felt like I was briefly revisiting the sugary hedonism of my student years, and it was perfect (am I getting old?????). Sarah was so excited and showed me her Taylor Swift perfume and I doused myself in it, smelling like dusky vanilla. There were shots, a belated toast to my birthday, and a debate as to where we were headed that night. I texted Not-Mark and he told me that he was out again that night, he and his friends were heading to something called ‘Dance Cave.’

“Oh my god, Dance Cave? We HAVE to go to Dance Cave!!!!” - it was decided. I sent Not-Mark a text, explaining the hilarious coincidence that was going to unite us tonight: we were also going to Dance Cave, no way! We got on the bus and headed back downtown.

Joining the queue for THE CAVE (words which are now branded on the inside of my wrist in black ink), I spied Not-Mark. Instead of going up and saying hi, I grabbed Sarah’s arm and turned myself around out of view. “OK, DON’T LOOK, BUT HE’S RIGHT. BEHIND. ME.” Now began the game of false ignorance that I remember myself playing in dance clubs all the time: I See You But I Don’t See You. Turns out Not-Mark was about to be playing that game as well, which wasn’t going to do much for us actually meeting each other that night.

Much to my chagrin, after getting drinks and hitting the dance floor, Not-Mark had still refused to See Me, despite us having made eye contact several different times that night so far. I was extremely busy Not Seeing Not-Mark, getting chatted up by a guy who said that his day-job was working a paper round. Impressive. Not wanting to give in and be the first person to say hi, I continued my plan of being in close proximity but engaging with everyone else around me. Some dude came up as ‘Come On Eileen’ started to play and we both sang it very badly into each other’s faces. I could feel Not-Mark’s eyes on me as I had this other guy’s hands on my hips. You wanna play this game, Not-Mark!??! Huh!?? Just watch me as this guy takes out his phone to get my number. I’m never going to text him back but just you watch! After I’d thrown my number out to that guy with all the care and bravado of someone throwing a packet of crisps into a street bin, I turned to Sarah, who had been serving as my eyes for Not-Mark.

“Has he seen me?”

“Yes. Oh my god, he’s so jealous. He kept watching you with that guy.”

“Amazing.” The plan was working. It was time to go into the bathrooms, re-apply lipstick and talk tactics. Back out on the dance floor, it seemed that Not-Mark and I had reached a stalemate. I decided to swallow my pride and go up to him to say hi. I walked over and tugged on his arm, and in that very moment…

“BAAAA - BA-NA-NA - NA-NA - BAAAAAA….”

‘Crazy In Love’ started blasting from every corner of the room. 

“THIS IS OUR SONG!!!” I said, with a touch of hysteria as we started to dance.

“GO JAY-Z!!!!!!”