The Sunflower Lounge is the closest Birmingham has to places like Manchester's Night & Day. Birmingham has unwisely embraced the binge-drinking theme pub on a monotonous scale, so thank god for The Sunflower, an independent bar that caters for Birmingham's indie and alternative crowd.
We held our disco in the Sunflower's basement, and Smiths and Morrissey fans are so keen that two ladies tried to get in fifteen minutes before we opened at eight o'clock! Minutes after they arrived, a very enthusiastic chap called Ray arrived with three of his family in tow, and he enjoyed himself so much that we gave him a prize - a signed copy of Phill Gatenby's Morrissey's Manchester.
As everyone came in, they were stamped on the back of their hand with a library date stamp and given a slice of birthday cake, which we soon ran out of. There was something pleasingly Morrissean about a room full of people listening to loud guitar music while eating cake.
We decorated the room with small black and white pictures of Morrissey, The Smiths, Alain, Boz, Gaz, Spencer, Albert Finney, Patti Smith, The New York Dolls, and a Japanese film poster of A Taste of Honey. These ended up being graffitied: Morrissey praying to Sandie Shaw, rosary clutched in hand, declaring, "I love you, Sandie, even though you're a girl." Johnny Marr's speech bubble said, "Bernard Sumner isn't as grumpy as Moz." Alain Whyte was captioned with "Sacked for having a better quiff", and Moz's plain white T-shirt had "sex machine" scrawled across it. In one photo, Boz looked disturbingly like a ventriloquist's dummy: "gottle of geer", indeed.
In the spirit of birthdays, we blew up balloons, and when Olivia played "Trash", I got over-excited and attempted to be an anarchist in a manner befitting my profession of librarianship, by throwing balloons at the punters. They didn't seem to mind, and it was like the Christmas edition of Top of the Pops - well, in my mind at least!
Olivia and I had never dj'ed before, and our boyfriends, who shuffled along reluctantly ("Oh, no, not four hours of that miserable tosser!" "Tough - you're coming with us and you'll be sitting on the door!"), were evidently concerned about women being allowed to use technology. Before the public arrived, the boyfriends got really quite irritating, which culminated in me standing on the stage yelling to mine, "Will you please stop wandering about the room like someone's missing gonad?" After that little outburst, I felt a lot better, and the boyfriends behaved themselves. This was also helped by the presence of Auntie Kate, who had come from Hull for the Morrissey gig the night before at Symphony Hall, and cracked the whip. "Come along, boys!" Hattie Jacques would've been proud.
I think the crux of the gender-technology riot is because DJ'ing is actually quite easy. Olivia and I had stroked our chins over putting together playlists, but decided not to - and it was much easier to just go with the flow, and that way we could also include people's requests easily. If I was a feminist ranter, I might say something about women being able to DJ intuitively, whereas men just like pressing lit-up buttons and saying things like 'base unit' - however, that would sound annoying, so I won't.
When I'm in clubs or whatnot, I get frustrated with how aloof DJs are, as if they exist in a magic bubble and secretly live on Mount Olympus with the immortals, despite legend claiming that the first person to use two record players to DJ was Jimmy Saville. It's that kind of snootiness that stops people asking for music that they want to hear, so I went round with a notepad taking requests. I felt like a waitress: "Would you like a side order of 'Dagenham Dave' with your 'Roy's Keen'?"
Once quite a few people had arrived, I took to the stage with a microphone - not to subject them to karaoke, but to thank everyone for coming and to tell them about the prizes and the collection for the Birmingham Dogs Home (we raised £17 for the dogs, which is really kind of everyone who came). I'd forgotten about feedback, and had to sidle across the stage to avoid the whining speaker, while trying to find the right distance between gob and microphone so as not to deafen everyone. From Top of the Pops, I had ended up on Phoenix Nights. I pointed out the two birthday boys in the room, one of whom was too drunk to realise I was referring to him. Joel Lane, one of my favourite authors arrived, so I duly announced his presence. I hope it wasn't too embarrassing for him. He's working on a novel at the moment, and at the end of the night asked me if I'd mind the disco appearing in the novel. It's so amazingly cool I've turned into liquid nitrogen at the thought of it! How fab? Very!
As no-one seemed to be in a dancing mood (maybe they were all secretly Quakers and can't dance on a Sunday), I decided instead to have a "Fascinating Facts About Morrissey" competition. The entrants were: "JK Rowling is a Morrissey fan", "My brother lives in Dublin near Moz's cousin, and drinks in the same pub as Moz's dad", and the strangely Reeves & Mortimer-esque, "At the height of his fame, Morrissey's quiff was so big that during inclement weather, small animals could shelter under it." Surreal Fact Man won the signed copy of Mark Simpson's Saint Morrissey - they clearly have the same sense of humour.
The T-shirt that Auntie Kate kindly donated (and washed) was won by Chris, who saw the disco advertised on MySpace. And how did he win such a splendid item, you might well ask? Simply because he had clearly stolen Morrissey's glasses. "I saw them on 'Pregnant For The Last Time' and knew I had to have them!" So he won a prize. Sean and his friends - birthday boy and requester-of-tracks-we-didn't- have - all won the Knobbly Knee contest. Big thanks to Sean for bringing so many of his friends along!
So what did we play? We had to spin the obvious stuff, but then we all love the obvious stuff anyway! Olivia excelled herself by playing tracks that seemed bloody weird (like Elvis' 'Marie's The Name (Of His Latest Flame)'), until she played the Smiths (in this case, 'Rusholme Ruffians') or Morrissey song that was musically a carbon copy of it. Joel was particularly impressed by that, and the two ladies who turned up early were in stitches! She played The New York Doll's 'Subway Train' and then followed it with 'Everyday is Like Sunday', as it was Morrissey's trick from the 2004 tour. I played The Crystals' 'He's a Rebel', and when a couple of mods wandered in (clearly confused by the 60s imagery of Gwendoline Watts in Billy Liar that Olivia put on the poster!), I played them 'My Generation' - Patti Smith's version, that is. Seeing the expressions on people's faces as she screamed "I'm so young, I'm so goddamn young" was quite amusing, and then I realised that it's probably the source of the refrain in 'Please Help The Cause Against Loneliness'. There was a request for Electronic, so I played 'Second Nature' seeing as Marr's guitars sound so exquisite on it, and then The Cramps' 'The Crusher', Sandie Shaw's 'Steven (You Don't Eat Meat)', which is one of the funniest songs I've ever heard in my life. Then I played 'Sing Your Life' and followed it with The Polecats' 'Make A Circuit With Me'. I love that song - it makes me so happy!
The trouble is that Olivia and I wanted to show off with the obscure stuff we'd brought with us ("Marion's 'Miyako Hideaway', cos they toured with Moz, and Johnny Marr produced them and plays guitar on it!"), but you've got to keep the people happy and it was fab playing something like 'Sheila Take A Bow' and seeing everyone jump about in their seats. I wanted to play Elva Snow and Red Lightning, but I'm sorry boys, I couldn't fit you in. Still, when I played 'Boxers' and listened to Alain's backing vocals, I got all emotional, and Auntie Kate wanted us to play 'The Operation' in honour of Spencer. As much as I wanted to play The Gazmen ("nurse, where's me bedpan?"), we decided that Birmingham might not be quite ready for it... not that anywhere else is either!
So, yes, it all passed off in a jolly fashion, without serious incident. I managed to get through an evening without tripping over or otherwise publicly humiliating myself (as long as we factor out the incident with the microphone!), Olivia's bouffant stayed proudly majestic throughout, the boyfriends behaved themselves, and Auntie Kate did a better job of talking to people than I did, as I am socially inept. We could've done without the barmaid being so grumpy, who told the punters to leave at 12, but not us, until I was DJ'ing to an almost empty room, however, we left the balloons for her to play with - surely that cheered her up no end.
It was lots of fun, and it was lovely to see people enjoying themselves, so watch out Birmingham... Helen and Olivia will be back!
