Rachel and I got off at Old Station tube, wasted some valuable high-heeled steps going the wrong direction. Turned around and found CAMP, a bar/club on the corner. Walked in to dim lights speckling the high ceiling, the deepbeat sounds of hip hop, an almost-crowded dance floor, big couches, long tables, skinny bartenders with headphones peeking out of their v-necked tee shirts and knit hats slouched just so on their heads. The crowd is a mix of die-hard old-school hiphop fanatics with all the best dance moves and east end hipsters wearing thick glasses and skinny jeans and university students just looking to have a good time.
The atmosphere is welcoming and as the night goes on everyone dances, it doesn't matter how. There is a respectful awareness of the people around you: a boy makes a point of making room for us to go by, extravagantly sweeping his arm out to let us pass like chivalry is alive and kicking. Half the fun is watching people dance--the d.j. acknowledges the bursts of talent taking place all over the floor, on the steps, on the chairs: "I see you!"
The room is hot. Girls crowd the bathroom mirror, skin glittering, bejeweled with sweat. We run into people from Queen Mary: so excited to see each other in this place that is not an English seminar. Our coats have been left draped over a couch along with everyone else's and we find them and don't put them on and emerge into London at night to feel the cool air on our skin.
These lesser-known clubs are the best. I've checked out some of the bigger clubs, too: Ministry of Sound, which was more like going to a concert--live music, a woman belting out something like soul over a techno beat, people waving their hands, facing the stage, enthralled. Koko is a club located in a former theater, ornate with the theater boxes still accessible. I also went to hip hop karaoke the other night at a little place by Oxford Circus; Londoners can rap!
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