Do you Remember Rasputin?

When I was a student we went clubbing. A lot.

• Monday: Kabanas
• Tuesday: The Zone
• Wednesday: Da Vinci’s
• Thursday: Panache
• Friday: Roadmender
• Saturday: Student Union
• Sunday: Recovery – we weren’t religious, we just needed a day off.

This was primarily to dance. Boys were also on the agenda but secondary to friendship and the phenomenon of communal movement. Dancing is a strange primal thing. I don’t dance on my own. Some do. I remember calling for a friend and he answered the door covered in sweat from dancing alone. I never ever saw him dance in a club. So it works for different people in different ways. I love dancing; it is joyful, it is without reason, a happy madness. And I am good at it. I’m full of English reserve in many facets of my life but yes sir I can boogie! It is the one realm where I can easily attain Flow, where my mind can halt the merciless neurosis that is much of the human condition. 

So I would be first on the dance floor, dragging friends to join in. And as I said, it was about boys too. We gave them names: Perfect Profile, Triangle Man, Tank Girl Boy, Mean Face man, Sexy Big Nose Boy, Taurus Tit, Dreadlock Boy 1, Dreadlock Boy 2 and Rasputin.

Rasputin was different.

• A: None of us fancied him
• B: He was old (Sadly, I suspect he was about my age now)

He had a bush- whacker beard, long hair, shorts and a singlet. He would pop up in clubs sporadically. Spontaneously a circle of clappers would form around him while he danced like a man possessed. I remember dancing with him once or twice. Bliss. He was the opposite of us in our carefully selected clothes. Despite his difference nobody ever started on him. If people took the piss out of the way he danced he’d dance right back at them and turn the joke around. He’d only ever stay for two or three songs and then he’d disappear, maintaining his mystery. To this day he is my dancing hero. I hope he’s still tearing up the clubs of Northampton.