And everyone tries to outdo each other about how much they despise the event. Long ago, it seems, people realised that raising your hopes that NYE will beat every other night you've experienced over the past 52 weeks, always ended in tears, vomit or an awkward silence in the morning as you searched for your other sock in a strangers bedroom. And so now the gloves are off. Nobody likes NYE and woe-betide anyone who tries to defend it.
Like everyone else, it seems, I’ve had my fair share of duff New Years. Be it spent being sick on the streets of Brixton, stood shivering in a blizzard whilst queuing for a shitty nightclub in Scarborough or sleeping through the Sydney fireworks it’s a night that has rarely lived up to any hype.
Even the good times, the years when I’ve welcomed the New Year in brilliant surrounds, there’s been a bad side. I was half knocked out with illness while Orbital played ‘Chime’ on the stroke of midnight back in 1996. And as we celebrated Sinan’s 30th birthday at a pub in central London in 2004 the screen that was supposed to beam pictures of the fireworks instead showed images of those dead and dying after the Tsunami.
And so, when this New Year came around, instead of traipsing up town, it seemed like a grand plan, when Fe and her housemates decided to host their own New Years party. For in one swing it got rid of all the annoying things about New Years. No queues, no extortionate entry fee, BYOB, no 4am bus back from Trafalgar Square and to quote an old club flier at University, no shit people.
The invites, (via facebook of course) were sent out by the end of November. As is the want for this night, most people hedged their bets and waited to see if anything better was on offer before they committed themselves. But I was never in any doubt that this party would rule.
Long ago, Dave and I hit upon a way to guarantee that any party we threw would be a success. It seemed important at the time. The magic ingredients were a free house, lots of booze, lots of people, a minimum of pretentious people and good, hard rock.
We weren’t in total agreement about the latter aspect but looking back at the number of classic parties hosted in Tooting and Balham over the years I don’t think we were far off in our judgement.
But Lo and Behold! It seems that we weren’t the forward thinking trendsetters that we thought we were. As without any assistance or help from yours truly the housemates invested all their time and effort, not to mention hundreds of pounds of money, on booze, glitter balls, a DJ and decks to ensure the party went smoothly. They even got me to dismantle a table.
And all in all I think it was a huge success. Around 70 people must have passed through the doors throughout the night. There were no gatecrashers, fights, spillages, breakages, tears or drug busts. The police weren’t called, the neighbours didn’t complain, the party poppers popped and Dave didn’t sing ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. And after a 12-hour stint, with a hardcore of revellers still in attendance the DJ finally packed up his equipment at around 7.30am the next day.
All of which will put me in a strange position next year. Because when everyone starts on the anti-NYE bandwagon I’m going to have to take my life in my own hands ands actually defend the bloody thing.
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