On Sunday, PS1 hosted M.I.A. for her album release party. With doors at 7pm, it seemed like a perfect day, surrounded by scumbag friends and weirdo fashionistas, the bar served complimentary tequila, vodka, beer, even a spread of mexican food. Ninjasonik was there to perform (who the fuck let the Ninjas in?) and JahJah got a megaphone for his birthday. All our friends were there and the mood was blissful, all of us priveledged and youthful… The evening was set!
Ninjasonik killed it, bringing on Johnny Sierra of The Death Set for “Negative Thinking (About Tight Pants)” and Johnny Nelson came hard with “BodyBags.” Then Rye Rye performed and suddenly it was time for M.I.A. But she wasn’t there yet? And PS1 has a 9:30pm outdoor music curfew. So… the staff and organizers very quickly built a stage and set up a sound system inside the museum flanked by two bars, but as you may guess, *inside* PS1 doesn’t have the same capacity as *outside* PS1. And for a show that initially had a 200-person limit that had grown to 500 and by last accounts had exceeded 700… well, not everyone was gonna get in.
What resulted was a mob-mentality at the large glass doors of PS1 as everyone who was promised a M.I.A. performance pushed and fought to get through the doors. “Back the fuck up! Back the FUCK UP!” screamed PS1 staffers. “We’re at capacity, I’m sorry! Back the FUCK UP!” It was all I could do to squeeze through the doors and pull my girlfriend through the throng.
Inside PS1 the scene was grim. Out of cold beer and cups, we were drinking warm beer from water bottles… just happy to be there and trying to enjoy ourselves. DJs played hard electro and most of us stuck to the side room near the bar. So that when M.I.A. actually did take the stage, the room was pretty thin. And most in the crowd were past excitement. Once drunk then bludgouned at the entrance, people seemed more hungover than anything else.
M.I.A. performed for maybe 45 seconds before ducking off backstage. Rumors on the blogosphere read she wasn’t drunk enough, and her twitter says the cops shut her down… but from what I can tell, she showed up late, had to play inside, and after the entrance raucous, no one seemed to care anymore. So… she quit. I was shocked. My girlfriend was pissed. But no one else seemed to really care.
In bed last night, watching M.I.A. perform on Letterman, my girlfriend asked, “Why are you watching this?”
I said, “I still like her music and her style.
“Her new album sucks,” my girlfriend said. ”I hate her.”
Ouch.
