bass
throb
fuzz

noise vibrations
embracing

loud
sub harmonics
pain bringer
reliever
body alternative
extra-sensory artificial device

vinyl hits diamond
diamond hits metal
metal hits paper
paper hits air
air hits inner ear

momentary lapse of chill
but nothing close to

she

is flesh
is love
is life

is no where near

for now I embrace
bass compensation

electric love
vinyl heart

I find myself in the eye of the whirlpool. It swirls inside a spectrum of colour, multiple light shafts, liquid shapes, and a haze of noise.

On the perimeter stands the source of this united chaos. Four stacks of giant speakers connected by a loop of cables converging at a hole in a nearby wall. Behind sits a hidden room…

I ponder on the irony of this room. It contains one preoccupied person, two turntables, a bit of hifi equipment and a stack of vinyl records. Nothing much organic about this setup… yet a phenonmenon was taking place in this building. Hundreds of people danced, twirled, laughed and played inside this living whirlpool.

I’m sucked into it’s electric waters – the beast I’d created swallowing me whole – enticing me to merge with the pounding tribalistic rhythms, coloured lights, and mass of drenched bodies…

A hand reaches into the pool and hauls me out. For a moment I stand dripping, holding on to the peace that comes with discovering the present… but without the pool’s foundation the drops hit ground and evaporate. The exterior comes back into focus.

“Noise control are here. You’d better come down”

I’m still focusing. “Noise control? What do they want. We’re not in a residential zone are we?”

“I dunno”

“Shit. We can’t stop now – there must be at least 300 people here…”

I step outside. It’s cold. I hear drunken shouts from outside a nearby pub that has just closed. It must around 3am. Mr Noise Control is in uniform. He looks tired. I wonder who would have called this poor man at such as ungodly hour.

“Good morning officer. Are we keeping somebody up? You can barely hear the music from out here…”

“We’ve had three calls” he replies.

“All from the same person I expect…”

He simply raises an eyebrow. I continue… “We’re right in the centre of the city. There’s 300 people up there having the time of their lives. You should be arresting those drunks over there, not us.”

He raised the other eyebrow, and hands over an official looking document. “This is a warning. Turn it down a bit OK? If I need to return I’ll confiscate your sound gear. It’ll cost you $55 per item to get it back, plus $25 per day it’s in storage. Failure to comply will land you with a $10,000 fine”.

“Right… Thanks”.

Back inside I enter the hidden room and spin the bass frequency three notches to the left. The ‘BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM’ morphs into a ‘thud thud thud thud’. My action creates a ripple in the whirlpool, vocalising it’s protest with shouts and whistles. But the room keeps spinning under it’s own silent synergy…