p-funk in da’ hause

I just got back from seeing George Clinton at First Ave. There were several moments I must now share. About 2 minutes after George Clinton took the stage (at least 20 minutes after Parliament took the stage), someone passed a fat-ass blunt up to the band. The amusing thing was not necessarily that this happened, but how the blunt was immediately taken to George for inspection, who looked at it a couple of times before visibly deciding “what the hell?” and taking quite the slew of consecutive puffs. His voice was then quite hoarse, and he actually coughed once or twice, saying, “I must be getting old.” This was at least an hour before the part of his set where he introduced his granddaughter to the audience, and she sang “Somethin’ Stank And I Want Some”.

I wanted to remember to write about the guy holding his cell phone up over the crowd (presumably so someone on the other end could enjoy the music,) both because it was pretty amusing and also because it really made me think about how often that must happen, and how five or ten years ago, it wouldn’t have even been possible. The bald guy who nodded at me and said “nice haircut” as I walked by was not nearly as amusing or thought provoking.

About the time I was really starting to “get into” the music… feeling it, if you will, the overwhelming smell of ganja permeated my tiny, tiny-ass personal bubble (the bubble shrinks when you’re surrounded by hundreds of other sweaty bodies packed onto a dance floor,) and nearly simultaneously, this gorgeous girl, with probably the biggest brown eyes I’ve ever seen (exaggerated, no doubt, by the gargantuan size of her pupils,) pressed her way through the crowd past me. It was one of those moments, and we locked eyes the entire eternity it took her to pass by me. We simultaneously said, “excuse me” and “sorry” (I think I actually said excuse me), and then the moment passed, and I was staring at the back of her head as she disappeared into the crowd.