Friday night I made it the Opulent Temple Massive on Treasure Island. It was an amazing and slightly strange party. It didn’t feel like what I have come to expect of a Burning Man party. It felt much more like a rave. Vick’s Vapor Rub on a dance floor… seriously? Plus there were a lot of overly aggressive guys. It was not not really my scene, so I hid behind my hoops. I took the occasion as an excuse to practice performing. It was an expansive warehouse and there was plenty of room that we weren’t inconveniencing anyone so I hooped all night with Rosie, Nicole and Laurie. I owe those three big thanks for being my hoop buddies for the night. Rosie and I arrived at 9:30 PM. I left at 4:00 am and I had only set my hoops down for about an hour.
It was a great night to hoop because there was plenty of room but often I’ve seen people push there way onto the dance floor with a hoop when there was barely room to stand. Once I saw someone carry a hoop into the Root Society Dome at Burning Man when no one could even stand because it was so packed. In that space it was ludicrous to even bring a hoop. I’m not even sure what they thought would happen.
Sometimes enough space can be created on a bustling dance floor to hoop. This is the grey area that takes some tact to know if it’s appropriate to hoop. I strongly feel that if you are going to take up valuable space on a crowded dance floor, you better be capable of putting on a show and entertaining the audience. It always makes me uncomfortable when I see a hooper walk into a dance floor with a hoop, expecting others to move out of the way, then proceed to waste hoop for 15 minutes irritating everyone on the dance floor. It makes us all look bad.
On the other end of the spectrum, I saw Stefan take a hoop to the center of a hugely crowded dance floor at L.I.B. last year and light up the audience. Everyone stopped dancing to watch the show. We’re talking 200, maybe more watching in awe. It was impressive as hell and frankly quite amazing. The guy can work a crowd. I think Meg the Cat was playing with him too.
Photographer Tev Lee caught some nice shots at the Opulent Temple fundraiser last Friday. Nice guy too. Check his work out here.
Free track. Glitched up and whompy just how I like it.
