Читать книгу Shadows Across The Moon - Helen Donlon - Страница 8

INTRODUCTION

Pirates is an anagram of parties. Nowhere is this connection more evident than in Ibiza. On an island where there have been pirates, outlaws and freewheeling individuals destroying or laying down procedures for living and partying for centuries, not much has ever really changed behind the scenes, even if party operators now live more or less within some kind of ‘civilized’ island society.

Ibiza parties are just different from parties elsewhere, as anyone who actually knows the island will attest. Centuries of outside influence, including Roman decadence and Moorish drum rituals, and later, religious Hindu and Buddhist iconography, have all played a part, when combined with the freebooting spirit of piracy, in creating the fundamental tenets for an Ibiza party or after-party. From trance parties in the forests, drummers bringing down the sunset on the beach, or freaks gathering outdoors with guitars and tape machines blasting jazz and rock ’n’ roll for two or three days on end, what happened on the island before the clubs is also the reason the clubs became necessary in the first place.

The first nightclubs on the island were created by hippies, and brought together rich and poor, international and local, gay and straight on dance floors infused with elements imported by well-travelled freaks who’d done the ‘hippie trail’ and come back with their brains front-loaded with esoteric and colourful ideals, and psychedelic drugs. Cushions were spread around, and open-air dance terraces were created under the stars, under the sunrise. As they evolved, the clubs grew to become the world famous establishments they are today, but behind the scenes Ibiza clubland has featured shadowy mafia connections, crooked politicians, backstabbing, outmanoeuvring skulduggery, specious drug busts, assassinations, suicides and huge fines.

It has also included tales of quixotic originality and futuristic vision, widely talented impresarios and impulsive brilliance, idealistic utopian contexts and new definitions of how to integrate time, space and human bodies. But the most important aspect remains the ambience: Ibiza is the world’s capital of chill-out culture, and when this goes hand in hand with the island’s inimitable club nights, the whole experience of the party makes perfect, euphoric sense.

I wrote this book because, after spending many a season end-to-end on the island myself (where, among other things, I worked as a clubland correspondent and party promoter) for nearly a decade, I felt it was time to bring together a detailed original narrative to tell the whole story. I wanted to make Shadows Across the Moon a tale which would, for the very first time, combine the story of the island’s clubs and their often chequered rise to glory, first-hand interviews conducted with some of the biggest DJs and other key players, and a contextual backdrop of centuries of history, including the vital sparks created by the 20th century’s dropout and freak communities which foreshadowed Ibiza clubland as we know it today.

– Helen Donlon, Spring 2015