The Synergy Project

Last night me and Mark Pilkington went along to The Synergy Project, a psychedelic festie-vibe club under the arches near London Bridge. I’d been invited along to be present at the psychedelic panel discussion (albeit not as part of the panel itself, which included Shroom author Andy Letcher and rave stalwart Fraser Clark). Seemed like a good idea to take some Dreamflesh / Strange Attractor wares along as well…

As it turned out, I missed the discussion. It was in the next room to our stall, but I felt like I was communicating more talking to one person for twenty minutes than twenty people for one minute. We didn’t sell much stuff of course—who wants to carry books around all night?—but it was great meeting and talking to people who were interested in and/or enthused about our publications.

It didn’t exactly feel like a consciousness revolution was about to kick off there and then, but it’s hugely energizing to connect again with this cultural flame that’s being tended to and fuelled by people like the Synergy Project. There’s a great vibe there, a technicolour eclecticism and cultured bacchanalia that’s infectiously wide-eyed. Music ranged from hard trance to funk, live bands playing heavy ska and flamenco, with DJs dropping in suddenly-congruous anomalies like ‘Blue Monday’ and ‘Whole Lotta Love’. Political and environmental charities and NGOs had a heavy presence, and while there’s a strong contingent of purely party people who glance occasionally with bemused saucer-eyes at the stalls, the crowd as a whole was encouragingly sensitive and free from the usual blinkered attitude I associate with such vast, packed London club spaces. And where else will you find a couple of dozen clubbers engrossed in a portrait drawing class at 3am?

The next one’s on February 8th, and I think there’ll be a discussion panel there on sacred sites. Mark and I should be doing another stall—come and say hello!