In the middle of another bizarre weekend in 2009 I found myself bloated from an immense bowl of Chinese beef swimming in noodles and water, touring Manchester’s Chinatown and crossing “Perform at a Thai Karaoke bar” off the proverbial List of Things To Do Before I Die. It was Natalie’s birthday, and we were among just four of the 130,000 people who came to the city for a night out. Then, somewhere on George St among the array of restaurants a sign caught Nat’s eye-
LONG LEGS
Normally on a night out I would avoid lap-dancing venues. I’ve experienced it, but in Manchester at the weekend there are usually better ways to spend money. But I could tell she’d noticed the building, and I started to wonder if women were even allowed in, let alone get dances.
Hell, I thought. It’s January. It’s an expensive month. I might as well push the boat out. We agreed tentatively to check it out, so I paid us both in and got a round of drinks…
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Later in the week, I meet Nat in a family pub and she tells me her perspective on the club.
NAT
I was kind of curious. We wanted to go in. Sarah and her boyfriend didn’t. It was more curiosity than anything.
MATT
Before we went in, what did you think it would be like?
NAT
Sleazy, gritty, a dodgy “watch-your-back” place with lots of druggies and perverts and God-knows what else lingering around. That kind of place.
MATT
Did it turn out to be like that?
NAT
Yeah. I thought it was sleazy- about as classy as a strip club could possibly be. It had the typical leopard-print seats. I thought the way they did (the dance) was a bit unprofessional by just getting you to move over a little bit and doing it right there in front (of other customers) rather than being a bit more private. But for ten pounds that’s what you get.
It is at this point I realise I’m starting to sound like some kind of adult entertainment connoisseur, and that for the past week I’d been mentally comparing Long Legs to it’s long-term local competitor, The Fantasy Bar.
MATT
The Fantasy Bar ’s more private. Each dance is done in a separate booth.
NAT
Well it should be like that really. It’s a bit embarrassing for you to be sat there, aware of everyone else. I mean, I noticed last night that when people were getting (a dance) that people were staring at them and like, “Look at what that guy’s doing!” That’s not really what you want it to be like, you know. That’s not what you pay for. But it’s ten pounds at the end of the day.
MATT
There was a guy who looked disturbingly like (local breakfast radio presenter) Mike Toolan who was trying to bite a woman’s tits at one point.
(Toolan, for the record, has his face on the side of pretty much every bus in town. Manchester radio stations have no pictures and are, largely, no different to stations worldwide.)
NAT
Oh I didn’t notice that! But that would not surprise me. I think he tried doing something (to a dancer) and she was like, “What are you doing? No touching.”
MATT
He’s lucky he didn’t get turfed out and filled in by about eight doormen.
NAT
To be fair, I think if you paid a bit extra you can do whatever you want. It’s that kind of place.
MATT
It’s possible.
According to Nat, it’s not just men who need to be warned. The rumours are rife that dancers receive ulterior payments for “extras”.
NAT
They’ve got signs in the ladies toilet saying, “No touching, blah blah blah, you’ll get barred, and any dancer found doing anything with the clients will be sacked immediately.” That’s all shit. It’s the law (saying that). That’s not how it works at all. If they’re getting paid £100 extra they’re making £100 profit.
MATT
I don’t think I went to the gents. I don’t think I saw anything like that.
NAT
It was a bit of an odd poster. I was like, “okay. It doesn’t apply to me, but okay.” Oh and apparently, lesbians can’t have dances off girls. But in that case- “Are you a lesbian?” “No.”
I agreed that there was no way of enforcing that rule.
MATT
Yeah. It’s like, “can I check your sexual orientation card please?”
NAT
“But you’re dressed like a man!” “But I just like these clothes!”
MATT
When it comes to a woman’s sexuality, it’s a sliding scale isn’t it? It’s not a tick-box thing.
NAT
Exactly. “Let’s take your name. Let’s take your age. Let me check your I.D. Let me check you’re not a lesbian. Give me ten pounds.” That’s what it is.
For the record, Natalie does not dress like a man. Nor does she behave like one. She is a genuine, straight- and I might as well say it- damn good-looking woman. But Long Legs’ “lesbian clause” seems flawed: Women are allowed in to the club in the first place, but lesbians aren’t allowed dances. As has always happened with adult entertainment outlets- the boundaries and legalities with which they work are blurred.
It seems, from various TV documentaries, that rules for dancers have gradually become more relaxed as time goes on. The girls who danced for me only had their heels on by the end of the dance. Physical contact during these dances has (apparently) increased over the years.
Regulations within such clubs are loosening. The only laws getting tighter seem to be regarding licensing. Many politicians, including the Home Secretary Jacqui Smith, want the laws tightening so that lap-dancing venues are regulated like sex shops. She finds it necessary to remind us that spending money in such clubs differs from “buying a cappuccino”. The amount of lap dancing venues opening in Britain seems to be worrying certain people, but not those who would visit- a new club opens in Britain every week (says The Independent). Being a sophisticated broadsheet, The Independent didn’t feel it necessary to go into much detail about what dancers are and are not allowed to do. Neither did any others.
What the hell is going on in this ridiculous country? A left –wing government is trying to slap these places with a sex-industry label, when brothels aren’t even legal, yet the CONSERVATIVES- bastions of archaic tradition- included a £10-off lap-dancing voucher in delegate’s packs for the Conservative Party conference last September. This is why I vote Liberal Democrat: they will never get in. Hence no matter which party gets in, when they fuck up like this (which Labour certainly have since I’ve watched the news) I can always say, “Well, I didn’t vote for you.”
MATT
You didn’t get a dance, did you?
NAT
No no no…
MATT
Was it weird watching it?
NAT
I didn’t know where to put myself. I was like, right. The girl’s sitting in front of me and that is not. Appealing. Whatsoever. And I was just like, hm. But it didn’t matter where I looked. It was happening all around!
MATT
The ambitions of a hundred guys have just been absolutely ruined.
NAT
Well, did you not notice I was texting a lot?
MATT
Yeah, I noticed that. I thought, come on Natalie, you’ve got a unique opportunity here, and you’re messing with your phone.
NAT
Yeah. “Oh look. I’ve got a text off no-one…” I felt a bit uncomfortable, to be fair. But, yeah- it was as sleazy as I expected it to be: men- bar you- that are overweight, have no morals and obviously have their own business or a good job that pays. They’ve probably got a family at home that they don’t give a damn about. They’re just obsessed by a fantasy. Which is pretty sad really.
We can but speculate.
MATT
I thought that the dancer was a bit tame because she looked as if she wasn’t that bothered. She was dancing but she was chewing gum, she wasn’t making eye contact- she was going through the motions. It was obvious that she was only thinking about the money, or the smack that she was going to shoot from the money.
Typically, I don’t notice the only small child in the pub until I air that assumption. We move to a different seat, away from any minors and nervous-looking adults.
MATT
Natalie’s offended a family.
NAT
Definitely.
(We move)
NAT
So where were we up to? Oh yeah, the fact that- no, she wasn’t very enthusiastic, to be fair. She was very, “This is money and that’s all I’m doing it for and I don’t really give a damn” but in the same respect I kind of understand that, because she’s working in a back-street strip club, probably to fund whatever obsessive habit she has: whether it be shopping, holidays, drugs, drink, whether she’s in a place in her life where she can’t escape… I kind of sympathise with her a little bit for that. If I was in her place, I wouldn’t be overly enthusiastic if someone was paying me to do that.
MATT
But then, if you want to make serious money out of it you do have to be enthusiastic so people keep coming back.
NAT
But in the same respect you don’t have to be because if you’ve got enough people coming in…
MATT
Maybe.
NAT
Some people don’t care about the intimacy part - at the end of the day, it’s looking at some girl dancing. And, you know, they do dance very good. I don’t know whether there are other places that do it better, but they do their job. They don’t make eye contact- maybe it makes them feel uncomfortable or guilty about the life that they’re leading. Because it brings it home a little bit more. So maybe it’s easier for them not to do that.
I think it’s safe to say that Nat won’t be back there. But will I? Probably not, in all honesty: Manchester is an exciting town, and there are better things to do than watch girls take clothes off. And regardless, Long Legs faces fierce competition from a selection of newly licensed venues that have sprung up across the city, much to the horror of local sewing circles and/or women’s rights groups. And I’ve not even been to any of these emerging outlets off my own back, let alone been coerced by a girl.
Long Legs can be found on George St., Manchester.
http://www.long-legs.co.uk
