For years some of my friends have been attending Purple Sneakers but I was never into Indie music. Well my knowledge of Indie music was getting better from listening to Triple J the past few years, so tonight I think it was time to take the plunge to experience my first Indie club event, so here we go!

Masterchef: Purple Sneakers @ The Gladstone

Purple Sneakers @ The Gladstone, Chippendale, Sydney
Assessment Time: 11:45AM – 02:45AM
Opening Hours: 19:00PM – 03:00AM
Lockout: None
Address: 115 Regent St, Chippendale, Sydney. Theres no real visibility that its called The Gladstone – all you see on the Verandah is www.aussiebar.com.au, which doesn’t even link to the Gladstone website. Apparently it only came under new management after a short stint as a strip club.
Venue Website: None
Promoter Website: http://www.boundarysounds.com
Occurence: Every Friday
Dress Code / Door Policy: anything goes, but everyone here is dressed in a very relaxed casual manner. I kind of almost felt overdressed with my collared shirt.

There’s even a 10 point rule list on entry which included things such as:
– No douchebags,
– No trashing of the toilets (The toilets became trashed anyway at the end of the night when a door was ripped off its handles, lol), and
– No pretentious behaviour.

Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $12 Full Entry.
Guestlist: There is a guestlist but I have no idea how to get on it or what it entails you to. You can try info@boundarysounds.com
Inside: The entrance to the venue is via the back. So, you first are presented with the back room of the Hotel/Bar, which resembles the rear of a typical small townhouse. Its like a tiny courtyard, with a brick shed to the right. The shed has wooden benches and plastic seats around the walls. Bricks lay around, and electricy and wiring is held down by gaff tape. BBQ in the corner. It really feels like you have walked into someone’s backyard, but they weren’t prepared for it. Continue walking inside to a hall where the cloak room is. Continue to the front where the bar is on the right, the DJs are in the left corner, and the dancefloor is in the middle. The dancefloor being a lightly carpeted area. Very danceable.
Cloak Room: $4 for all items
Bar Prices: I didn’t drink tonight, but the line was 1 or 2 people deep throughout the night
DJs: (In order of appearance per hour from 8PM) Retox, Erectro, PhDJ, SVU (Farewell Set), Joyride, Surecut Kids, The Holidays (DJ Set)
Music Style: Indie, Alternative Rock. M had no idea what any of these songs were, hailing from an RnB/pop background and he didn’t enjoy it. I usually listen to Triple J, so I had a fair idea what about half these songs were. Basically it was a complete mess of all these indie and alternative rock songs from the past 20 years, with no proper mixing. Most songs were played in full, and the crowd moment was often lost as a result. Songs that were heard were from R Kelly, Regurgitator, System of a Down, Art Vs Science, Friendly Fires, Yeah yeah yeahs, etc. These were the ones I recognized – but some songs played you just couldnt dance to at all.
Crowd: Mostly local Aussies. Surprisingly a few Asian fans were spotted. Most seem to be aged in their teens to early 20s, but I couldn’t tell.
Entertainment: No extra entertainment.
Atmosphere: Inside was as hot as an oven. There was definitely a huge build up of humidity in the room, and your body would have to change to an amphibian state to stay in there for long periods of time. It was pretty bad. The single fan and measly solo air conditioner did squat all with the situation. On the floor, empty cups and bottles lie strewn everywhere. The inside is pretty small, but its packed, and there is basically no room to dance properly – you could really only move or jerk your body around. There are no cleaners here apparently. Out the back is where you relax from the intense humidity of the inside, but you face another downer – cigarette smoke. The entire back courtyard and shed reeks of cigarettes. You can’t escape it. To top it off, there are also cups and bottles strewn on the concrete floor. It’s a filthy house party in the guise of a dance event. I am certainly not used to it, but a friend whom I met that night, certainly was. We were told that the monthly Purple Sneakers event in Canberra was much more cleaner, and that even the old venue at Abercrombie Hotel (which looked pretty dirty) was cleaner than this.

Entrance to the makeshift brickshed aka the chillout room

Video: Walkthrough Video

Video: 180 of the back courtyard: