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Fringe Factory: Shake Your Money Maker

 

If done right, the modern-day Speak Easy can easily capture that once forbidden atmosphere of 1920’s Prohibition, where scar-faced mobsters stood in dimly lit corners puffing on Cuban cigars, quietly watching the goings on of their dandy bartenders and well-dressed patrons; Where secret handshakes and passwords opened the door to a world outside the oppressive rule of the fuzz, and the taste of danger and defiance was as sweet as a 50-cent Peep Show and shot of “Demon Rum.”

 

On Saturday, January 3, the Highland Inn Ballroom (in the basement of the Highland Inn Hotel) achieved exactly that, thanks to the speak-tacular sound and space design efforts of Fringe Factory: the two-woman, vinyl-spinning duo of Vicki V and Suzy Q. In December 2007, Fringe Factory transformed the underground recital hall into a sensory-blasting retro-lounge for a year-end private dance party. When more than 500 people showed up to get their groove on to well-known and obscure tunes of the sixties and seventies, Vicki and Suzy decided to turn the party into a regular event. So -- on the last Saturday of every month since then and going forward, Fringe Factory presents a new Moddesey, complete with guest DJ’s, live bands, psychedelic light shows, visual projections, and on.

 

As the second part of their name implies, every show is homage to Andy Warhol’s famed Silver Factory -- the NYC studio where the pop icon hosted his notorious porn parties. Think: super models, musicians, mohair suits, and ménage a trios. Inarguably, Fringe Factory is more g-rated than the amphetamine-addicted orgy-fest of Warhol’s days, sort of a “Bizarro Jerry” of the real deal: Take out the unsavory elements of drug abuse and S&M torture from the original “Silver Factory” AND add a kinder, gentler assembly of finely clad people who love to dress up, dance, drink, and dissect the intricacies of art. In honor of their inspiration, past Fringe Factory events have included a modern-twist on Warhol’s “Exploding Plastic Inevitable,” and an evening in which the ballroom was covered from floor to ceiling in sheets of tin foil.

 

To shake things up, every Fringe Factory dance party has its own, original theme. The January 3 event was “Hot Damn! Mod Party,” emphasis on the Soul music of the 60’s and 70’s. More grooves, than groovy; more hip than heel; more rhythm than rock’n roll.

When I descended the stairs into the black-and-white checkered Ballroom Lounge, I could hear the “Jack Jack bo-back” of the “Banana Song” playing in the background, and I instantly knew that this would be a fee fy mo-d party to remember.

 

If Holly Golightly had a turntable (from Tiffany’s), this is how her cocktail parties would go. The wide, open ballroom had tinsel-wrapped pillars and brass tin ceilings; disco balls, floating balloons, juke boxes, and kissing booths.

The dance floor was filled with dapper gentlemen donning three-piece Italian suits and winklepicker shoes; Women in brightly colored shift dresses, Gabardine miniskirts, go-go-boots, pixie cuts, Russian fur hats and false eyelashes. Several guest DJ’s kept a steady stream of beat-tastic jams going from The Rolling Stones to Otis Redding; the Byrd’s to Booker T and The MG’s; and James Brown to Bo Diddley -- as the fog machine threw a thin layer of mist across the twisting and jiving shapes.

The place felt cool, the people boss. Everyone dressed to the nines, mingling, doing the mashed potato, saying “baby” after every male name: “Kurt, baby, can you spot me some Benjamin’s for the bar tab?” And nobody broke character.

 

The real razz-a-ma-tazz came with the live, four-piece band the “Soul Shakers.” Who knew that four, skinny white guys who look more like bike messengers than Blues performers could be so gas? I highly recommend catching their next show on Friday, February 13 at Northside Tavern.

 

As 2 a.m. rolled around, the record needle turned over its last track and the 35 mm projector flipped over its last reel. As I ascended the steps onto the street above, I felt like I had traveled through a worm hole back to the present, with only a red martini-glass hand stamp to prove where I had been.

 

Fringe Factory presents a new mod dance party on the second Saturday of every month. Highland Inn Ballroom.