Ancestral voices

Plus ça change

One of the nice things about Blok M, I reflect, as my taxi jars to a halt outside Top Gun, is that change is a slow process on the street. And whatever the bar owners might do by way of events, gimmicks and happenings, there’s a centre of gravity, an equilibrium, to which - in time - all things return. And so it is with New Top Gun. The gloss and the glitter have worn away since the Grand Opening, and the place is returning to its old character - but not so much in appearance as in the feel of the place.

The Girls still occupy the same territorial spots they did years ago, and cluster round the guys at their tables in much the same formations. The pool table, as I’ve mentioned before, is still a flashpoint for claim-jumping and hijacking places on the play list as soon as the staff’s back is turned. The bar counter has the same comfortable feel about it, and the staff have adapted the old Top Gun style of cheerfully flirtatious serving.

The old Blokkers who remember Pentagon may also detect faint echoes of that long since gone (and much lamented) establishment in My Bar. The weirdest throwback occurs when the disco is full of girls dancing in the semi-darkness. The animation, the swaying and pulsing, are at odd moments strikingly reminiscent of the dance style of Pentagon in its heyday.

To me these phenomena reflect what I like to call the spirit of the place. Buildings do acquire a character, a sort of spectral patina that rubs off on subsequent owners and generations. The longer I haunt the Blok the more I’m aware of these ancestral voices, and they become part of its unique charm.

The ghost in the machine

To continue with this train of thought, I’m beginning to suspect that a tension some of the regulars have sensed in the late night atmosphere in My Bar may be a discord in the harmonics of the building itself. Sure, My Bar “rocks the Blok”, as the boss says, but for me much of the raucous discordant noise that passes for music late at night in the disco is strangely at odds with the nature of the place. Old Pentagon was famous enough for the loudness of its music; but the stuff was tuneful and danceable, and once the rhythm was established the whole place could become really vibrant, capturing everyone and sweeping them along in its beat.

It’s precisely this synergy that there used to be between the girls, the guys, the music and the dancing, that’s lacking in My Bar. Many nights in can be a bit like a motor that’s not firing on all cylinders but suddenly roars into harmony and hits a real high spot. Everything focuses - the guys at the bar, the girls on and around the dance floor, the bar staff - and there’s a great surge of energy in the place. Otherwise the place tends to be unfocussed, separate groups each with its own little circle of action.

Restoring the balance of nature

Dear old Oscar. The cat of the street, it seems to possess nine lives. Having been nearly killed off once by an ill-fated decision to close down for the whole of Ramadan, nearly killed off again by the lunatic entry-charge it started making for girls, the latest self-inflicted body blow was ripping out the back bar seating and putting a pool table in its place. All credit to the management for heeding the collective voice of the regulars, and reinstating the old layout of easy seating and bar tables. For this is Oscar’s forte, a live music bar with a comfortable feel to it, and business has been slowly but steadily picking up since the restoration.

It’s my belief that the owners should try to get more in tune with the spirit of their bars, to step back and just pick up the vibrations. One litmus is simple happiness. Some nights there are customers by the score, girls by the bushel, but there’s no joy in the place - rather an almost earnest dedication to drinking and wenching. My most vivid memories of the past are those nights when whoops of spontaneous laughter would break out, when whole tables would erupt in guffaws and giggles. D’s Place upstairs bar, at its height, was the apotheosis of glee and revelry. Nowadays, some nights it has the cheerfulness of a wake and all the joy of a Leeds bus queue on a rainy evening.

The other factor in the equation is of course the types of guys and girls who frequent the place. There aren’t as many of the diehard regulars as there used to be, because fewer chaps settle in Jakarta than in days of yore, and as we’ve all noticed and lamented that there aren’t as many fresh and sparkling Sweet Young Things as there used to be. But human nature doesn’t change, and we all like - and need - a place in which to laugh out loud and let rip occasionally. The dear old Blok can still provide this, but these days we’ve got to dig a bit deeper and make more effort for it to happen.