LONDONIUM

This past week was my first trip to London since 2005. Don't get me wrong, London is still one of my Top 3 cities in the world, but I am over it. I lived in London from February - September 2003. (Historical footnote, the U.S. invaded Iraq and started Gulf War II in March until April 2003. Iraq, 1 month to conquer and it will take over 15 years to rebuilt. Afganistan will take at least 20 years to fix, but I digress.....).

The Summer of 2003 was the best summer I have had since Camp Hale. (Summer 2008 was another summer highlight, but I'll save that for another blog post). That summer in London was amazing. The sequel to the Matrix was opening, there was a heatwave in Europe, the gay dance club Heaven was in its glory days, I travelled to Rome, Dubai, Bristol, Edinburgh and Dublin that summer. It was my first London Pride. And all summer long, I fell in love with the City of London in the process. Leaving London, the job, and my friends was hard. And I tried to get back there for work, but I got pulled into the Miami orbit instead. Reflecting on it now, on this trip, Miami was definitely the better city to live in for me.

And I had a blast this past week in London. Priscilla Queen of the Desert was hilarious: http://www.priscillathemusical.com/ I had always wanted to see La Cax Au Folles and this West End production, while dated, did not disappoint. (Priscilla was the better show. It should be a big hit when it transfers to Broadway).

I went to Clarence House, which is the official residences of Prince Charles, Prince William and Prince Harry. Clarence House was an real eye opener as a home owner. As a residence, I hated it. Except for the original Monet, it looked like an awful place to live. The entire house was a museum. I would have hated to grow up there as a child. The only open part of the house for this tour was the first floor (receiving rooms, a sitting room, a dining room, the hallways). I'm sure William and Harry's actual residences on the second floor would be more modern, but it was still stifling. What was interesting was the prominent photos of Camilla Parker Bowles and not one photo anywhere of Princess Diana. The garden was lovely, if a bit understated. I saw this great exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery (which is a different museum than the National Gallery) called Gay Icons: http://www.npg.org.uk:8080/gayicons/index.htm I went to British Museum for the first time and saw the actual Rosetta Stone. The British Museum has the biggest collection of Roman, Greek, and Egyptian artifacts outside of Rome, Athens, or Cairo (all of who want their national treasures back from the British).

For a city that has not changed much in the last 3000 years, what had changed considerably was the gay scene. In 2003, Heaven was the largest and most popular club, but a scrappy up and coming club called GAY was challenging Heaven's dominance. At the time, GAY had both a bar and the second hottest Friday night in London with top talent - Robbie Williams, McFly, Britney Spears, Kylie Minogue, all doing a half hour set at midnight at the Astoria. Now in 2009, GAY has purchased Heaven and opened it as it's primary club, with their other more loungy club called GAY Late. Kubar, which was this tiny little bar on Charing Cross Road had moved into a much bigger space and is the second most popular gay club in London. Kubar also has a second club. The second Kubar is more loungy, whereas at Kubar Prime, there is a nice little dance floor in the basement.

What's most interesting to me about all of this is gay branding. Only in London have clubs/bars started second bars with the same names in the same city (and within blocks of each other) In the U.S., the only bar I know to have successfully started 2 bars with the same name is Halo (in Miami and Washington D.C.). Others have tried, like Vlada in New York & Miami, but the Miami extension isn't that fun. It's interesting, because gay clubs do have national prominence in the U.S., but really, no gay club has been able to successfully expand into another bar in a different city, although I'm sure several could. SBNY could do it, The Abbey in LA could be a successful brand extension.

Edinburgh, Scotland is another city I really enjoy. This was third and least favorite time attending the Military Tattoo: http://www.edintattoo.co.uk/ Don't get me wrong, the Tattoo is always inpressive, and there really is nothing like it anywhere else in the world, but the Tattoo is morphing more into a "music" experience, while I enjoyed it the first time I saw it as more a military experience. Edinburgh is a very beautiful city.

Overall, I had another great trip to the UK. But if Warner Bros. asked me to move to London in 2003, I would have taken a pay cut to go there. Now, it would take a big pay raise to get me to pack up and move to London in the future.