Massive like a Rhino!

One thing you need to remember about doormen is that we are inherently just big kids, we're also worse than a sewing circle when we're together and get pissed off about something!

For a period of around five years I worked alongside a lot of doormen at a variety of venues, we worked hard and played hard too, taking every opportunity to go out and paint the town.   When greeting each other though we didn't follow the normal handshake and single arm embrace of respect you see in many documentaries. No, we opted for flexing at each other.  It started when driving past friends on the door, instead of giving a friendly wave we'd flex out bicep and let out a stupid mwah ha laugh, childish yes but it was our little thing!   

A lot of the guys were heavy gym goers and some were pretty big lads, some weren't quite so big but thought they were!  This kind of levelled the playing field with everyone just flexing away at each other!  The mwah ha ha needed work though and someone added in Arnie style, "is it cos I is massive" in a little dig back at all the punters who said every night to us "is it cos ....." 

The massive bit we loved adding it to our drive by flexes and for some reason one day I greeted a few of the guys with

"Massive like a Rhino!"  

That was it and the rhino madness began, someone found a cheap energy drink which featured a rhino in its logo so we all started drinking that at work.  Then, and I will take full childish responsibility for this one, I was waking past a toy shop in Harrogate and saw a badge making machine!  Cue me buying it and a dozen bottles of the energy drink so I could peel off the labels, Blue Peter style!

Perks and Porsches

Being a doorman can lead to many perks, especially these days as a valid doorman licence can gain you a q' jump and free entry to most clubs in the country.  It's that little unwritten rule which, for the most part anyway is still in force as it were to this day.  And for good reason, most doormen develop a sixth sense after a few years on the job much the same way as I'm sure many other trades do, something doesn't feel or look right and instinctively you know this.  That's a very useful skill that takes years to develop and doesn't switch off easily, so even on a night out you're still very aware and I, like many doormen get told to stop working when I'm supposed to be socialising! 

I was once asked by an old school doorman I knew and to be honest feared, how long I'd been on the door?

"Seven years now" I said.

"Ah, you'll finally be learning your trade then." 

Believe me that was a sign of respect which made me smile and is hard to earn, particularly from the old school guys who'll usually only give respect after they've seen you getting stuck into a fight.   In my opinion, that's something that's fading these days on the door and I don't think for the most part it's a good thing, after all it's a dangerous job and if you're limited to what you can do it's only a matter of time before people start getting hurt.

Another perk of the job is the opportunity to take five every now and then and have your back covered whilst doing so, be it a quick smoke break or in the case of my old mate Tony, disappearing down a fire escape with a bird for a quick fumble!

In my case however I was walking through a bar early doors one night when an old mate of mine Marcus came up to me and said, "can you get cover for five?"

"Yeah sure it's dead" I said "what's up?"

With that he tossed me a set of car keys!

"I'm off for a slash" Marcus replied, "take it for a spin and see what you think "

He winked and walked off.

I looked down slightly puzzled and then smiled as I saw a Porsche keyring in my hand!   I went outside and parked there was a brand new 911 turbo, Marcus was in Finance somehow in Leeds and I knew he did well but, hello!  Needless to say I went for TWO spins round the block, after covering myself of course!

Toilet sex in Harrogate.

I did a previous blog about sex in Scarborough but Harrogate is no exception to the needs of the "smelly toilet club"

Many years ago when at Revolution bar in Harrogate, when we caught a couple in toilets, the manager preferred the stealth approach.  So he could get his phone out and take a pic or a vid! 

Then there's the very recent case of two women in a toilet cubicle, and not doing drugs!   One left quickly looking deeply embarrassed however the other girl accused me and all the girls who'd used the toilets of being homophobic!  No love, we're just not gross!  

One time though I remember working at Time nightclub in Harrogate and, when we were checking the toilets right at the end of the end we found a couple getting hot and heavy in the men's toilet!   The music was off and we shouted to come out which they did with the woman looking all embarrassed and heading to the door hiding her eyes.  The man looked pissed off, obviously didn't finish ha.  I was feeling jokey so said,

"Mate I've done you a favour, did you see her in the light?"  I asked 

"That's my wife" came his reply

Oops, but after seeing six or so sniggering doormen he decided better of saying anything else! 

Getting hit by your own side!

Well on occasion sadly it does happen.  Fights start and end in seconds sometimes and one mistimed grab can then into a punch into the face of another doorman!  Yes that's happened to me, luckily not with enough regularity to make me question whether these were "accidents" or not!

One night I was on the front door of a bar in Scarborough, we were the middle of three 700 ish capacity places and, as such would help each other out if needed.  

I remember seeing a scuffle start on the front door the  Yates bar next door so moved out into the street to monitor.  I couldn't see the other doorman who should have been on the front door with Joe the head doorman who was now fully scrapping with this bloke and had another man trying to pull him off.  I broke into a run knowing the two lads on the door with me would see me charge and at least one would be on his way after me.   As I got to the fight I body checked the man trying to grab Joe and sent him flying then took hold of the man Joe was tied up with from behind.   Two doormen appeared at this point, one of my guys who went straight for the man I'd body checked and Big John from the bar further down the road.   The first thing I saw was John coming towards us, the next was Johns fist square in my face as we struggled to control this guy.  The third was Johns fist again in my face this time on my temple splitting it open!  

"Stop helping!" Came my cry!

Bastard.

How to terrify a bad boyfriend

A number of years ago I was working in a nightclub called Time.  It was a pretty big place over several floors and as such required a fair few doormen to man.

On one particular night I was covering the main dance floor.  My attention was caught by a small group, In which a young couple appeared to be arguing.  Now it's usually a good idea to leave domestic arguments alone as they usually resolve themselves quickly, but sometimes people need to be reminded that they're causing a scene.   It began to get more heated so I started to make my way through the crowd to have a quiet word.  All of a sudden the girl tried to turn her back and get away and the lad she was with grabbed her and slapped her full on across the face sending her flying.

I immediately grabbed my radio and requested immediate back up on the too floor fearing retaliation from other male witnesses which happens a lot in these situations.  

I sped up and got myself between the lad and any onlookers just as several doormen came rushing in so I filled them in quickly as to what had happened and got hold of the lad with a doorman named Rob.  

Rob worked as a manager in a local hotel and was a top bloke, not the most muscular but a big lad who loved getting stuck in.  He took hold of one side of the lad and said,

"Right lets take him outside, and bum him" 

My face nearly dropped as much as the lads did!  I saw the half smile creep on Robs face and played along snarling "yeah."  A poor response I'll grant you but he'd taken me by surprise a bit!

As we marched him to the nearest fire escape the lad struggled and got increasingly worried and I swear it's true but he managed to grab hold of the door frame as we pushed him through shouting,

"No, no please no!"

Needless to say we just hammer fisted his fingers to get him to let go and closed to door on him, maybe overstepping our bounds?  Well maybe he won't hit a girl again.

Doormen nights out

Worrying.  We could stop there really!

I've been on a fair few doormen nights out and they are nearly always bloody interesting to say the least!  We had a doorman who was allergic to E numbers in jelly sweets so we used to feed him wine gums and watch the sugar rush spike his adrenaline and send him loopy, until the point he tried to full on snog me one night which wasn't overly pleasant! 

We used to take shortcuts into venues via the fire escapes, just to keep staff on their toes.

When I was very new to the trade I was once in an Indian restaurant in Leeds at around 2am when the door burst open and two masked men came in brandishing Stanley knives!  They looked at the waiter standing behind the bar, turned, saw around 30 large mostly shaven headed men staring at them and then ran back out again!  Free beers and much laughter ensued that night!

I have slightly taken the piss on a few occasions but then it's a perk of the Job, we spend so much time having to be "on it" as it were, that when it's time to let your hair down you can go overboard! 

I may have once got very drunk and taken my shirt off on the dance floor, danced on the bar and ran around to the mission impossible theme, which I'd insisted the DJ played, yes i think insisted is better than coerced, or threatened.  Then I was greeted by the doormen, or bad guys at the time, who were very uncomfortable when asking me to stop, you see I was their Boss at the time! 

Ice making solution?

Well most trades have their little pranks that get played on junior members of staff.  Be it being sent somewhere for a "long stand" or for a tin of tartan paint there's plenty to amuse!  My personal favourite was sending lads to the office at a quarry I working in for "a 25mm hole". good times.

Quite recently though I was lucky enough to witness glass collectors being sent from a nightclub over the road from where I was working, to my club, for Ice making solution!   The two young lads came to the door and asked the manager for just that.  He led them inside and they reappeared a few minutes later carrying buckets! 

"Now remember don't spill any and for god sake don't mix them up remember that's part A and that's part B!" He said, pointing at the identical buckets of water.

Hurried, and rather worried nods came back at us.  

It was all I could do not to cry as I watched the two young lads oh so carefully cross the road!

Do as I say, not as I do!

A good decade or so now I was working at a Revolution bar.   The venue itself was circular, with a kitchen in the centre.  This made it tricky when closing time came as you need to move people in two directions at once!  We decided to block off both ends of the smaller of the rooms with chairs and tables and move people back from there.  This worked fine and anyone who wanted to use the bathroom just had to walk around this area.  This was until one night when I came across a man trying to climb over the tables!

"Fella" I said "just walk round bud you can get to the toilets that way"

With that he went for me!  No idea why but became an instant tussle resulting in me holding him in as tight a full nelson as I can manage as he's quite a big strong lad and half dragging, half pushing him to the door.  

It was one of the longer take outs as the real world presets a lot more problems than you may imagine, there are chairs and tables everywhere, all with glasses and bottles usually balanced precariously, there's a lot of noise and confusion and people everywhere obviously and you have to try and take this person outside without hurting him, yourself, or anyone else!  Not always an easy task and I think there's something to be said for allowing us more freedom as these people, perhaps normal office workers during the day, can turn into violent, evil maniacs when drunk and only a seconds lapse of reason can result in disastrous consequences, and jail time.

I eventually got the man to the front door and managed to push him outside past our area manager John who was covering for the regular head doorman. 

"Ha, you struggled getting me out didn't you!" The man championed.

"We'll you're out aren't you" said John

I let out a wry smile and slap! the man reached forward and literally slapped the side of my face.  Well I nearly lost it.  I lunged forward straight into John whose arms squeezed me gently and was told in no uncertain terms to get back inside! 

Grumbling away to myself but knowing my job I went back in and began a walk around.  

Not two minutes later there came a radio call through "Fire escapes open!" 

This usually meant someone had opened it to let a friend of theirs in we'd refused so I quickly made my way there just in time to see the man I'd dragged out shouting at John!   Clearly one of his mates had indeed opened the door to let him and but John was having none of it.  Then from nowhere slap!  The guy slapped John in the face.  I'll describe the punch that followed as orbital as I have a vivid slow motion memory of seeing John's big arm rise up and right cross the man square on the jaw knocking him clean out.  

I went over to John and said jokingly

"Why didn't I get to do that?"

"Do as I say Dan, not as I do" came the gruff response.

After hours in Asda

I've previously mentioned how the two worst words put together are "bored doorstaff" cos we always find ways of entertaining ourselves!  

This extends to outside of work too and we used to nip to the 24 hour asda now and then after shift for nibbles and the like.  But whilst there we're still hyper and pumped from work, in a nearly empty supermarket, in the middle of the night, oooh it's playtime.  

We all tended to separate and get whatever foodstuffs we were after but then how do you find each other again? By playing Marco Polo that's how!  Yes a group of off duty doormen running around asda in the middle of the night to shouts of "Marco" and the reply "Polo" followed by much laughter.  

And did the night security guards ever say anything?  Not a chance in hell, not even when we played "the ticket run game".  Now when self service checkouts came in we soon figured out a game you could play with them.  What you had to do was pay for your shopping, and when the receipt stated to print, grab hold of it and start running!  You see on the old machines the paper would come straight out off the roll and the winner was the person who could pull the longest strip of receipt paper out of the machine!   Possibly illegal, highly entertaining and probably the reason the paper tears when you try it these days.

How to steal a doorman, literally

No I don't mean poach him from another company although that does of course happen.

I mean a few years ago I was working in Scarborough and one of my mates from home asked me how good my lads were, "Yeha they're a good group mate" I said "Why do you ask?"  

"Oh, I just wondered how they'd react to me and the boys pullin up in a van and gaggin and baggin ya and sticking you in the back, I'm comin to Scarborough next weekend by the way" A somewhat different response than I was expecting!

"Probably not the best idea mate" I said

"It's a bit too public, quite possibly someone'll call the police"

"Well I need to do something" came the disgruntled response.   You see he meant it, Keith was a 29 stone 6'8" skinhead tattoo sporting biker who had previously split his own tongue like a snake because "I thought it looked good"

His sense of humour was slightly, different shall we say, when I first met him at work many years previously his opening line was  "you're new, I've good news and bad news for you, the good news is I'm totally wasted, the bad news is you're carrying me home"

And fell on me, not pleasant!

We agreed he could test them a bit when he came over  but I decided to tell my manager, just in case he was watching the CCTV and panicked!

Come Saturday night I'm on the front door of my bar with two doormen in tow.

"Jesus" says Andy, "have you seen the size of that guy comin down the street?"

"Not right for our place Andy" I said, "make sure he doesn't come in"

"Piss off you're head doorman you do it!" Came the hurried response!

Keith approached the door with five of his equally tattooed biker mates.

"Not tonight mate, you're not quite meetin our dress code" I calmly said.

"And what the fuck are you gonna do about it little man" said a snarling Keith

"My job fella you're not dressed right for here" I replied

Keith was, as always wearing a black t shirt, leather waistcoat and black jeans.

"I have to dress like this cos I'm too big" came his reply.

"Well you shouldn't be so big then should you!"

At this point Andy and Tony looked slightly concerned, probably that I was about to be eaten.

"You cheeky like shit!" He snapped "are you being fattist?!"

"Well I wouldn't if you stopped eating so much!" I shouted

Andy and Tony are intelligent enough to work out that something's not right here and the smiles from Keith's mates weren't helping either!

"Sod it i've nicked your doorman!" shouted Keith and proceeded to bend down, pick me up and throw me over his shoulder before literally skipping off down the street giggling and cackling like a little girl!

Festival fun

The atmosphere at festivals can be fantastic and I've been lucky enough to work at a few, my favourites being the smaller ones as they are more family based and feel good affairs rather than the larger, more commercial ones.  

Of course with smaller, feel good festivals, you get hippies, lots of hippies in all shapes and sizes both young and old.  

This can be slightly irritating when trying to have a rational conversation but I tell you what, I've been up and patrolling in the small hours until early morning and these folk are the ones up and about picking up any rubbish and making sure the festival ground is as clean and tidy as it can be so trust me, what they may lack in personal hygiene, in some cases, they more than make up for in their love of nature so good on 'em in my opinion.

Of course doing security at these events can be rather interesting, particularly in the quite obscene amount of drugs people seem to be on!  Weed being one of the biggest to the point that one guy who saw me out organising the car park came up to me and passed me a fat spliff saying "here mate, have this on your break, cheers for what you're doin bro"

I always enjoyed the end of the day campfires when all walks of people would get together and have impromptu singalongs varying from unheard of folk songs to tenacious d's fuck her gently.

This is also a time when the fire staff and poi people come out to play and you get your own private fire show which looks amazing and anyone can and is positively encouraged to join in. 

The most fun I had though was at a local festival when my boss ICBM or Intensive Care Bear Mike, "bear" for short and i got hold of fake swords and shields and put on a martial arts based fight show for everyone around totally on the spur of the moment, exhausting but the kids loved it.

Bark like a dog Peter!

Now he'll hate me for writing this but after watching the video again I decided it had to be done.  

A few years ago I was working with a nice lad called Peter, he was a friendly Eastern European lad who always got the  butt of the jokes, probably cos he was a nice lad but still a strong one and capable of getting stuck in.  For me he only annoyed me once when I asked him to do something and didn't, it could have escalated the situation but luckily didn't so I ribbed him a bit and forgot about it. Until however a few weeks later Peter myself and a female door woman called Emma decided to go out for drinks after work, which turned into lots and lots of drinks to the point we're back at Emma's, and it's broad daylight.  Now Emma has a few dogs, one of which sleeps in a large cage in her house and Peter has already annoyed Emma several times by this point climaxing in him reminding her of how he has a video of her sweeping the pavement outside the club like a good girl.  Not a wise move. Now I was quite drunk at this point and my next memory, because I have a video of it, is of Peter IN the dog cage with a dog, being told by myself to bark like a dog in the cage bitch.

Quite how we got Peter in the cage still escapes me but that's probably for the best.  Needless to say although short the video is clear and yes, he does bark like a dog.

Do you know who I am?

The words that make you both grimace and laugh at the same time.  I mean come on really?  Why do people feel the need to say that, it's so arrogant and condescending, particularly if you've already been rude to people!

An example of such an incident happened quite recently to me in my local nightclub.  We have a VIP area with a suited meeter and greeter in the doorway checking for VIP wristbands, without which you can't gain access.  Occasionally though the meeter's and greeters have to take toilet breaks and get either door staff or bar staff to cover for a few minutes.  On this occasion it happened to be a glass collector who had been asked to cover and on my way past he called me over.  

Now two Middle Aged business men types had gone up to a 17 year old slip of a lad, laughed at him and gone and sat down in the VIP area, bless him he even challenged them further but luckily they just plain ignored him.  He informed me of this and said it'd just happened and pointed the two men out to me in the VIP area.   I approached the men who did indeed look like businessmen and reminded me of the middle class, blading, slightly podgy bank mangers you see on BBC drama's.  

"Hi guys, I'm security, I'm sorry but this is a VIP area, you need to get a wristband from reception to be in here I'm afraid."

No response, not even an acknowledgement of my presence. 

I calmly pulled the table in front of them back slightly and raised my voice slightly 

"Right guys, you've ignored my colleague on the door and pushed past him then ignored him again, now you've ignored me?  I don't think so guys and I will remove you now look at me and leave now please."  

This got a response, they both looked at me as the older of the two got up and said those immortal words

"Do you know who I am?"

Now I did know he was nobody of any great importance, in other words if you come here all the time and spend money then you'll be welcomed but just because you have money and have decided to come out you think you can speak to everyone here like shit? I think not.

"Totally ignorant?  Leaving shortly?" Came my reply.

Clearly this guy didn't come out very often because he then decided to counter this with "I feel like pouring this beer over your head"

Perfect response, for me anyway, as I smiled and said 

"Well you've just threatened me and I feel like choking you out right now, but I tell you what I'll restrain myself, how about you just fuck off out of here before you cross a line and get yourself hurt"

Maybe not the best response but factually accurate, and it worked as they left without a word.

Don't show off to doormen

Now just like many local towns mine has a few characters and our fair share of idiots too. 

Be it the boy racers who pull away from the lights outside the bars in a cloud of smoke as something on their shit cars breaks, or slide into a kerb whilst cornering in the rain trying to show off and in some cases don't move at all as the stall at the lights, there's always something to amuse. 

My personal favourites are the wannabes who dress as doormen and wander round talking to us about how they're getting their badges soon.  

Some of these guys even demonstrate martial arts techniques to us occasionally with hilarious consequences as I have seen a simple sidekick he felt the need to show me, throw a wannabe off balance and lead to a faceplant on the pavement!  Score one for CCTV playback there. 

Old School beatdown

When the SIA license came in and the more anti social people out there realised that they could "bait" door staff, and then have their licence revoked and cost them their jobs.  I personally noticed an increase of people, generally young males, who attempted to do just that because after all, they know their rights, do they hell.

Quite why you'd want to tempt a doorman into hitting you I'm not sure, mainly given the fact that HE'S GOING TO HIT YOU!   

So I've come to the conclusion they're either manipulative sadists or just plain stupid, either way no great loss to society in my opinion and seeing as how these days more of them end up getting locked up themselves maybe soon they'll realise it doesn't work. Usually.

What happened In Carringtons nightclub years ago was along these lines, there was an Mexican/American in, he was a 6ft shaven-headed muscular twat, and spent most of the evening telling everyone how he was an unarmed combat instructor on a local American Military base.  Drawing close to the end of the night he became increasingly boisterous and started offering doormen outside for a spar, then grew even more agitated when we all refused.  

He then tried to get us to go outside and fight him for real, claiming he could beat any of us up.   Knowing trouble was imminent several of us began to position ourselves around him, close enough to move quickly if necessary but not close enough for him to feel threatened.  The head doorman was talking to him trying to calm him down but I think we all knew it was just a matter of time before it exploded.  But it didn't. 

If I was the head doorman I'd probably have tried to talk and then made sure my guys were in position and basically said yes to the guy, he should walk to the door with me and when there we form a wall and call the police if we had to.  This has happened to me and it does work but can be tricky to manage but at least any violence is now outside and not in the venue.   

In this case though before it got to that stage the head doorman was interrupted by an old school retired doorman who'll i'll call Smokey to protect his identity as he said yeah I'll fight you to the American and proceeded to kick ten shades of shit out of him outside the club.  20 years of street fighting and bar brawling seems to win out which we all found amusing, even more so when the American stumbled off shouted how he was gonna come back and bust a cap in our asses!  Yes he really did say that, but of course, didn't.