So last week I told you guys all about the Nothing But Trouble white collar boxing event that was going down at Sideshow on Saturday which promised to be the sickest night imaginable.
Combine a 1920s prohibition theme, badass amateur boxing, big ticket sponsors and the fact that my man Big City fought like a flippin’ CHAMPION and you have all the makings of a seriously killer time.
Also, don’t forget the whisky. Never forget the whisky. It flowed like sweet nectar and resulted in me getting home in the wee hours only to pull my weathered edition of William Blake’s Complete Works off the shelf and start reading The Proverbs Of Hell to J-Rab at 2am.
Because why? Because the Tygers of wrath are wiser than the horses of instruction motherfucker, and don’t you forget it!
So yeah. Things may have gotten a little weird at the end there, but it all started out innocently enough. To reconstruct the evening, here are the only images I’ve managed to track down. They’re packed to the max with branding (sorry about that) but I feel bad cropping it out so just bare with me.
The Beginning
The beginning of the night can be nervy. Especially when you’re hitting up a dress-up party because you never know if the people going got the message or not.
My main man Peggles just had a rad hat, whereas I’d gone full retard in a suit-and-tie, suspenders and shiny brothel creepers.
Thankfully as we arrived we were greeted by these brass band mofos klapping a little bit of swing and a whole buncha ous lingering by the downstairs bar dressed to the motherflippin nines.
I immediately relaxed, sauntered over to the bar and ordered an overpriced craft beer whilst Peggles surveyed his surroundings with a vague “shoulda suited up†look, but he’s not a man to sweat stuff like that.
Besides, the golden rule of dress-up is that there will ALWAYS be charnas who just plain didn’t get the message like nervous-looking-black-T-shirt-and-jeans guy:
But enough of that namby pamby bullshit. Who cares what anyone looked like, we were there to drink and watch ous MOER each other.
The fights lasted three rounds each (2mins per round) and no official winner was declared at the end of that time. As they explained at the beginning, everyone was a winner for taking part and helping to raise money for the Dare To Share charity.
Obviously, if a fighter got knocked down or knocked out, then he / she had clearly lost, but otherwise it was left completely up to the crowd to decide on a winner.
First up were the girls KO Katie vs Angry Bird Soandso. I was pretty hopeless at catching any names of any fighters on the night and, as the whisky flowed, even managed to miss some fights completely, but the first one was pretty memorable.
To put it bluntly, it was the gutsiest brawl I’ve ever watched two women fight.
Both women came out guns blazing but even though Angry Bird Soandso had the height advantage, KO Katie lived up to her name and let loose a flurry of blows that were a testament to not only her natural born instinct to murder the shit out of shit, but also her impressive fitness.
Sure, she started to wind down in the third round, but there was no question in this Tiger’s mind as to who had been owned by who (whom?).
The Middle
Ok, I’m not going to lay any claims to being a credible source of information from from this point in the story on. I was a good couple of beers and whiskies in and my attention span was about 45 seconds long so I missed the fighters names and, after three fights, was starting to confuse one fight with the other.
The men were up next and I must say, I was well impressed with the level of skill these guys showed considering none of them had fought before and the fact that they’ve only been training for three months.
Fists flew, the crowd cheered like mad, a good couple of skull-rattling blows landed and the manic energy in the place increased with every fight.
Then came the half-time show which featured a belter with big feathery things dancing all sexy in the ring and further riling up the already boozed and severely riled-up crowd.
I do however remember Craig The Viking Stack and Fake-Tattoo guy’s fight after intermission, but only because shit got so dirty in their fight that they were basically tackling one another to the floor while the crowd roared for blood.
It was a pretty violent fight, hats off to both fighters for going into the ring with a lot of guts. Definitely rates up there as one of my favourite fights of the night.
BUT the best fight by a country mile was when my main man Mike Big City Bullard went up against Andrew Don’t-Remember-His-Rad-Nickname Wood.
It was the stuff fucking LEGENDS are made of. Round 1 both fighters came out swinging. Big City had the obvious size advantage and landed some fucking hard blows, but Don’t-Remember-His-Rad-Nickname wasn’t taking that shit lying down. The man was fit as hell and able to weather Big City’s blows into the second round when things took a bad turn for Big City.
Round 2 was a bloodbath. Don’t-Remember-His-Rad-Nickname came out fresh as a daisy. Big City on the other hand was starting to wear out.
Bar a few meaty hooks and jabs that he landed, Big City spent most of round 2 getting his ass handed to him and then took a suckerpunch right in the kisser after the bell had sounded for his trouble. In movies they call this “The Long Dark Night Of The Soul†– it’s when the hero reaches the point in the story when he’s completely fucked.
The bell sounded for round 3 and it looked like it was going to be more of the same. Big City caught some nasty blows and had to keep readjusting his head-guard so he could see what the fuck was going on. He was putting up a brave show, but the man was tired, another minute and it would be all over.
But Big City had other plans. After a standing count in which he truly looked as though he was ready to call it, he squared up and threw everything he had into a devastating left-right combo that dropped Don’t-Remember-His-Rad-Nickname like a sack of hammers.
The fight was nearly called off, but to his credit Don’t-Remember-His-Rad-Nickname got back up and saw it through to the end though the crowd had clearly already chosen a clear winner.
CORRECTION: The fight WAS called off, Big City knocked him down and they called it.
True guts, true glory. Big City let loose with the Noon Gun and that was all she wrote.
Sheer fucking poetry 
The End
The last fight of the night was a whole other level of barbarism. I have no idea who was up there, what their names were or even what my name was. All I know is there was blood and lots of it. The crowd lapped that shit up as things reached a fever pitch.
After the fighting, DJs tore up the decks and we got stuck into the sauce good and proper.
I vaguely remember a number of conversations that felt far more important than they probably were with a whole bunch of people I’d probably apologise to if I could remember who they were or what I’d said.
It was just a killer night. One of those rare occasions that lives up to and exceeds expectations on every level.
If this happens again my only advice is suit up and go. It’s an awesome idea and a guaranteed good time any way you look at it.
Kudos to everyone who made it happen and see ya’ll at the next one.
-ST
The alarm goes off, you get up, you shuffle off to have a piss, you summon the strength to go through the motions.
