When we got there at 10:40 p.m., the underwear party was just getting started. The Knockout isn’t a big place, and it wouldn’t take long before it filled up with barely-dressed young people. We shed our pants at the door. My friend slipped her dress over her head while I peeled off my shirt. The feeling of freedom didn’t hit us right away, but by the time our wristbands had been secured and we made our way to the coat check we were looking at each other with elation.
“Do you feel it too? How amazing this is, not having to wear clothes?”
Club Neon has been hosting its annual pants-less Valentine’s Day party since 2004. This year it was DJ’ed by Jamie Jams and EmDee.There was a $5 cover, but only for those too shy and repressed to expose their undies. The primary attraction of this night is, in Club Neon’s words, “the chance to dance with no pants.”
We started dancing immediately. The music penetrated us right away – as if, without clothes, the beat had a more direct line into our skin. 1980s dance hits, of course, captured the joy of the moment perfectly.
Love was certainly in the air. A couple nearby had swapped underwear, so the man was wearing a lacy thong and the woman had on striped boxer briefs. They stood swaying rhythmically while they stroked each other’s respective undergarments.
Pretty soon the entire group I came with was making out, in various permutations and combinations of coupling. Two random French men had joined us somehow, and we were all basking in the collective effervescence of the disco ball-lit dance floor.
The music switched from ’80s to modern pop, and we all started singing the words. We couldn’t hear each other over the music, but we could feel the same patterns of air were exiting our mouths. Something about being in underwear made partial telepathy possible. As strangers partnered up on the dance floor, they found themselves immediately touching all those normally hidden parts of each other – no way to avoid being thrilled.
In conclusion, why can’t all parties be underwear parties?