Everyone experiences fear on New Year’s Eve. There is a tremendous panic that the year’s biggest party will pass you by and ,you will end up on your own in front of the telly, and it becomes nothing more than one day passing into the next.
This is why even the worst clubs, the ones with sticky, glass-soaked floors and eggy beer charge big bucks for entry alone. This is why we must thank the New Year’s Gang.
Like so many videos online, the first one started as a bit of fun. They they spent the stroke of the midnight wearing masks in the shape of mantis shrimp, cutting up prawn crackers with scissors in an empty scout hut. The description of the video read ‘No-one has ever done this at New Year before.’
They had three million hits before the sun rose.
So the channel continued, remaining silent until the last minute of the year, when another video appeared. This time they sculptured Moses parting the Red Sea out of polystyrene in the Serengeti, keeping hyenas at bay with Wagner played on a boom box. Once again the description of the video read 'No-one has ever done this at New Year before.’
This time they hit ten million.
This continued for five years. They weren’t charlatans. They were filmmakers, trained in the finest school in New York. No matter how original their ideas are, you can guarantee that the lighting would be perfect, that the sound would be crystal clear, each shot framed to perfection. Their videos were not necessarily raucous, just something you will not have seen before. So no matter what happens, you will have a unique experience on New Year’s Eve.
More and more people chose to stay home. The videos provided a perfect excuse to miss out on exhausting, overpriced social events. Their hits reached nine figures. Clubs screened their performances on big screen, and slashed their entry price. Many councils scrapped their fireworks displays, and invested in big screens instead. A handful of people showed up.
In the eighth year, The New Year’s Gang changed to a live stream. They rode camels through the streets of London, wearing t-shirts with a range of Mondrian paintings fixed together in a colourful montage. The streets were deserted, the lights of computers glowing through closed curtains.
They reached the Thames, and dismounted on the same spot where a few years before thousands had crowded together. One member pulled out some fireworks, and shot them towards the sky. Then they locked hands and sand Auld Lang Syne.
It was what everyone used to do at New Year. Only now, the fear was gone.