If you ask anyone there that night the first thing they were instantly attacked by, they’ll tell you the traffic, rows and rows of cars blocking the street leading to the rave’s venue, people having to step out from their rides to trek in, in many ways that was the pre rave, the music of car horns, blaring and blaring, tyres screeching, street guys hollering that they have drugs for sale, high heels clacking, glitter and makeup glowing off of headlights, like a grunge red carpet show. Leading to the hallowed gate of what would be the Boiler Room edition of Group Therapy, one of the biggest raves in today’s Lagos, electronic dance and house music, queer expression, bodies bodies bodies.

If you were to go further to ask what the second attack was, it would be the heat inside the venue, but before we get there, let’s meet back up with our procession, but before we meet back up with our procession, a quick backstory. It must’ve been early April when a blog on Instagram posted a smear campaign against Group Therapy, branding them an orgy, calling them out for promoting homosexuality in a country where it is outlawed, even posting videos and pictures of people who had been dancing at the rave, the account calling to their fellow bigoted and homophobic Nigerians to come together to make sure the rave stopped happening, tagging the Nigerian police, pleading with them to raid the next one. The people’s safe space was safe no longer.

Of course the post was taken down shortly after it went up, the organizers for Group Therapy received backlash for their statement regarding the drama, and people begun to boycott the event,, a short while before this rave happened, Group Therapy released a set of house rules meant to protect their ravers, they also put in position welfare officers that would be around the venue in case anyone needed to complain about anything, security had become tighter. At the gate, everyone’s tickets were checked before they were let in, then they’d have to go to the tickets stand too show their ticket again to collect their access wristbands, then they’d have to go through another security gate to show their wristbands to be allowed in, and then finally the door to the rave, same protocol, the people just want to dance and be free.Then we have the issue of the heat inside the venue. In many ways it was expected, Boiler Room was grandiose, celebrated, major, and they were here, in Lagos, crossing over with Group Therapy, everybody was bound to turn up, seeing as it was the grand finale of a very celebratory Easter, what the art and entertainment crowd here has dubbed, ‘Homecoming Weekend.”

But we’re talking about two different types of heat here, of course with an overcrowded venue and hundreds of people dancing, yes, it got hot hot, but also with the infiltration of the people’s safe space, Group Therapy regulars, the queer escapists, they felt especially aware on a night like this, paranoia had rooted itself in their subconscious, from the corners of their eyes, they could feel people watching them, judging them, the outsiders, the people who didn’t get it, who didn’t see them, heat.

This is where my voyage starts, a psychedelic account, the rave outside the rave, I’d in many ways already given up on dancing inside, I was having a different sensory induced experience, hearing lights, seeing music, I quickly associated myself with the communal experience happening outside, friend groups, alternative subcultures, oddities from every corner, together apart together.

The bathroom its own ecosystem, people kissing at the walls, passing around blunts and lipgloss, cold water to the face, the mirror tells you you’re okay, people are making friends, internet personas being demystified, “oh I know you from twitter, oh we’re mutuals on insta,”so much is happening but just the right amount, ecstasy is a spirit hovering about hugging people, everyone is beautiful, everyone is precious, everyone is love.

Even though I spent most of the night outside, I got to experience some of the sets, albeit briefly, We Are All Chemicals and Yosa played a back to back set that was a testimony to the power of their synergy, they played as one organism, one mind, their music bleeding into one another, coexisting and stretching out into the crowd as an infectious wave. AMEME brought his star-power to the stage, he knew how to communicate with the audience, him working as a bridge, a translator between the music and the dancers, his set was a conversation, a call and response and he played into it like a maestro. Aniko was already a well-known highlight, Group Therapy’s finest, their set was gospel, religious, praise and worship, transcendental, the people had already come to expect this from them, but still they left every set transformed, no stone was left unturned, the sick were made whole, the blind could see, and they left the rave halls to testify, Aniko’s crowd were testifiers, believers, if you somehow ever thought to yourself why the rave was called Group Therapy, this is the very moment, cast away your sorrows, your pain. “For the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil.”

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After my short escape inside to dance with my friend, my skin becoming its own pulsating organism, breathing and alive independent of me, a push and pull of symbiosis, my eyes closed, flying, swimming, opening my eyes to a kaleidoscope, I bring out my camcorder to immortalize it, I am lost in the crowd, I feel everything, I feel everything. I return outside.This is a non-linear account, if only you could traverse space time like I did that night, taking portraits of people, my camera flashes, I grin, you’ve been immortalized in a photograph, my eyes are striking, the dark eyeshadow makes me look like a vampire, so I heard, we’re all creatures of the night, I am accosted by three witches, “Are you a witch?” They ask, “No,” I say, “But I’m acquainted with a couple.” Goth girls strut like they own the place because they do, the makeup makes you look like an alien, no it’s a compliment, you don’t belong here, you’re too beautiful for this place. Gay boys with their tops off looking to bottom, I’m feeling extra voyeuristic, I like to watch, hugs linger for just as long as it takes to feel like heaven, I get excited to see a friend, they swear they’ll be back but I never see them again, it’s too many people around, many thoughts, many feelings, I drown in this pool, I am not complaining.The night starts to ease to an end, if any bad things happened that night, I am choosing not to fixate on them, sympathy is a knife, family and friends, all we have is out togetherness, the rave has prevailed through another night, if there is a reckoning, we will not see it, it will pass us by.

The night taught me multiple things, many of which aren’t even in this article, when the sun started to come up, I took a little walk on my way home, coming down, thinking about Jimi Hendrix, his album, Are You Experienced, and the title especially, a lot of us forget ourselves sometimes, especially at raves and etcetera, losing ourselves in experiences, in moments, collecting times, we experience, as we should, but we forget to be experienced, we forget to be to others special and our own universe, unforgettable in truth and sincerity. Are you experienced?