True Stories: Sterling Moss
Written By: Ben Gomori
Part Two of our double dose of True Stories this week sees Chris Liberator’s acid techno partner-in-crime Sterling Moss [pictured left] give some very sound advice about jaguars, and about how to get through a DJ set while you’re infected by rabies…
A couple of years ago I was DJing in South Africa. After playing the gig, the promoter offered to take me to see some wild animals at a park just outside of Johannesburg – I hadn’t had the opportunity on previous trips. After driving round the enclosures checking out the lions, zebras and rhinos, we stopped to visit the feeding areas. We checked out kids feeding baby white lions, but for the excitement factor decided to get into a cage with slightly larger jaguars. Fantastic experience until one of them decided to bite me on the side of my stomach! The resounding mantra of ‘don’t turn your back on them’ bounced around inside my head but to no avail – they decided that I looked like lunch.
We thought a visit to the hospital wasn’t necessary, but later that day I noticed bruising developing around the wound. The following morning I made my way back to London, via Zurich, on an extremely long plane journey considering I was nursing a puncture wound in my side.
On arrival in London I called my doctor to see if my tetanus jabs were up to date. They asked why and I replied: “I’ve been bitten”, “By what?” they enquired – “A jaguar!” They recommended I go the emergency room at the hospital immediately, where to my amusement I found not one doctor on the ward was familiar with treating wildcat bites. I don’t think there had been any incidence of that happening in London. I saw doctor after doctor and they had no clue as to what to do, nurses visited me just to check out the ‘Jaguar Man’. Eventually I sat with a doctor while he Googled wildcat bites to find the best course of action! The centre for tropical diseases was called, and after a short conversation it was recommended I should be given a month worth of rabies vaccine. Of course when you are injected with the vaccine you are being given rabies, and your body reacts as though flu is coming on – temperature, nausea, all that good stuff…every other day for a month…
After finishing the course of medication, you need to have a booster jab one week later. If you miss the jab it is very possible that you’ll have to start the month again. Unfortunately I was booked to play a week-long festival in Europe on the specific day, and so would be away for all the surrounding time. To avoid any onset of the illness, the hospital recommended taking an ice-chest to keep the vaccine live, check in at a local hospital so they could refrigerate it and then return on the specific day to have it administered. Obviously this was not an option as being given (what amounted to) a massive dose of rabies flu half was through a week of gigging was not the most convenient of ideas.
We managed to move the days around so I could return for the final jab, but that was the absolute last day I could receive it. As I was boarding the plane back to catch my final booster, I noticed a gentleman acting nervously but didn’t think anything of it. Halfway back to London this same guy would have such an extreme panic attack it would cause us to divert to Belgium to meet the emergency services. As we sat on the runway and the pilot talked over the intercom about the medical emergency on board, I thought to myself “there’s gonna be another medical emergency on board if we don’t get back soon as I’ll start howling at the moon!”.
With the clock ticking, after refuelling and waiting for a new take-off slot, we were airborne, landing with 45 minutes to spare. Miraculously straight through passport control and after a high-speed race to the hospital, I arrived as the nurse was locking up for the final appointment of the day. I slipped through with seconds to spare. As I sat there they pulled out the final vile of rabies (daubed with a skull and crossbones), administered the final shot, and I thought to myself – “never turn your back on a jaguar!”
Chris Liberator & Sterling Moss’ The Sound Of London Acid Techno sample pack is out now at loopmasters.com
Data Transmission : True Stories: Sterling Moss
