It’s
11 pm on a Wednesday night at Club X in downtown Montreal and
the joint is, well, swinging. Sixty or so sexual adventurers
of various ages, shapes and sizes have congregated to dance,
drink, and, um, let me try to put this gently . . . fuck their
brains out. Or so I’m hoping, at least. I’m here
to watch it all go down, and though I’m a little self-conscious
and arguably out of my element, I’m happy. Consider me
an easy sell when it comes to debauchery.
Sitting
up at the bar beside me on the main floor are a couple of thirty-something
mulatto chicks, a few good-looking college age couples, and
a disproportionate number of older, borderline elderly dudes.
Lounging around on the clubs sofa’s are mostly middle-aged
couples, some attractive, some not so attractive, and the odd
cluster of single men keenly eyeing the door whenever any new
meat walks in. With the exception of the homemade porn tape
screening on the club’s television monitor, and the fully
erect bronzed male statues hanging everywhere off the walls,
one could easily mistake Club X for some generic suburban discotheque
anywhere in North America. But rest assured -- it is not.
Make no mistake, the Montreal swinger scene is booming. According
to the owners, thousands of people have passed through the doors
of Club X.
Not
too long ago, if Club X were even open on a Wednesday night,
there might have been 20 people lurking around the joint looking
to bump uglies. Tonight there are easily three times that number,
and on most weekends, it’s not unusual for over 200 enthusiasts
to stop by. And that’s only Club X. Montreal is home to
at least half a dozen swinging establishments, and if the online
ads are any indication, there’s one hell of a lot of orgy
activity going down in private residences as well.
Many
of these swingers have been introduced to ‘the lifestyle’
by MB (not his real initials). A bona fide swinging ‘missionary,’
MB will tell everything you need to know about swinging etiquette:
all the local hotspots, what to expect the first time you get
naked in a room full of strangers, and how to politely tell
somebody you’re not interested in to get their stinky
ol’ appendage out of your face without hurting their feelings.
Since
2005, when a landmark decision by the Quebec Superior Court
cleared up any legal ambiguities regarding swinging; by ruling
that “contemporary Canadian society tolerates swingers'
clubs if the sexual exchanges take place in private," swingers’
clubs have been thriving.
So
long as the sexual activity takes place in a members-only club,
where there’s no chance of grandma stumbling in and accidentally
drowning in a hail storm of semen, swingers have been able to
boink to their hearts content without fear of getting busted
by the morality squad. Even though Montreal used to be the only
city in Canada, and one of the few jurisdictions in North America,
where, historically, on-site sexual activities have not only
been tolerated but actually encouraged in sex clubs, on-site
coital action had always been a bit of a grey area legally –
but that was then, and since then the sexually curious have
been coming out to the clubs in droves. 
My
primary mission this evening, outside of collecting various
mental images for future private stroking sessions, is to locate
and interview the owner, MB, who, as it turns out, happens to
be hosting tonight’s event. So far I’ve been having
trouble pinning him down. MB has been running around organizing
a game of sexual musical chairs slated to go down later, working
the DJ booth, and giving tours of the club to the considerable
number of first-timers in attendance. With all the newcomers
here tonight, he has his hands full, and when I finally catch
up to him he politely informs me that he will only be able to
talk to me later on in the evening. He introduces me to two
very attractive young couples, letting them know I’m a
journalist of sorts, and suggests I get any 411 I need for the
time being from them. I hang with them for a few minutes, but
before I can send any relevant questions their way, it’s
announced over the PA system that the club’s doors are
now officially closed to the public and it’s time to let
the games begin. Veronique and Ginette, the two thoroughly delicious
chicks I’ve just been introduced to, abruptly excuse themselves
to go play musical sex chairs. I decide not to take it personally.
It
doesn’t take long for me to realize that sexual musical
chairs is possibly the greatest game ever invented. The way
it works is that six men (I was invited to participate but politely
declined) are lined up on couches that have been placed on the
dance floor. Six chicks then dance around them, circling the
couches until the music is stopped, at which point they have
one minute to give the dude who happens to be in front of them
a boner. They do this with their mouths, their breasts, whatever
arsenal they choose to work with, and once their minute is up,
the barmaid goes around squeezing each dude’s exposed
erection to determine who is the least hard. The couple producing
the softest hard-on gets ejected from the game, and they start
the process all over again until there is only one couple left,
ahem, standing. Later, the tables are turned and the men circle
the couches, trying to produce the hardest nipples on the women.
Neither Veronique nor Nathalie win the game officially, but
after witnessing their bone-inspiring talents, I decide they
are both winners in my book and tell them as much. They’re
sweet and polite, but clearly couldn’t care less what
I think about their considerable gifts.
Immediately
after the games come to a close, most people start making their
way downstairs to the orgy, or rather, ‘play’ rooms.
Knowing full well that this is where I want to be, I decide
to give up pestering MB for awhile and waste no time securing
myself a spot right in the middle of the action. One side of
the room is full of beds reserved for couples that just want
to make out undisturbed, or rather, untouched, by the several
naked single males lurking around discreetly tugging on their
ding-dongs. On the other side of the room is the ‘cum-one,
cum-all’ area where those looking for anonymous strangers
to come give ‘em a poke can hang out. For the moment there
is just one slender woman in her early 40s in this latter section,
buck naked and performing fellatio on one of the old dudes who
was sitting at the bar with me earlier. I notice that the old
guy may be boney but he’s hung like a horse. Bravo! A
few moments later a younger stud joins in and starts working
her from behind. It’s all good.
The
volume of sexual activity starts to intensify and when I glance
across the room I’m thrilled to discover that a stark
naked and spread-eagled Veronique is knee-deep in a scene with
Nathalie and her boyfriend. Another young straight-looking English-speaking
couple, Concordia university students I suspect, pull up on
the bed beside them and also start doing the nasty, occasionally
looking over at Veronique’s scene for inspiration, and
less occasionally reaching over to the bed on the other side
of them to cop a feel of the middle-aged triad going at it next
door.
As
more people enter the room and take off their clothes, the place
starts to smell a little too much like a locker room for my
liking, but there ain’t no way I’m about to call
it a night and go home-even if the lady participating in the
threesome unfolding just a few feet in front of me looks way
too much like my Mom for comfort. I still haven’t done
any interviews of note and it’s certainly not every day
I get to hang out in to a scene straight out of Fellini’s
Satyricon.
A man
my age approaches me and tells me that his wife would like me
to come over and ‘play’ with her. I look over and
see an exotic looking chick giving me the eyeball, beckoning
me to come to her bed. I tell him I appreciate the offer but
am pretty sure my wife would hold it against me if I came home
smelling of exotic looking chick. “Sure, no problem, I
understand” he tells me, and I get the impression that
he honestly does. I'm not so sure his wife does though, 'cuz
10 minutes later I notice she's left her perch and has discreetly
made her way over to my side of the room, seemingly intent on
wrapping her lips around my joystick. I'm actually a little
flattered. After all, there's certainly no shortage of man meat
in the joint, plenty of other bones for an attractive gal like
her to gnaw on. Sheesh, it could almost make a feller feel kinda
special.
Despite
what many might choose to believe, there is remarkably little
pressure to get involved in the action, and I have no doubts
that an attractive single female hanging out in the orgy room
is far less likely to get harassed than she would at most other
clubs in town-or simply walking down the street for that matter.
Say what you will about swingers, but they certainly understand
the concept of respect, and there ain’t nobody pressuring
nobody to have sex here. It’s simply considered uncool.
In light of the recent uptick in reported sexual assaults at
McGill and other university campuses, female students looking
to let their guard down without fear of being harassed might
well consider slugging back cocktails at a swinger’s club,
where everybody appears to understand that “no”
actually means “no.”
Just
as I’m thinking about finally heading home a young blonde
girl I was drooling over earlier in the evening comes down to
the room with some guy, starts to disrobe and make her way over
to the shower area. I’d been hoping all night that this
delectable temptress would wind up in the orgy room and am eager,
along with all the other voyeurs in the room, to bear witness
to her in all her glory. But just as she and her boyfriend start
getting down to business, I feel a tap on my shoulder. It’s
MB. He’s naked from the waist down. “Okay, I’m
ready to do my interview now” he tells me, penis in hand.
But I’m too distracted to talk to him. I try and ask him
a few questions, but I don’t really hear his answers.
The blond chick has her boyfriend in her mouth and is masturbating
wildly while another half-naked girl is chomping down on her
breasts. MB is no doubt an interesting guy, and I need his quotes
to do this story, but I just can’t muster up the professionalism
to interview him in the midst of all this activity.
“How
are you making out?” he asks me. “You know, the
great thing about Montreal swingers is that people are very
kind and respectful to newcomers here.” “Oh, yes,
yes, I’m sure,” I mutter, vainly trying to focus
my attention on his words and not the sounds of the blond chick
bringing herself to orgasm. “And it’s not about
money yet either, you know” he continues, “Swinging
is still a sub-culture in Montreal, not an industry. Nobody
makes a living off of running a sex club here, it’s for
the love of it.”
I grunt
an acknowledgement but MB recognizes that my attentions are
focused elsewhere. “Would you rather we do this at another
time?” he finally asks me considerately. “Um, uh,
yeah, that’s probably a better idea,” I tell him,
“there’s too much, uh . . . noise, in here to concentrate.”
“Another day then?”
I answer
in the affirmative. Because damn right that’s something
I might want to do. Even if interviewing MB has absolutely nothing
to do with it anymore. It dawns on me that his may well have
been the greatest night of my entire life. Consider me an easy
sell when it comes to debauchery.
Also
by Chris Barry:
Bust
a Move
Trapeze
- Swinging Ad Extremis
Hells
in Paradise
The
Cannabis Cup
Colonic
Hydrotheraphy
