I Love Uni White Party - Home Nightclub

I’ve been asked to check this University event out. A combined effort of all the universities, targeted for students who had just had their first O-Week. Well, considering my own O-week was about 8 years ago, I was wondering whether I should go. Then.. on the promo poster were the magic words: “WHITE PARTY”. Can anybody say GANDALF DA WHITE IS BACK??!! Got my dancing partner C to come along and so off we set our dancing merry feet – here we go!

I Love Uni White Party @ Home Nightclub

Assessment Time: 11:00pm – 3:00am
Opening Hours: 9:30pm – late (4-5am?)
Website: http://www.homesydney.com.au
Address:  Cockle bay wharf, Darling Harbour, Sydney
Dress Code / Door Policy: White attire only. However people who were not wearing white were still allowed in, despite warnings that people were not going to be allowed in.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $15 presold tickets (sold out). $25 at the door. The girl at the counter liked my outfit and I asked for a discount for having such an ‘awesome’ outfit.  She lowered my entry fee to $20. Score!
Guestlist: none
Inside: The White Party event was for the main arena room to hold 500 or so people. All the other rooms were closed. Later after midnight, the other trance / house / rock band rooms were opened up for the general public.
Cloak Room: Did not utilise cloak room today.
Bar: Didn’t drink tonight
DJ: Unknown.
Music: RnB initially in the main room. After around midnight, a change of DJ’s and an opening of doors to the public for sublime ensure the RnB was killed, and house and trance/ house took over for the rest of the night. It was strange because at one point in the night, a singer came out and sang some house songs, it was so bloody bizarre – how could people dance to this?? The small room upstairs was also used for a local rock band gig. I have never seen it done like this – what has happened to Sublime?? I was disappointed in one’s choice of music selection to dance to after the rnb stopped.
Crowd: Lots of asians for the rnb component, with a sprinkle of other nationalities. Almost all are uni students. Of course, as rnb is killed, the rnb lovers left and the ratio became a mixed bag of everything – Whites, Asians, Indians.
Entertainment: MC and professional male dance crews. Wow, they actually *do* hire men to dance. They were more house dancers but were pretty good at what they did.
Atmosphere: Main room was always happening. The other rooms later in the night were only so so. The sublime room was the only other somewhat happening room for the trance lovers.

Video: – 360 view at around 2am,
Taken by C – you can see me for 2 seconds dancing with a random dude

Click here to view the embedded video.

Keep reading on for Gandalf’s adventures!

Timeline

Gandalf is back
It’s been 10 weeks since I took over Sensation White Melbourne.. and now it was time to take over Australia’s largest club. (yeah, it really is the largest one). As I line up, people in line are pretty much staring at my awesome outfit. People left right centre are taking photos of me and with me, and I still haven’t stepped into the club yet! I think the outfit is alright. I still like my pirate one better.

No usyd represent?!
This was a joint university thing. There were placards everywhere with “I <3 UNSW”, “I <3 UTS”, and “I <3 MACQ” .. but where was “I <3 USYD”??? Nowhere, my friend. I couldn’t find any placards. What a travesty!! Well, someone has to represent!

Photobooth is designed to steal your money.
Met some girls and we jumped into the photobooth for photos. It’s 8 dollars!! Jesus H. Christ what a rip off. So in goes 1 dollar, 2 dollars.. a few more.. until it says there is $1.50 left. Chuck in a dollar and it doesn’t accept it. Throw another $2 coin and it just swallows it. Oh my god.. what a crafty little machine this was… eating our money and yet not producing photos!! What a load of horseshit! Meanwhile, immature teenage boys keep peeking into the booth, praying that we are having an orgy of some sorts. Ha, one can only dream.

I have many many fans. Most of them guys.
A lot of guys come up and say things like ‘awesome outfit’, ‘can I have a photo?’, ‘JESUS!’, or anything along those lines. I like them, I take photos and usually we part. But shit, this one particular guy followed me around half the night! After we had our photo I dug into the main room and beelined to the middle. I turn around he is right behind me, following me! Fair enough, so I stop, but he stops as well. He wants to hang out and dance with Gandalf. My golly gosh. Biggest grin on his face everytime I looked back at him. He’s a fan of me, big deal. I had a suspicion he could have been gay, but I will never know.

He stalked me around the place

Getting up on main stage.
People are jumping up on stage and a random girl I met has jumped up for dance. Other people who are trying to get up are promptly taken down by security. I decide to give it a try, since I have the best outfit tonight and all. I crawl up onto the stage and stand up in front of the crowd. Everyone cheers, but within 2 seconds the security detail tell me to get off. So so unfair. Meanwhile the random girl is left ALONE up on stage to dance. She isn’t even dancing. I would call it swaying her body left and right, with the occasional booty bump to add flavour. She was obviously loving this attention. Godamn some things in life are unfair. One day I will be allowed up on stage!!

More guys follow me to take leftovers
Most places I went in the main room, guys are following me. I am noticing a trend. Girls come up to me and talk, and then these guys are swooping in left right and centre to be my wingman. I didn’t ask for this! Oh well, what are you going to do.

Girls don’t like hairy guys
I love this outfit. I walked by a few girls (and this only happens with girls) .. and you can see the look on their face as I walk by. Their entire face screws up into the ‘what the f*ck?’ look, or occaisionally a girl would turn around and see me coming – they literally YELP in shock / fright about this menacing wizard walking past. It’s quite entertaining for me. haha

Boob Squeeze War!
Yeah, a random girl squeezes my boobs without permission. I find that unfair, so I naturally grabbed and squeezed her boobs back without asking her. She REELED BACK in horror and gave me the DIRTIEST look ever. hahahahahahhahahaa..  how does it go – eye for an eye?

.. so take off all your robes
It was getting hot in here, so off went the cape and wigs. I felt like a free man. Meanwhile the wigs and cape sit near a group of 8 or so asians, who stare at me, C and her friend dance. They are literally gawking at us. I would probably have been doing the same thing back when I was 18/19, praying one day I could dance like that.

Getting pretty hot.. took off the beard

Anyway they seem bored and decide to do what any normal bored person does at a club – PUT ON SOMEONE ELSE’S OUTFIT. Second thing I know, there is a guy with my wig, beard and cape on. It’s funny, but I have to keep a close eye on it – I don’t want to get this stuff stolen. They seem friendly enough and we take some happy snaps. They can’t dance though, which was a shame.

He put on my white outfit without asking - it suits him though

Here’s an extra video of a raver at the Sublime room:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Arrivederci
C and friend want to leave at 2am, primarily of the bizarre music that was now playing, but Gandalf convinces them to stay another hour, and we leave 3am.

Recommendation

First half rnb was good. Everyone is in the party mood. However only the main room was open at this time for the rnb lovers. Still was a good atmosphere.

I Love Uni @ Home Nightclub (upto midnight) – 7.5/10

Second half is where the sublime / Oh My! crowd came in.. mixed feelings – all rooms were opened up and the choice of music you want to dance to was wide open, but the crowd just wasn’t there. There were not enough people to fill all rooms up. It was busy, but not like you would expect on an old ‘Famous’ Saturday night when it was truly at capacity. If the ‘I Love Uni’ was not on earlier – I am pretty sure the place would have been pretty dead. The trance room was a sad sight – I wish more people were into it – however the people inside were friendly and just danced away.

Oh My / Sublime @ Home Nightclub Sydney – 5/10

Homemade Saturdays @ Home Nightclub Sydney
Assessment Time: 11:30pm – 1:45am
Website: http://www.homesydney.com
Address: Cockle Bay Wharf
Dress Code: Casual ok. I wore a t-shirt, jeans and dress shoes.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: Something ridiculous like $25 I think. No thumbprint scanners tonight.
Guestlist: Did not submit one, but visit the website to submit a guestlist.
Inside: See video. Basically one big room, 3 other dance rooms and a chill out room. Chill out room is not featured in the walkthrough video.
Cloak Room: $3 or $4 I think. Memory bad.  Cloak room is not advertised, but is it at the end of the main room bar, right next to the speakers.
DJ: Same DJ as last time here on a Satuday. Don’t know his name but he’s bald, and hates guys dancing up on the front podium.
Music: Electro/Commercial house in main room, old school rnb upstairs. See video.
Crowd: Mixed. Even mix of asian, caucasian, black, white, whatever.
Atmosphere: Very good and vibing tonight. Packed for a change. It was pissing down raining outside, so there might be a correlation there.
Entertainment: Front podium dancers and MC to keep it going.

Main Room Home Nightclub - 3rd October 2009 - Very packed and alive

Video: Walkthrough of Home Nightclub:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Thoughts
Tonight is packed. Surprise!
Really packed tonight. Not just downstairs, but the other rooms were bustling heaps as well. Strange, as the other two nights I came here, the other rooms were quite dead. The rain outside probably really did keep people inside – you would think rain would keep people inside at home, no?

Watered down Tequila shots.. and my solution to solve this ridiculous issue.
Drunken behaviour is bad sometimes. So they decided to serve tequila shots… ON ICE. First its no shots after midnight.. now tequila on the rocks? That’s just going too far!!! I am 25 godamn it, not 18! They should give us 25 year olds special privilege to have pure shots, as well as shots after midnight, and let everybody else have only diluted shots on ice. NOW THAT’S AN IDEA AUSTRALIA!

Dancing
I danced heaps on the podium in the main room. It’s good to get it out of the system. They even allowed people to shoulder ride, which is nice. Here’s a short excerpt of the night.

Video: Tiesto’s Adagio for Strings at Home Nightclub:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Kicked out thanks to passing out
One of my friends passed out, and we were dragging her sorry ass outside. Bouncer saw us and helped kick all of us out. We had to find her other friend. We found her also passed out, in the women’s toilet. Classy indeed. Apparently the water downed tequila shots seriously pushed her over the edge. LOL.

A blow up boyfriend
While looking for the second friend, I bumped into a hen’s night. They somehow managed to brign a Male blow-up doll into the place. I wonder if the doll had to pay for entry as well. I took a photo with them. She shoved the mans face into mine, and I accidentally kissed him. Gross.

Me, the hen and our boyfriend the blow up doll. I think his name was Ken.

Coda
Kicked out 1:30am by association of drunk friend. 2am lock out also applied as we did try to go back inside.

Recommendation
Despite the tequila on the rocks… it was a pretty good night tonight!

Homemade Saturdays @ Home Nightclub Sydney, 3rd October 2009 – 7/10

About Home Nightclub:
Location: Cockle Bay wharf, Darling Habour
Website: http://www.homesydney.com
Inside: All rooms except the mid-wall room was open. Main room on the floor, with upstairs balcony area and 2nd bar. Outdoor smoking area connected to this. A 2nd smaller room on the 2nd level. 3rd level are 2 extra rooms. This place is a maze of rooms.

About Homemade Saturdays:
Assessment Time: 1.30am-3.30am
Dress Code: Casual ok. I was wearing my tuxedo from the wedding. You also get fingerprinted and photo scanned on the way in.
Entry Fee / Cover Charge: $25
Guestlist: See website
Cloakroom: Yes, at the bar near at the DJ eng.
Bar: $12 yaberbombs.
Music: House in the main room. Can’t complain, all the commercial house tunes were being played. Actually it was executed quite well here. There was also a saxophone player to add another dimension to the music – much like the Bongo players at Bungalow  and Cargo Bar.

Supporting saxaphone player used to great effect with the music

RNB room – RNB of course – but I wasn’t there long enough.

Party tunes and retro at the top level. They seemed to have combined all the rooms into one major huge event.
Crowd: Mixed – Asians, Euros
Atmosphere: Party and vibing in the main room. However the other rooms seemed pretty dead. Especially the RNB room as nobody was there – it was the most dead room of them all. There were a hundred other places where you could have your proper rnb fix – and Home Nightclub doesn’t seem to be popular right now as the place to be for it.

360 from the main podium

Click here to view the embedded video.

Timeline:
Kicked off the podium by the sexist DJ
There are girls up at the front dancing. Drunk old me wants a dance too! I went up and danced for a good 50 seconds. Then I hear a:

DJ: “OI!”
James: (turns around)
DJ: “GET OFF THE STAGE – NOW!!!”
James: (jumps off stage)

Man.. what a cold DJ. Given, he probably has a lot of drunk guys coming up onto his stage, but fuck you anyway Mr DJ, even if you played really good beats. A minute later I have my female friend go up and dance, and there was no objections. Total sexism!!!

Recognized by girls I took a photo with 2 months ago
There are other girls up on stage. I am a pervert and I take photos of them. They see me and they recognize me:
Girls: ‘OMG! It’s you! You’re the sailor!!’

There was only one time previously I dressed up as a sailor – at an rnb Pajama Party 3 months ago, full of asians. But I did take a photo with 2 euro girls…

With 2 girls and Samurai man at the Pajama party

Ahh.. now I remember them! We take another photo. How on earth does someone recognize an Asian, from the million other Asians in sydney? I don’t know.. I thought we all looked the same !

The girls recognized me 3 months later. Amazing!

Though not as epic as the girl who recognized me 20 months later.. its rare that these things happen, and when they do happen, I never forget them.

Why I only danced in the main room:
The main room was where it was at. Huge elevated podium at the back, and lots of people. I took a break to see the other rooms. RNB room was so dead it wasn’t funny. Upstairs there was another house room, but it was an absolute sausage fest – no way I was going to dance in there.

The other retro room was dead as well. What WAS with Home lately, and why was it so dead?? Whatever happened to the days when Famous was here and it was totally packed? A shame as well nobody here liked the RNB room. The DJ mustv’e been suffering real bad.

RNB Room - Homemade Saturdays at Home Nightclub - oh its so dead

Swapping photo shots:
I looked up and some drunk idiots were waving down. I waved back. They waved even harder back at me. I took out my camera and took a photo of them. They took theirs out and took a photo of me. Pretty funny.

Randoms who took a photo of me. I took one back.

Coda
We left from exhaustion and hunger

Recommendation
You can spend $25 at a better spot for house – such as chinese laundry. I can’t recommend this place as somewher worth visiting unless you just hang around in the main room.. A shame, as last time I came here (when only half the rooms were open) it wasn’t too bad at all. Now that all rooms are open, people are more spread out.. and it gives a more sucky vibe. Hopefully in the future it would pick up.

A small mention on the radio of an RNB night on Friday at Home Nightclub. The last time I went to a RNB event at Home bar, it went off! Sounds good, so I dragged my friends along. Here we go!

Assessment Time: 10:30pm – 12:30pm
Address: Cockle Bay Wharf
Door Policy / Dress Code: Casual ok
Cover Charge / Entry Fee: $20. $10 on guestlist.
Guestlist: Unknown, but one was available
Inside: Only the main room was open for tonight’s one-off RNB special. Main floor could hold a few hundred people.
Bar: $12 Yagerbombs
Music: RNB. Typical RNB tunes playing. Regulars to sublime trance event only had the upstairs rooms tonight.
Crowd: There was nobody here, but the crowd that was here, was Mixed. Indian, Asian, Black, Aussie, Euro. Our group represented the only asians.
Atmosphere: Dead.

Timeline
Home nightclub – an empty shell
There was no line for our RNB event. Bad sign, but it was early. We walked into the main floor and this is what we saw:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Here’s a picture of my friend with dancefloor behind.

Friend and the main dancefloor behind him. Nobody is behind him.

Yup.. that’s right.. there was NOTHING. NOBODY. Where on earth was everyone?? Did the promoters even bother to properly promote this ?? There were some people on the side seats, sitting down – too scared to even fathom to go on the dancefloor.  This place was as dead as a dick after coitus. Nobody wanted to dance, but not me. Not James Tran. I MARCHED RIGHT UP AND DANCED IN THE MIDDLE OF HOME NIGHTCLUB – THE LARGEST NIGHTCLUB IN AUSTRAILA. ALONE. AND I DANCED.

I danced for a few minutes, before this self amusement looked a bit weird in front of the other people. Evolution of dance crowd attempt failed. Nobody wanted to join James for a dance.

I asked the bargirl if it was always this busy.
“Sometimes, it depends” she replies. It wasn’t looking too hopeful.

“Maybe it’ll pick up later”, friends say. It didn’t.

We get kicked off the DJ stage, because we don’t have the hook ups.
Me and my friend see some girls up on stage just dancing, so we decide to join them. Here’s a video – look for me up on stage bopping around:

Click here to view the embedded video.

One of the girls comes up to my friend and asks her if she knew the DJ. No, my friend didn’t know the DJ. He obviously is a popular DJ.
The girl says to my friend “you can only come up here if you know the DJ”. We were then ceremoniously booted off the stage, not before they took photos with us.

Me, Friend, and two friends of the DJ who kicked us off the stage. lol there were just as many people on the dancefloor as up on stage.

So, the entire population of women were only here because the DJ invited them?? What is this place?? HAHAHA. What a joke! There was NOBODY on the floor to show off to. Well there was just this one Xzibit lookalike black guy sipping on his drink, but he wasn’t dancing. He did really looked like Xzibit though.

Entertaining ourselves in this wasteland called a nightclub
Some things to pass the time with. Feel free to use these ideas for your own when you find yourself in a similar dire situation:

1. I play choo choo train around the dead dance floor with a friend – the few people on the dancefloor looked at us with amusement, as I ‘CHOO CHOO’ chug around the floor with my friend behind me,  turning her wheels. A ‘transport’ version of the conga line.
2. We play some limbo – a great time killer. Just use two people to hold their arms out, and everybody else goes under!
3. Jumping around in group circles, while everybody stares at us.
4. I sleaze myself in front of 4 girls – These girls just came into the club. I went up to the prettiest girl and with my sleaziest voice said “Wanna dance?”. She gave me a bemused face, and I said it again but with an added line -  “Wanna dance .. with, THIS?” and I slowly point to myself, up and down. Another bemused look, and her friends are giggling. Meanwhile my friends out back are cracking themselves laughing. haha.. this wasn’t going anywhere. They left the club altogether after that encounter. I suppose I did them a favour.

I’m sorry.
My friends know I run this blog. They wanted me to pick a good club tonight. They put their trust in me. I failed them in the greatest way possible by making them come to a night worse than clubbing at that sole club in Katoomba – Yup, there *is* a club there – I was the only one there, with a 40 something year old DJ playing James Brown and other hip artists. I even tweeted a recommendation to come here tonight without doing my research. I suck, and I apologize.

I don’t apologize on the promoters though. Without them, they would not have made such a crap night possible. This was an epic fail.

Coda
After giving this place 2 hours to revive itself, we left to Pontoon Bar.

Recommendation:
Do not go to events which are not properly promoted. Whoever promoted this event, get professional help. PLEASE.

POST CODA: Pontoon Bar
I’m not going to write a separate post for this. Free Entry, 10 times more packed – which made it a billion times better. I highly recommend it if you have nowhere else to go for your RNB needs. H

We even saw some other people come in from Home Nightclub. I was too ashamed to acknowledge them, and they were probably too ashamed as well to recognize me. It’s one of those things you just don’t talk about with a fellow clubber.

There are a high concentration of Indians, so if you don’t like that crowd (I don’t mind but some others don’t), then don’t go here.Here’s a video in comparison.

Until next time.

Pontoon Bar Afterwards - 100x more people than Home Nightclub tonight

Homemade Saturdays @ HOME Sydney
Website: http://www.homemadesaturdays.com/
Cover Charge / Entry Fee: Free entry before 9.30pm for all on guest list and $10 after till 10.30pm and after that $15 till 11pm, VIP CLOSES 11pm and then general admission applies which is $25
Guestlist: Submitted through guestlistsydney.com, but you can also send to party@promotersinc.com or party@homesydney.com
Music: Main arena consists of House, Dance, Electro, Rnb mashups/remixes. This was enough to keep everybody around happy. Highlight of the night was “Im on a boat” near closing time. The smaller room is the specialized RNB room tonight. I wasn’t in here too long, as my friends hung out in the main arena most of the time.
Dress Code: Casual allowed. Dress up allowed. My hat was allowed.

Crowd: Mixed. Locals, backpackers, and different nationalities everywhere.
Atmosphere: Main Arena big party mood. Rnb room, was the same, but because of the smaller size it was more isolated for each group of people there. It was pretty packed in here. It was pretty good.
Entertainment: MC to keep things running in main arena. Random people (ie pretty girls) picked to get up and dance.
Cloak Room: Yes

Timeline
It’s my birthday! and someone else’s too!
Everybody I saw, I would absolutely announce to them that “It’s my birthday!”. Either people said “happy birthday!” back or they wouldn’t believe me, and they would stand there ignoring the drunk old James.  Then suddenly some guy replied back and said it was his birthdate as well. We compared licenses and OMG we had the same birthday!!. It was his 21st birthday. Pretty cool to meet someone else with the same birthday!

Even mum can’t stop me from taking home a Scottish girl.
“Hey! its my birthday!” I say to the two girls at the bar. They’re friendly, and about 10 minutes later I’m making out with one of them. After about 30 minutes of this continual making out. I was getting tired, and my braces were starting to irritate my lips. I wanted to dance!!! She says no, and wants to go home with me.
girl: “so who do you live with?”

me: “my mum. You are not coming over. My room is next to hers”
girl: “I promise to be quiet”
me: (omg lol) “no! what about yours?”
girl: “I have flatmates! Let me come over, you can kick me out in the morning before she wakes up!”
OMFG LOL WHAT AN OFFER… A girl offering a free bang AND I don’t have to make breakfast for her! Did god really want me to get laid tonight as a birthday present?

Decision was made to leave, but on the way out her friends find her and take her away. Oh well. Back to dancing!!

Taking over the dancefloor – how I did it
I was still high off my kite. Joined my two guy friends who had stayed behind. Everyone else had gone home while I was making out with Scottish girl. It was my birthday and I decided to  talk to everybody on the dancefloor and inform them it was my birthday, which is exactly what I did.  Here are some of the stories from  my waltzing around:

Irish couple: I found a girl alone and talked to her. Suddenly her boyfriend comes up and says hi! omg -.- Then I told him, I was just talking to her to protect her from other creeps (such as me LOL). He thanks me and we’re friends. Phew! It was his last day in sydney before he and his girlfriend go back to Ireland. That was pretty cool. Throughout the rest of the night we have merry Irish dancing. I showed him the new riverdance dance I finally learned from a girl who taught me at We Love Sounds 2 weeks ago. He’s impressed and we all do a little riverdance.

Lebanese girls: Walking by, one of them takes my hat. I grab the thief and I dance with her. I announce it was my birthday. She gives me a birthday kiss on the lips and calls me a “hot asian”. Thanks, but please tell me something I don’t know! LOL… the birthday god was here at Home nightclub for sure.

Birthday boy: I bumped into the guy who had the same birthday as me, and we have a little dance with his friends. Awesome guy.

Dancing guys: A group of guys. I join their circle for a dance. Big cheers and more merry dancing. This is fun!

Girl with a big muscly guy: Everytime I went by her, she stole my hat. But she was with this big muscle man. I didn’t even want to TRY to hit on her, but I did announce it was my birthday. So I dance normally with her. Then suddenly when he turns around away,  she gives me a wet one on the lips. OMG wow. But as much as I wanted to, I was not going down this road of having a literal birthday bash, even if the birthday god was watching over me tonight. I take my hat and run back to find the next person to announce my birthday to.

Some other women: Bunch of 30 something women dancing alone. I announced to them it was my birthday. One says cool and we dance. She looked bored, so I dragged her around to say hi to all my new dancefloor friends. She teaches me Salsa, but I still can’t get my head around. Then i left.

By this point in time it was around 2.30am, and I basically said “hello, its my birthday” to everybody, and everyone here was my new friend. Pretty cool! Me and my two friends dance off the night away.

They played ‘I’m on a boat’!
Around 3.30am, the DJ plays “Im on a boat” by the Lonely Island. This has got to be possibly the greatest birthday present ever. Dancing to this awesome song. Me and my friends go mad and chant along to it, and some of the crowd know it too and singalong too.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Coda
Sometime after 4am the club closes, and I said bye to everyone.. there were probably 30 or so people left. An awesome night for us.

About Home Bar

Address: 101 Cockle Bay Wharf, Darling Harbour (opposite the IMAX theatre)
Website: http://www.homesydney.com
Inside: Entry is via their side door. It is not accessible via the front bar entrance. When you enter, there is a little foyer with two openings. On the right opening is entry to the main room. The other is a set of stairs that lead up.

The main room is quite large both in terms of dimensions and height. You enter from the back where the bar resides. At the back is a technician (yes, a light and possibly sound technician) The DJ is at the front. The huge Shiny sublime logo hangs as a modern day chandelier. Overlooking the main room on 3 sides is a balcony setup where people are peering down Upstairs is another bar and the balcony peering over downstairs. On Level 2 there is a small room playing trance music. Another set of stairs around the bar leads you to level 3 -  set of stairs and a tiny room resides where slow house plays. It’s not crowded and it’s quite good music, but it was dead as throughout the night.

The main room of Home Nightclub. Taken from the 2nd level balcony

About BSXC
A once off event, possibly once a year for the UNSW BSOC.
Entry: $10 (1st round), $15 (2nd round), $20 (3rd round). $25 at the door. A relative bargain.
Crowd: Dominantly Asian. It was UNSW, after all.
Atmosphere: Main room – very good. Use of MC had the crowd continually going. Trance room – Small, but there was no pretentiousness when dancing here. House room upstairs – Dead most of the night, but for me, seemed to be the best room, I liked the beats, and I loved the freedom to dance, compared to downstairs were it was packed to the rafters.

Entertainment: I caught a glimpse of some dancers at the front. Don’t know if there were any other forms of entertainment. It was a good way to break things up. No podium dancers at this place, nor podiums to speak of.

Timeline
Got in around 10pm, and it was packed as in the main room. I headed straight for the cloak room.  Everyone got their bags in,  then it was my turn to put my bag in the cloak room- “sorry, the cloak room is full”. NO WAY!! I KNEW I should have gotten here earlier for the bar tab. I hid the bag behind a chair, where a couple was already making out.

Earplugs (a plug)
I was in front of one of the main speakers while waiting for the cloak room. It was so loud, I could literally feel my clothes and body vibrate to the really loud music. I had my earplugs in my ears to save me (later when I got home – no ringing!) – Thank god for earplugs!
They aren’t that bad, and some people do notice, but most of the time people don’t really care. Its only when you take photos and see you realise how dorky looking you look like:

Myself with an orange 32dB reducing ear plug, (and my chest hair)

Room switching
I’m an impulsive dancer – When I hear a song, I run off to the next room and dance, until I am sick of the song playing over there as well. This way, it sort of keeps me happy through the night, instead of being stuck in one room where you have no choice in what music you wish to dance to. I like these kind of venues, but sadly most only have one room of music.

Phased closing
First they closed the top level house room, then they close the trance room and everyone was pushed to the bottom rnb level, where they started to play some more commercial house than rnb. It was a bizarre mix. At least the MC was still there on the mic

Some technical difficulties
Unfortunately throughout the night, especially nearing the end, there were a few sound difficulties. Meaning that at one time the music was pumping at normal loud levels, then suddenly the volume would cut in half! It became as quiet than a lounge, and people could actually have normal conversations in the room. This kind of happened to often, and just got a little annoying.

Teenagers – everywhere
I have never seen so many sets of braces at a club, ever. I think everybody I met or talked to here was under 20. This line pretty much scaerd me:

“I just turned 18 in April!”. April was 3 weeks ago. I didn’t start proper clubbing until I was 22. A late bloomer. Everybody I met here said it was their first time here. I felt pretty old here! Oh well, it more or less made me look like an awesome dancer since they couldn’t dance.

Videos:
Twirling in the trance room:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Spinning glowsticks on strings, around 2am:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Coda
Left at around 2am, I was exhausted. Over an an average to good night. Nothing much to complain about, which is good.

Time to go back into Rnb again with Selvi on this heavily promoted night.

[ This is Urban @ Home Bar ]
A once off event for Boxing Day 2007
Music: Main room rnb, House and Trance in the others.
Crowd: Dominantly Asian, some Africans.
Atmosphere: Crowded, Hot, Fun
Cover Charge: $35, $30 on guestlist, free if you organised a large guestlist(?).

[ Experiences ]
Me, Selvi, Pedro, Su and Su’s friend were here tonight. I had the hat, bandana, tie and sunnies on.. the most accessories I’ve worn in a night. The line was superlong. Two lines. One for pre-paid or discount tickets and one for pay at the door. Funnily the door price line went faster than the cheaper line.

Right after going in we went upstairs and I did some dancing. After a few minutes a group of girls lead went up to me…

Pretty blonde leader wanted to keep my hat.. in exchange for her mobile number. I really didn’t want to give my hat away for this girls number , so I said no… silly old me. I danced with her friends for a bit, her Filo friend kept falling with her heels on, and I had to constantly catch her! There was no close..

Su. We danced for a minute.. then she danced with some other guy wearing goggles. She danced with him for a bit (and snogged I think according to Selvi), then I bumped into her again. She then latched onto me for the rest of the night and didn’t want to dance with him again .. strange. Goggle guy liked my tie, though I didn’t get a pic with him.

Su and I just walked around and tried to pick up guys and girls respectively. She is so picky. Su had a few guys approach her but she just rejected them all. I danced with chicks a plenty.. scared a few as well.. while some tried to outdance me… including the one below.

Katrina i think was her name. Hilarious she was for some reason!

[ Coda ]
We just got tired and hungry.. left around 3am. The place was still packed.

Home is a great place for any event. Fucking expensive though.

About Famous
What: Originally from Melbourne, this weekly event has only recently made its Sydney debut a few months ago.

Music: House, but played by good DJ’s. I don’t know anything about the DJ scene as I just go for the experience. There are three flavours of house tonight. There’s the current trend of electro house in the main room. Then in the other two rooms there is a slow ambient kind of house.. almost SHE-like, and another more experimental garage house to best explain it.

Cover Charge - $25. $20 on guestlist. Free if you’re the birthday boy or girl and organized a guestlist.

Crowd: Aussie / Euro

Entertainment Two podium dancers shook their stuff at the front. They were very very good dancers.

About Home Bar:
Location: Situated in Darling Harbour and the start of a long line of bars and clubs along the Eastern side of Darling Harbour which ends at ing St Wharf. Next to IMAX.

The place: Entry is via their side door. It is not accessible via the front bar entrance. When you enter, there is a little foyer with two openings. On the right opening is entry to the main room. The other is a set of stairs that lead upstairs.

The main room is quite large both in terms of dimensions and height. You enter from the back where the bar resides. The DJ is at the front. The huge Shiny ‘F’ logo hangs as a modern day chandelier. Overlooking the main room on 3 sides is a balcony setup where people are peering down Upstairs is another bar and the balcony peering over downstairs. There are lounges in one of the internal balconies. On the left near the stairs there is another hallway which snakes you to another room. No music is playing here. However there is a zillion lounges and an outdoor balcony to smoke. This room is probably for people to actually have a chance to talk to each other without yelling.

Back outside the snakey hallway, there are yet another set of stairs cleverly hid behind the bar. Walk up the first set of stairs and a tiny room resides where slow house plays. It’s not crowded and it’s quite dark so it’s a good place to start practicing clubbing. Walk up he second set of stairs and you are on the top level. There is a bar, and another small room, where the more raw/fast house is being played. I can’t remember. It’s well lit and it’s full of men who aren’t dancing.

Timeline
The line: Anything held at home bar has a long lines. It was no different tonight. When I got there, a line from the place was stretched to kingdom come. I hoped Selvi had lined up earlier so I could score a lazy entry. “JAMES!!” I hear. It’s Selvi. She’s right at the front about to go in! Thank heavens, she is good for something after all. I cut right in, surely upsetting the massive line behind me who were waiting fair and square. I say hello to the birthday girl and make fluff chat with her friends. Line control man is ushering us in “Hurry up hurry up – keep moving !! Welcome to Famous !”. No security check, just ID. UV light stamp on entry. I was in within 5 minutes, but surely the wait in line would be much longer if I started at the end.

It’s your birthday – dance ! I had no time at all to get acquainted with the birthday girl and co, so I was basically cut out of their dancing circle. Well, I didn’t even bother trying to be part of it. I think I was still a little tired from the night before. I don’t know. The main room was very packed, and there was absolutely no room at the front to do any dancing. I got bored

quickly, thinking I should at least try to be social and join that circle. I got back and saw Selvi in the circle. I inserted myself in next to her. Pedro, her on/off boyfriend was there dancing with her.

So I had to fake some moves up alone. A guy dressed like Saddam Hussein was next to me on my right. In front, there were 4 or 5 of the girls including birthday girl. They were not dancing at all. Well they were swaying to the music. They needed a guy to sweep them off their feet. There were some drunk guys around them. I didn’t know if the guys were random or were with them. Selvi, Pedro and I soon left the circle. Selvi told me she only knew the birthday girl.

Cruising with Saddam: I did get a chance to say hello to Saddam and his friend, let’s call him Barry, since I don’t know his name. Saddam was going around with a camera, asking people if he wanted to “take a photo with Saddam!!”. It was great, though he was only asking guys. Girls would’ve loved it. He was wearing the army suit, beret and even
the fake Saddam moustache. So me, saddam and barry go into the room of pure lounge. We take a seat in front of two guys.

Saddam: Hey!
Guys: <silence and a stare>
Saddam: You want a photo with Saddam!?
Guys: <more silence and glarier stares>

These silent guys looked like they were going to jump across the table and strangle us.

Saddam: Hey… hi five guys!
Guys: <slowly shaking head no>. <More ice cold looks at Saddam>

I can’t stop laughing. These guys were so unfriendly it was making me laugh at the while ridiculousness of it. They definitely didn’t expect an arab dictator and his 2 asian sidekicks hassling them for hi fives or a ‘borat’-esque conversation. They soon murmured to each other and left the couch, in acknowledgement that we weren’t going to leave our seat anytime soon.

Lazy man pickup

Got to the bar. Two fake tanned girls, Suzanne (Sue) and Alisha (Ali G), almost push in. I gave them a dirty “dont freaking push in” glare. They apologized. Somehow we talked, and they asked for my number after a funny 5 minute convo. They must’ve been drunk. Got some photos the week after. Here’s a group one:

Katie’s 18th – Also a non dancer.
Tonight was her 18th birthday celebratory night. She came with Julie and Anna. By this time, Selvi and her birthday friend had ditched me without letting me know. Katie had designated drivers syndrome and refused to drink. What kind of 18th is one that you remember? She had just came from pumphouse down the road next so the chinese gardens. I told her it was shit. She totally agreed. (You won’t see a review here for pumphouse unless I was forced to go at knifepoint.. It’s that bad in my opinion) anyway there’s no real story here, except that it was Julie’s first time at a club as well. I totally got her in the dancing mood. Katie claimed that she wasn’t drunk enough yet to do it. Anna refused to let me hug her goodbye. She was very adamant about that. Must’ve had bad experiences with clowns.

Coda
Got to about 3.30am. The girls were tired. Famous was still packed on the main floor. They had closed the other two rooms by this time, or they were dead I think.

It’s a good place to go for house. The $25 is such a pain in the ass though. The main floor was constantly packed, giving one little room to dance. Made the atmosphere good though.

I would recommend to attend to Famous if you’re a house fan.