Clubbing with James Tran

Leadup An hour to kill – a mini 4-club dance spree: Tonight I wore just jeans, a shirt and sneakers.. Pontoon - Crowd was half indian, half everyone else. Free entry. Casual door policy. RnB. Good venue for an RnB fix. Left after 30 minutes – another asian dancing guy was taking the girls. He was out there, just dancing with any girl he saw, and was doing quite well. I wondered where my energy was tonight. Pavillion – Two girls in the front, 4 on the side, and indian guys for the rest of the people on here. DJ was playing west coast rap. My favourite anthems were being played (Dr Dre,  Snoop Dogg, etc). A crazy indian was dance-cracking onto the two girls in the front. He was out there, just shaking his body loose. I wondered where my energy was tonight. I think I get intimidated by other good dancers in a desolate setting. Shark Bar/Hotel – I walked in and there was nobody on the floor. I was about to leave, but they started to play “Push it” by Salt N Pepa. I love this song so I *had* to get up there. So I jumped up and did a little boogie to the song, to the amusement of everybody staring at the elevated dancefloor in the middle. Everyone who looked at me I looked back, and they would stare away. A group of people at the very back took a photo of me and waved hi. The song ended and I ran off. Spectrum – My usual friends had gone home, so I met up with the French backpackers for some dance. We checked out Spectrum first. Free entry. House. We went upstairs and it was *dead* as. A handful of people dancing, a handful of people sitting down, a small room, and that was it. I don’t think this was meant to be a place for clubbing. Reminded me like an oxford st version of Manning Bar at USYD. I can’t imagine that place being a place for clubbing. We left quite quickly. We then stumbled upon Oxford Art Factory and settled in.. After Work Art Fridays @ The Oxford Art Factory (Art After Dark) (29th May 2009) Note: This review is primarily for the ‘Art After Dark’ Room’, and not the ‘Live Art Space’ where a cover charge applied. About Oxford Art Factory (assessment time 1.30am) Address: 38-46 Oxford St, Darlinghurst The Bar: Jugs of beers and cocktails offered for a reasonable price. Website: http://www.oxfordartfactory.com Inside: Walking downstairs, there are two rooms: Live Art Space: Carpeted area with central wooden dancefloor, with DJ up on stage. At the back is an elevated area where more lounges exist. It was mostly dancefloor space.

Art After Dark: (where we were) A further flight of stairs down takes you to this room. It’s pretty small, holding about 100 people max. A bar as well here. The room has a high ceiling length, and a big TV on one end of the wall. It’s been painted white, which is different. Tonight there were only lounges along the wall, and not sticking out as in the picture.

About After Work Art Fridays: (assessment time 1.30am) Entry Fee/Cover Charge: Free for the Art After Dark Bar, $15 for the DJ in the Live Art Space Room tonight. After 3am it was free for all. Crowd / Dress Code: Artsy types. People in their 20’s and 30’s. Lots of hats around. Anything goes. Atmosphere: I was expecting not many people to be here, so guess how surprised I was when I saw the whole room packed! Well, it was 1.30am, and it was a small area, but usually at an average to bad venue, 1.30am is when people start going home. So overall it was a good sign. Music: Art After Dark Bar – Earlier in the evening there were live bands playing, but we missed that. So when we arrived, the band area was cleared and there was a DJ playing a mix of music across pop, rnb, retro and rock. Basically a bit of everything, and each upcoming song would be of a different genre. Somehow though the crowd was fully right into every song being played. Live Art Space – DJ Sega (USA) was the main act playing tonight, (Indie). I didn’t get to check him out. Later another DJ was playing around 3am, with some dubstep beats, and another artist came up for some raps where I could practise some krumpin on the very open dance floor. The crowd here were all the hardcore types left, so everybody was into it. (continue reading…)

We just finished an all you can eat pizza.. and feeling really really lethargic we decide to head to some clubs… we were thinking of St James.. but that was overdone latey – and Roof bar / Skygardens shut its doors on Saturday (presumably forever). Coolabar: We got in and there were 3 mature ladies dancing on their own. Besides their 4 friends on the side not dancing, there were no other girls in the club. We bought a drink each and sat down then skulked about the start of a crap night… we see an old couple walk by outside, look inside and immediately walk out again. I didnt even jiggle my butt in there. Cheers Got here about 11.30. and it was fairly busy, but only one or two people dancing on the floor. I do a bit of a dance, and people were looking. The scary thing about Cheers is that there are people literally bordering the dancefloor staring at you drinks in their hand – you have no breathing room, and its really intimidating. I still have yet to brave dancing here alone. Eventually it got really packed. Stripper man dance move We’re dancing and we hear screams. A random guy behind us is grinding against a random girl. She’s screaming but keeps going, as she secretly likes it. Everyone just stares at him. You can actually hear him say “yeah thats right, that’s all i want, a little dance”, like a pedophile – I couldnt stop laughing.. it was crazy awesome. He then pulls up his shirt to show off his flat tummy.. poor girl nearly fainted and her friends pulled her away. Everyone gave him props. After this the pizza was getting to us.. we left for… Shark Bar / Hotel Two shit clubs so far, it would be fun to make it 3 in a row. We got in, and there was already a group of guys taking all the girls. They had already established a circle and were doing crazy shit. Needless to say, we ran out of energy after about 5 or 6 songs. There was nobody in here worth even looking at. We left and called it a night at 1.30am. Pathetic, and easily the worst night out clubbing this year. Should have gone to Side bar to finish it off.

There wasn’t much intention to go dancing tonight. Me, Joe, Srey, Ashley, Mandy are just chatting in Shark Bar … one of the girls notices that there was a dancefloor in this place. It was on the otherside.. once the music gets louder, we decide to have a bit of a dance. There were probably about 3 circles. Ourselves, the americans, and some other asians. About Fridays @ Shark Bar / Hotel Location: 127 Liverpool Street (Cnr Pitt Street) Sydney Website: http://www.sharkhotel.com.au Music: RNB. Size: One small wooden floor to hold 100 ? A DJ booth in the corner with lights in the ceiling. Open access to the pool tables and chairs surrounding. (continue reading…)

Lead Up Suzanne unofficially broke up with her boyfriend Tim. A night out at a gay bar or at the cross was put on the table. She was keen. She also invited Alisha, David, and Tim the now unofficial ex. None of my personal friends were eager to hang out with me at the cross with a bunch of people I didn’t really know. Up to this point in time, I only knew Suzanne and Alisha, for a combined total of 5 minutes. Hmm.. Here we go… The only rejection I enjoyed Space was the first choice as it was rnb with fellow wogs and aussies (it’s Saturday, not Friday) We got rejected at Space because Tim was wearing old trackpants and a jacket from the early nineties. Reminded me of my brothers fashion sense. (thought: I need to get my brother some proper jeans this week, that lazy sod.) Dave got pissed off and talked to me about it as Tim went to get jeans from a friends place nearby. I supported the idea of abandoning Tim. Sue told us that Tim was begging to be back with her every moment he could. Tim was only here tonight to get back with Sue. Quickie at sharkies: Me and Dave went into sharkies to piss and more importantly, to have a dance. There were only two girls on the floor, dancing on the sidelines next to their table. We went up and somehow half integrated with them into a circle. We made some small talk with our partners. It felt jilted, but it went ok. We left on a happy note, full of happy stuff. Breaking up is the hardest part: Walked out of sharkies back to sue. She was in the middle of an argument with Tim. She didn’t want to go back to him. Dave stepped in (he’s a big guy) and repeated to Tim what Sue had said. Tim didn’t get it. After threats back and forth, it culminated in Dave getting his shirt ripped, and Tim attempting to smash a bottle on his head but missing. Tim ran off and we didn’t see him again that night. Sue was upset and apologized to me for such a bad start to the night. I didn’t know what to say. Dave looked ok but the happy stuff had disippated. We went down oxford st and some guy gave us free passes to Havana. So ends the biggest lead up to our main destination.. Havana nightclub: The venue has been covered before for Friday nights so here are some essentials for Saturdays: Cover charge: $15. Free before midnight with a free pass. Crowd: aussies and wogs. Young. More guys than girls. Girls were good. Music: house. Commercial. Atmosphere: tonight was busy. Friendly crowd. (continue reading…)

After an expensive dinner at a Korean BBQ restaurant followed by heavy drinking, two of my high school friends Patrick and Mithilesh wanted some free clubbing action. It was going to be a tight ass night (again) I knew Pavillion was packed on Saturday nights so off we went. ~Midnight: Pavillion Hotel A Quick Summary of Pavillion Saturday nights: I covered this in some earlier post so in summary, Pavillion Hotel means: - rnb and hip hop with some pop songs - free all night - dark and packed - mixed crowd of Aussies/Asians/Indians - cheap alcohol Once we got in, we went straight to the dancing. Ran into Kimberley, who I met through VSA (Yes, the same VSA group I met Kevin last night). She was here for her friends birthday. Pavilion must be a popular place for Vietnamese birthdays. Kimbo didn’t want a photo but I got a photo with the birthday girl. Dunno her name. I don’t think we lasted long. It was a little too packed to do much attention grabbing dancing. Mithilesh didn’t like it so I chose Shark Bar next. Why shark bar? Isn’t it so dodgy? Yes, it is. But the dance floor is reasonable on Saturday. It’s enough to dance and mingle. About Shark Hotel Saturday Nights: Liverpool St. Same building as Space nightclub (which is located the level directly above). On entering you see lots of chairs. Then on the right theres lots of pool tables. The dancefloor takes a back seat in the rear. This place is more of a hangout place for people to chat and get cheap drinks. The dancefloor isn’t what people usually come here to do. Renowned to have some dodgy characters within. (continue reading…)