I always steer away from political fundraisers and events, unless there’s an open bar involved, then I steer toward the Svedka. When art is also involved, I don’t even have to feel guilty. That’s why I’d been excited for weeks to attend Truth Through Action’s first party and short film screening at Mansion.

In a nutshell, this organization makes innovative and in the case of their first film, highly comedic, viral videos encouraging young people to vote and support the Democratic Party. I strongly encourage watching their first movie Blue Balled here. Aside from the film screening, partiers enjoyed a photo exhibit called Political Monogamy by Reka Nyari and a musical performance by Shanna Zell (a tune of hers is also featured in the movie.) It’s always refreshing to feel like you’re taking in a little culture with your alcohol consumption, just because it garners the illusion that clubs don’t necessarily have to be a sinful place.

I Only Sleep With Democrats wife-beaters were for sale and the open bar drinks were appropriately named after political figures like George Bush, Hillary Clinton and John McCain. I stuck with Ross Perot. What can I say? He tasted the best.

And speaking of taste, to my heavy-drinking readers, there’s a new beverage on my delicious list. Truth Through Action included TK KU, an Asian citrus liquor, as part of their open bar.

I don’t know if it’s technically a liqueur or a super smooth version of sake. These details are irrelevant since all you need to know is that for 40 proof, this stuff tastes like heaven. I drank it straight, on ice, at 9pm. Enough said. Making the drink even more entertaining is that it’s presented in, according to their card, The World’s Only Illuminating Bottle. Wow. It was like a light saber and a Grey Goose container rolled into one. And I didn’t let the fact that whatever makes the liquor bottle shine will most likely be pinpointed as a cancer-causer ten years from now bother me at all.

Illuminating liquor, art and indie film all in support of a good cause? What better evening-out launch party could anybody want?

I recently found myself at One, the restaurant aside Gansevoort in Meatpacking which is the promoter pre-party dinner hub of the city. To explain what that means, you’ve gotta know that promoters often cut deals with New York City restaurants, bringing their hot entourage to eat for free before attending whatever club they’re herding people to that evening.

Why This Works: A Flow Chart (keep in mind I haven’t made a flow chart since eighth grade):

Generally speaking, it’s a promoter’s job to have hot chicks and guys who’ll buy tables at their beck and call –> For the most part, guys who buy bottle service work all the time (allowing them to afford bottle service) and being hard workers, don’t have a time to socially micromanage a glamorous entourage. –> Since partying at a table alone without a glamorous entourage is considered faux-pas and a major waste of alcohol, the hard workers decide to team up with a promoter who is, for all practical purposes, a species of middleman. –> On the opposite end of the spectrum, those who make up the glamorous entourage most likely can’t afford a table of their own, hence their decision to work with a promoter. –> To further entice the glamorous entourage to come out with them, promoters will offer perks like limo rides or free dinner at a trendy NYC restaurant pre-clubbing. –> Trendy NYC restaurants need good-looking patrons into order to retain their aforementioned status as trendy. –> Since a promoter already has a glamorous entourage that can’t afford trendy dinners at their disposal, the promoter offers their encourage to eat and drink for free beforehand at [insert trendy restaurant here] –> The restaurant gives away free food to the promoter and their group in exchange for what is essentially, product placement PR with humans. –> Theoretically, everybody wins.

I’m sure many variations of this formula exist, but this is its core function as I understand it. Many restaurants (more than I can list) work with promoters in this capacity, but I don’t think any participate as much as Gansevoort’s next door neighbor, One.

One has really uncomfortable seats and tables, insanely loud music, and mediocre food. At some promotional restaurant gigs, you actually see a menu and order whatever you choose. At most however, menus are a never presented and the server just brings out select appetizers and main courses for everyone to share family-style while boozing people up on a lot of champagne. A sample promotional dinner at One consists of:

-Unlimited wine and champagne (dangerous)

-A shared Caeser-like salad (pretty good)

-A shared quesadilla (pretty gross)

-A shared appetizer pizza (pretty satisfying)

-An odd chicken tapas thing (which I think I don’t like) and

-Shared steak with French fries and ravioli for the main course.

Not too shabby.

My qualm with One has nothing to do with the food, but rather the music level, which is so absurdly high you’d think you were eating in the middle of a concert or club, which essentially, you are. Promoter dinners take place at 10 or 10:30 since everyone has to be in the club around midnight. One, which doubles as a bar (hence the importance they be perceived as ‘trendy’) starts cranking up the volume to make the place feel like a discotheque at around the same time the promoter tables are sitting down to eat. You therefore often find yourself in the completely surreal experience of eating in silence with thirteen other people, listening to deafeningly loud party music. Carrying on a conversation is an impossibility and on my last visit, the unthinkable happened.

At 11:30 One went black. Black as in they turned all the lighting off, even in the dining area. The restaurant was darker than the inside of your average club, because at least your average club has fancy strobe machines and an expensive lighting system. Literally, none of us could see. Not each other. Not our food. It was like some creepy horror movie in which you suddenly find yourself at a vampires banquet in a dungeon.

I thought the whole thing was a joke and waited for them to play ‘Thriller’ and then turn the ambiance lighting back up – but no. It was a big finger in the face to anyone who was still eating, and even the non-promoter diners seemed pretty weirded out. I mean, this is New York. A lot of people sit down to dinner at 11:30pm. And I understand that One likes to think of itself as a lounge and therefore wants to create a party atmosphere to sell drinks to wasted people in ASAP, but why then bother having a restaurant?

More nightlife mysteries, unsolved.

The folks at SoHo hotspot Upstairs on Spring Street just refused to be discouraged by cop raids and the fact that their bar has been shut down for weeks. They continue to merrily sell bottles (raking in cash) and force patrons to walk downstairs to Café Bari should they want to purchase a drink. The latest development is that they’ve moved the DJ booth (previously on a folding table off to the side) into their empty bar space for kicks. Dynamic restructuring!

To me, these absurdities are further testament to how much New York partiers love this establishment. What other locale could get away with a seemingly-permanently closed main bar and upstairs-downstairs trips should you want to open a tab?

At this point, if they finally get their liquor license, the place might lose half its charm.

Remember that episode of Sex and the City when Carrie goes to some hip, joint-smoking couple’s baby shower and gets her insanely expensive shoes stolen? That’s the first thing I thought of when I entered a party this weekend and the front foyer looked like this:

The de-shoeing excuse the lame couple on Sex and the City gave had something to do with protecting their pristine offspring from New York’s street germs. Funny, because I’m sure when these children ventured into Central Park with their nanny they touched, licked and molested the urban landscape as if it were a candy cane.

At the party I was attending, our bachelor host didn’t have this concerned parent excuse. He also didn’t have hardwood floors, making everyone even more confused as to why our shoes had to be checked at the door as if they were a violent weapon.

What I found most interesting about the party that ensued (a lovely and successful party btw) was the subtle yet intense murmur of complaints steadily voiced by the females in attendance. Perhaps not surprisingly, New York women really don’t like to part with their shoes. Some put on a happy face while bitching below the radar about how without their suede heels, their outfit no longer “worked.” Others complained they felt inferior or “like midgets” without their stilettos. Many commiserated over how the entire situation was just kindergarten-style “unfair.” As one guest pointed out, “If our host can afford this apartment, can’t he afford to have someone come clean the floor?”

“Wow!” I thought. “This could get ugly!” But I resisted chanting “Fight! Fight!” like the people on WWE Wrestling.

I, for one, feel like I’ve suffered enough discomfort via footwear for one lifetime and therefore remain grateful for any opportunity to take my high heels off. The best comedy occurred at the end of the night when all the guests, now drunk on gin and bubbly, had to locate their shoes in this tangled, overflowing pile and somehow retain their balance long enough to put them back on. Many toppled over. Lot’s of shoulders were lent for support.

I experienced a mini panic attack when I couldn’t locate my gold strappy sandals in the shoe orgy. The impossibly frightening was happening: My life was a Sex and the City episode! Someone stole them!

I became especially enraged since I already had one pair of shoes mysteriously stolen at a house party in Brazil. Fortunately, after a little digging, I found my sandals suffocating under a pair of sneakers.

Crisis averted.

Miss Model Behavior’s the new nightlife writer for theBlaqlist.com. Feel free to post any nightlife comments or questions on our forum or contact her at MissModelBehavior@theBlaqlist.com

Tenjune is one of those clubs I’ve always resisted getting intimate with, hanging out there a handful of times but always in passing. For some unknown reason, my friends have always framed the idea as:

“Let’s swing by Tenjune,” as opposed to, “Let’s spend the night at Tenjune.”

I wrote about my mild dislike of the place and briefly made fun of their Halloween decorations, only to realize recently that I never really gave this establishment a fair chance. So I set up my Saturday evening with the intention of scoping out this hotspot for real.

I tagged along with a promoter and therefore experienced a stress-free, smooth entry around 12:15 AM. Yes it was mad early, and the inside of the club reflected this. While the dance floor and bar were cluttered with people, the surrounding, elevated VIP section remained void of human activity. This made the club surprisingly comfortable and I relished in the fact that my friends and I could dance without having our noses pressed up into one another’s sweat glands. Sweat was nowhere to be found in fact, since Alaskan-style air blast through the club’s vents at high frequency. I’d recently purchased a fashion statement of a jacket that I enjoyed showing off so didn’t mind, but my heart went out to the sundress-clad ladies suddenly smothered in goosebumps.

The DJ spun everything from rap to Billy Joel to the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air theme song to Ministry of Sound in a surprisingly smooth flow. The club’s population count and temperature rose naturally over the next half-hour and it wasn’t until one of my guy friends elbowed me in the ribs while performing a head jerk that I realized the man in the table next to us was Kanye West.

Kanye West!?!?

I’m one of those people who remain stoic and unenthusiastic about celebrity sightings, but Kayne West!?! He’s perhaps the coolest male artist you could see these days, primarily because he invented terms like “go ahead, go nuts, go apeshit,” which my friends and I have adopted in regular speech. So I admit that my excitement went up a notch and I became even more determined to thoroughly enjoy the evening.

About Kanye: He partied with three male members of his entourage and a breathtakingly beautiful Rihanna-looking girl who had the most enviable legs I’ve ever seen. A girlfriend of mine, who follows celebrity stalker publications said that she’d seen pictures of this sizzlin lady with Kanye on his recent beach vacation. Nice!

Kanye himself wore a plain green T-shirt, jeans, crazy cool sneakers that were a hybrid between Nikes and Uggs, and a plain cloth baseball cap worn elevated and twisted to one side. He’s remarkably short. In fact, I’d described him as child size. (Note: Being the only table next to him, we were all expressly asked by management not to take photographs).

Kanye didn’t smoke or drink the entire evening. He did however, look relaxed and like he was having a good time. He alternated between sitting on the banquette focusing on his cell phone and jiving on top of the banquette dancing in small, jerky movements, occasionally pausing to chat with the gorgeous female hottie.

Immediately, my stress-prone brain began to wonder: Kanye’s tunes are such a club staple – How does a DJ best handle the music situation when the artist himself is in the house? Does that mean you play more Kanye songs? Or does it mean to you play none at all?

I pondered this dilemma until the DJ finally bust out “Stronger” and the crowd went wild. I immediately honed in on Kanye eager for some sort of reaction on his part, but got nothing. Throughout the beginning of the song he tapped away on his cell phone, seemingly oblivious, then stood up and enjoyed his music with everyone else.

“Would he sing along?” I wondered. “Or is he so totally sick of hearing his own music that he wants to barf right now?” Again, I observed him like a veteran stalker and didn’t see him mouth any of the words (although his gorgeous lady friend was singing them at the top of her lungs). Later on, the DJ played “The Good Life.” Kanye got a little more into this tune and even sang a tiny bit by the end.

Kanye and his entourage rolled out of the club unusually early and all that was left by 1:45 AM was their empty bottles. Overall, I enjoyed the Tenjune experience, although I don’t know how much of my review is bias since the most famous rapper of the moment was literally 3 feet away.

I do give Tenjune props for keeping their VIP area roomier than other places. If you do decide to invest in a table you’re truly are gaining some privacy and breathing room since a bouncer guards the prive area (unlike Pink Elephant or Kiss and Fly’s elevated areas for example). This surprised me because on previous visits to Tenjune I felt like the club was unbearably crowded. Maybe the weekend party load has been lightened thanks to New Yorkers jetting off to the Hamptons or maybe Tenjune really does deserve props for keeping their club appropriately below capacity. Either way, whatever my previous issue with this locale, it suddenly seemed unimportant.

Another cool feature of note is that the club provided a ‘make your own shot’ service at the tables. They give you many mixers (watermelon, yes!) as well as shot glasses and a shaker. So the wanna-be bartender of your group can cocktail shots all night long for anyone who’s interested. I thought this was a fun feature to what’s otherwise a boring, cookie-cutter table set up.

Who knows? At this rate, I think I’ll be frequenting Tenjune again.

Everyone has their own going out style. Some like to make a theatrical production of the night with designer clothes, extras, cameras and mass texts. Others like to sneak out of their apartments at 1 A.M. without telling a soul. Some of us like to pregame profusely. Others nurse one drink the whole night.

This range of styles came sharply into focus for me after an increasing number of party arguments I’d experienced with one of my newer friends. The dilemma every night was essentially this: I wanted to go wherever my friends were going so that we’d have a table, home base, and people to keep an eye on us (safety in numbers). And she wanted to go someplace just her and I.

Apparently, I’m a pack mentality going out person.

She is not.

And I never even realized this about myself!

Maybe I’m an insecure partier, but I like to enjoy a club with all my friends around me (preferably multiple groups of friends around me) and usually with someone who’s acting as leader / entrance aficionado / alcohol provider. I find that this leaves me with less to worry about. Now if I’m going to a locale where I know the doorman and know how to procure free booze, I’m happy to break off into a smaller group. Otherwise, I’m a power in numbers person. Not to mention that I enjoy catching up and creating memories with my gaggle of friends.

My party style nemesis on the other hand continually points out that the large group slows us down, sometimes makes it longer to get in, is inconvenient for cab travel, requires us to keep track of everyone, and makes it our problem when Jenny pukes in the street. Most importantly she notes, it prevents you from meeting new people.

Me: It prevents you from meeting complete strangers. Strangers who are creeps.

Her: It prevents you from meeting new potential men, because we’re always with the guy friends and ex-flames of our group.

Me: I meet new people. I like to use my friends as a base and then branch off to look around.

Her: So you can’t even be in Pink Elephant with out a life raft?

Me: It’s better to meet new friends through friends. People you’re already connected to.

Her: That’s incest. Incest with baggage.

So who’s right?

This weekend I found myself in a club more crowded than Penn Station on a holiday weekend rush hour Friday. Yes, it was really that bad. My group of friends didn’t have a table to call home, making the entire evening even more uncomfortable (uncomfortable factors one and two were 1. That I was wearing a corset (bad fashion decision, don’t ask) and 2. That I was carrying a purse large enough to qualify as a suitcase (long day, don’t ask.))

In the mosh pit that was everywhere, one of my friends thrust herself toward me and said,

“Look at them. They are totally hookers.”

I turned around and saw she was referring to an undulating table of exponentially hot girls and notably gross men. I laughed her off. That wasn’t prostitution. That was just standard sicko New York clubs.

“No. No.” My girlfriend insisted. “This isn’t the typical modelizer - baby model thing. These girls are hookers.”

As if on cue, I noticed on old girlfriend of mine at the questionable table. I hadn’t seen her in years and while she’d changed hair style and color, she still looked great. If she was hanging around, clearly this table was legit. Last time I’d checked in with her she was pursuing her MBA. I squirmed through the club to talk to her and we exchanged hellos, news, and checked to see if we still had each other’s numbers. She then continued to dance on a banquette and I, in a body lock against the table and vicious crowd, stayed put for a moment to survey the dance floor and catch my breath. That’s when a beautiful nymph like creature, the Queen Bee of the table, grabbed my arm and whispered:

“You can’t stand here. This is a private table.”

“Oh OK,” I said quickly. “Sorry, I was just saying hi to [insert my friend’s name here].”

“This is a private table and these are my clients,” was her response.

I took all my strength not to clasp my hands over my mouth in muffled horror / laughter. She certainly wins the straightforward award. And oh no! Did she think I was trying to steal her clientele? This was a total misunderstanding. To her credit, I was wearing something that looked like a corset and carrying a bag that could, for all she knew, contain dominatrix gear.

Bad news.

I sprinted away and gushed to my friend, “You were right! They are hookers.” She gave me a victorious grin.

So this is what theoretically hot Manhattan clubs have been reduced to? Is this the curse of the overcrowded weekend? Or is this happening all the time and I remain naively unaware?

Once the nymph who’d forced me from her table saw how crowded the club truly was realized I wasn’t banging into her table by choice, she grabbed me again and whispered some sort of apology. “They just don’t like anyone here,” she explained.

“Right,” I thought. “Why would guys want women to hang around them for free when they could spend thousands?”

Nothing was really making sense and that was my cue to go home and watch the Lion King in an attempt to purify my mind from the insanity I’d just involuntarily been a part of.

My girlfriend who’d stayed on, reported that security had actually come over to the crazy table and asked everyone to step away. My girlfriend being a ballsy babe said straight to the security guy’s face, “You know they’re hookers, right?”

There was an extremely tense moment before the security guy grinned and burst out laughing.

“Yeah hunnie, I know,” he said. “But they spend six thousand dollars every time they come here, so we let ‘em do what they want.”

Huh. So I guess since Spitzer, being an escort isn’t even something you have to be on the DL about anymore. Label me ‘weirded out.’

I thoroughly enjoy admitting when I’m wrong. Maybe because it happens so often. Everyone ready to time travel? Good. Let’s go way back to October of last year, when I had this to say about the swanky, closet-size, SoHo lounge Goldbar:

In broad terms, Goldbar pisses me off. The door’s extremely tight and the place is never packed. They’re super snoody and won’t let patrons take pictures inside, and no, I don’t think this is to protect the artwork (I really doubt they’re hanging paintings that valuable in place where people come to get shitfaced and often climb/fall into the walls).

Hmm. Several months later, I opted for a softer tone:

After not loving Gold Bar my first few encounters, I actually had a positive experience there this weekend. This might have had something to do with the fact it was our last stop of the evening (we arrived at 3:30 AM) and everyone had easily drunk a bottle of vodka a head since we left the house.

Not really a ringing endorsement but okay.

The ‘gold skull closet’ as I fondly call it was actually FULL (I guess that’s what happens when you go out on Saturday instead of Monday night), the music was FUN (Billy Joel? Yes, please!) and the bathrooms, which I used for the first time, were clean and spacious enough for me to stretch out and change my clothes (don’t ask why I was changing clothes).

As if we weren’t retard enough, my girlfriend ordered me a specialty alcoholic concoction called the Gold Rush. It tasted like a Long Island Iced Tea on crack. When I inquired about its ingredients, I received a slurred response that it was whisky, bourbon, and honey, all made ‘bearable’ by a giant ice cube in the middle. I took two sips and wisely professed to my friend,

“This is throw up. This is throw up.”

I think what I was trying to express is that the drink was both vomit inducing while also tasting like liquid sour patch kids gone bad. It’s a miracle no one projectile puked that night.

Months later again, I’m here to come full circle and give Goldbar two tequila happy thumbs up. I found myself hanging out there both this past weekend and the one before. I’m here to say, on the record, that this place is a good time.

I partied there on a Sunday night and found what I judged to be the sexiest crowd out that night in the city. The flocks of female supermodels seemed relaxed instead of rigid. Men weren’t busy boasting bottle service to impress, they were actually pulling out cute dance moves and managing to look like homo-sapiens genuinely enjoying themselves instead of bankers desperate to prove that they know how to party.

Since Goldbar shimmers with a lounge-y feel, that hard-core club vibe that often makes intimacy, listening or thinking impossible, isn’t there. You are therefore more prone to talk to some one instead of just making vulgar “I’m checking you out” insinuations with your eyes across a crowded dance floor.

I’ve been getting excited since someone in the rumor mill has been churning out news that the owners of Goldbar and Cain would be opening “Cain Downtown” here in the SoHo area. Naturally, I was thrilled about the birth of another downtown club I could attend, get wrecked in, and walk home from. It only took me an entire year to warm up to Goldbar! Now that the skull closet and I are friends, I had high hopes for my relationship with Jamie and Jayma’s next downtown venture.

Sadly, it doesn’t seem like this is going to materialize. Apparently, the locals are hell-bent against Cain becoming their new neighbor. And frankly who can blame them? I wouldn’t want an establishment that was known for go-go dancers in zebra bikinis and for pushing people too drunk to see straight onto the street at four AM as my neighbor either.

Tragic story for all of us who were hoping to save cab fare to Chelsea by hanging out downtown.

Miss Model Behavior’s the new nightlife writer for theBlaqlist.com. Feel free to post any nightlife comments or questions on our forum or contact her at MissModelBehavior@theBlaqlist.com

If your New York relationship was good (and by good I mean was able to last longer than the customary three months), it can be exceedingly difficult to let go of. City breakups are rough, and if you partied together, splitting up can also lead to a lot of awkward encounters and hardcore game playing.

So here’s my question: If you have clout at a nightlife establishment i.e. you know the doorman, the owner, the investor who mattered or the security dude, is it socially or morally acceptable to have your ex-significant other banned from the place? Setting up an infrastructure with the powers of the locale so that when your ex walks up to the red rope they’re automatically turned away? A nightlife blacklisting of sorts?

I think the answer to this question is more complicated than it seems. On the one hand, this is spiteful, childish, and clearly illustrates that you still like the person and haven’t moved on. On the other hand, aren’t all relationships, at their fundamental level, a power struggle? And what better way to showcase your power than by excommunicating the former object of your affection from a place that you used to both go to together? And with New York being as large as it is, is it really so much to ask that they party somewhere else?

Just like a messy custody battle, it’s not that easy to divvy up your spots versus my spots. What are former couples supposed to do? Create some sort of calendar that clarifies you can go to Goldbar every Wednesday, Friday and Sunday and he can have full reign of 1 Oak on Saturdays? When there is no tacit agreement, and your request for personal space at Cain is disregarded (meaning your ex shows up and flaunts their new diet and girlfriend in your face) is it okay to use your connections to make sure the club’s staff keeps them out?

Anyone who’s ever had a disastrous clubbing event with an ex, cast your vote here.

Wednesday night Upstairs, the exclusive SoHo club and location of much debauchery like dollar bill tossing, was raided by the cops.

Old news.

The charges had something to do with liquor license violations and a legal problem with the sound system. All I focused on was trying to hide my inherent panic: Where would I go to hear Hip Hop and Bruce Springsteen in the same night? Where would men go to meet models age sixteen and under? Where would Leonardo Di Caprio go to schmooze low key with his entourage?

Luckily, this terrifying series of questions didn’t continue for long. A mere thirty-six hours after the raid, I received a text from one of the owners at Upstairs assuring me it was re-opened and ready for Friday night. That was fast! It wasn’t until I was in the club this weekend that I realized why: The bar was closed.

But don’t think Upstairs was going to let a pesky little thing like a liquor license get in the way of their bash or business plan. They’re just serving bottle service only until further notice – and the creepy part is that is took me twenty minutes to even notice that the bar looked like an abandoned warehouse: a blank wall, utterly void of life, liquor or bar tenders.

Talk about a loophole in the system!

“No, you cannot purchase a vodka on the rocks; I can only sell you the entire bottle.”

Interesting.

I found this similar to how Milan recently enacted laws that prohibit liquor from being sold after 2 AM instead of after 4 AM in order to help prevent drunk driving. Now bartenders scream, “Two AM last call! Everyone get your bottles!” and people stock up on Magnums or just purchase bottles of champagne which they walk around downing as if it were JuicyJuice.

Yes, this is really going to encourage people to drink less.