Thursday. It came so fast I don’t think anyone was truly ready for it. Even the most professional organizers don’t have much experience dealing with 3-day weekend scenarios in which Friday’s the day off. So after countless emails and what felt like hundreds of debates via MSN, someone in my Hamptons crew made the executive decision that we’d all leave for Long Island post-clubbing at 2:30 AM to avoid traffic. Making this plan possible were two sober drivers and a car service. The most amusing part of our time spent at Kiss & Fly (which wasn’t promoting any 4^th of July party but was just its normal, crowded, cone-filled self) remained that every time the word “Hamptons” came up you’d hear a resounding chorus of, “Yep! We’re leaving right after this!”

So apparently our ingenious idea of partying in the city and driving to Long Island post-club in the middle of the night was something other East-bound fun-seekers had thought of as well. In fact, the more people I spoke to, the more it became apparent that all of Kiss & Fly was heading to the Hamptons as soon as the party winded down. Instead of cruising down a desolate LIE, I realized we could very well be entering some sort of packed, party highway.

So much for avoiding the crowds.

After Kiss & Fly, it took awhile to get everyone regrouped in our ringleader’s SoHo apartment. He tried to sober people up with homemade pressed Paninis, a sandwich that’s easily up for grabs for the title of “best Panini of my life” since it was crisp, meaty and oozing with Dijon. When finally car-bound, we wrestled over who got to utilize the one pillow available in the backseat. Someone upfront with a potent chip craving instructed the driver to stop at a gas station, where they proceeded to buy one of every kind of potato chip known to man. Cape Cod – Doritos Nacho Flavor – Lays BBQ – Doritos Cooler Ranch and Cheetos were consequently passed around until everyone fell asleep sitting up, inhaling crumbs. When I startled from slumber, I realized it was because our car wheels were crunching gravel instead of gliding over pavement i.e. we’d arrived at our house’s driveway in the shortest Long Island travel experience of my life. If only I could be unconscious and high on snack food’s artificial flavorings for all such journeys…

As our group stumbled inside and proceeded to claim couches / beds / lawn chairs / sections of the floor, the head of our house received a message from producer friends interested in pitching a reality TV program / documentary centered around the life of a friend of ours in the house who is launching a noteworthy business venture in coming months. Their idea had been to come to the Hamptons for the long weekend to get some trial footage. The text they sent resembled something like:

“We’ve decided to come. See you all tomorrow. I hope there are enough beds for us and the camera crew.”

To which our first reaction was, “camera crew!?!!?!?” and our second reaction was, “beds!?!!??”

We wrote back that we hoped the camera crew would be okay with sleeping outdoors on lawn chairs, since every Hamptons house on holiday long weekends is PACKED, PACKED still being an understatement.

So we drifted to sleep plotting how to best avoid the oncoming camera and fake an accident in which all the necessary electrical equipment might get destroyed in the pool. The adventures to come…

The Plaza, known primarily as a mid-town tourist venue and home to the delightful brat Eloise, seems to want a slice of the city’s nightlife party pie. In an operation that involved tenting off their lobby bar with heavy velvet curtains and installing a doorman and DJ, the Plaza now hosts its own mini lounge, seeped in darkness, elegance and plush fabrics. Currently, scattered hotel guests and large groups from New York’s nightlife circuit (imported by promoters who are selling the Plaza as a ‘pre-party’ spot) stake out on opposite sides of the venue. Busboys in tuxes navigate between them. The atmosphere is somewhat surreal, reminding me of the private, chronically un-crowded hotel bars in London, like the Sanderson’s impenetrable Purple Bar.

A major plus of the Plaza opposed to other lounges, is that the music remains at a tasteful level, making conversation with fellow humans an actual possibility. There’s also something undeniably magical about a New York staple building like the Plaza Hotel: the marble floors, the shiny bellman, the buttoned uniforms, the quality furnishings, the sparkling chandeliers. One feels privileged to be here, and for Manhattan ladies who like to dress up and dawn jewelry, this is the perfect place to debut a cocktail number.

The Plaza lounge is a new nightlife initiative, quiet at the moment with promise of becoming a bustling pre-clubbing staple. My experience was so calming, serene, and in stark contrast to normal pre-parties, that I’m sort of hoping the place doesn’t get crazy anytime soon.

Photo Tour below:

The lone interior doorman pulls back the red velvet rope. White tuxedos? Yes, please.

A clubbing crew enjoys drinks before heading to Upstairs.

Impressive glowing décor.

The Ladies Bathroom flower arrangement. A few giant steps above anything you’d see at a typical nightlife venue.

The even more gigantic entry-way flower arrangement, complete with overarching wreath, which is several times the size of an actual human being. [Note the person seated in the corner as a point of reference.]

Update! Update!

The Kiss & Fly cone has multiplied. [Old photo above] There are now TWO. Note the new side view photo I took to properly showcase this point.

I guess I thought that by drawing attention to it via the Internet, the cone would somehow magically disappear and get removed by a Kiss & Fly janitor who’s also a devout reader of my blog.

Not the case!

In fact, the opposite has occurred. The club seems to be promoting the mysterious bathroom stall (rumored as a coke room, but this can’t be true because the stall doesn’t even have a proper door and Kiss is not a place like Upstairs, geez) as a traffic cone hosting facility.

Fix this toilet already or just riddle me a reason for this bizarre set up!

I almost brought up Issue Cone with one of the owners last night over casual conversation, but then realized he might not find it so amusing that I write about the intimate quirks of his club online for sport. I was also way too drunk to conduct a proper interview and figured he’d might think I was dropping acid when all my questions revolved around an orange construction object I’ve fondly named Earl. Plus, it’s in the women’s room. Is he even aware?

I’ll work on getting an eventual statement from him. More disconcerting at the moment, is the fact that my favorite part about journeying to Kiss & Fly is not the music, free drinks, good-looking revelers or really pretty disco ball, but rather my nightly check-up on the cone.

In less interesting news, Kiss also got their Amazon-braided dancers completely halter free bikini tops. Take a look. No back strap. No front strap. No strap in between. How do these things stay on their shaking lady parts? If it’s adhesive and they have to glue feathers to their breasts, I really hope they’re getting paid extra for that.

More mysteries, unsolved.

I woke up this past Saturday at 10 am still drunk from Friday night at Cain and instinctually knowing there was no way I’d be spending the rest of the weekend in the city. My Hamptons escape house would be too crazy for my hung over mind to handle so I eliminated Long Island as an option (last weekend the house was overcrowded and loud to the point that sleep became an impossibility. Girls with cars actually drove back to Manhattan to flee the madness at 3, 4 and 5 AM in the morning – it was that bad.) So without leaving bed, I lurched for my cell phone and dialed an ex-boyfriend from college who I knew had a share house in the fabled Jersey Shore.

After we caught up on each other’s Friday nights, I discovered he happened to be at Penn Station heading to the shore as we spoke. The proceeding conversation went something like this:

Me: So, any chance of you inviting me?

Um…well, you should definitely come out another weekend.

Why not now?

It’s only my second weekend out there myself. I haven’t been since Memorial Day. I don’t even know how to get there with the train.

That’s a dumb excuse. Obviously you’re going to figure out how to get there with the train. Why can’t I come?

[Really awkward pause.]

Me: We don’t have to sleep in the same room. You don’t even have to make-out when we’re get drunk. I just want to be poolside. I need to leave the city.

It’s not that, it’s –

You won’t even have to talk to me. I’ll bring a book.

I definitely want you to come out another weekend –

Other weekends you’ll be at weddings and I’ll be in the Hamptons. Seize the present moment.

I just –

It’ll be more fun with me there goddammit!

Well, I can pick you up at Spring Lake…

DING! DING!! DING!!! Victory!

Children, take this as a lesson as to where persistence can get you.

I’d write about my psychological theory ‘the crazy girl approach to love’ that came into play here, the theory that men really just want to be told what to do, but I already wrote that article here.

It wasn’t until halfway there on the train an hour later that I sobered up and became fully conscious of what I’d done. I was entering the land of frat boys, Guidos and sideways baseball caps without mental preparation or body armor. New Jersey Transit was propelling me directly into the jaws of the New York summer destination famous for its lack of class.

House party activities that ensued included beer pong, quarters, consuming Coors Light, eating Dominos, and this endlessly amusing game called cornhole with which I became obsessed. After defeating every person in the house and their guests, I wanted to continue playing. When I started envisioning myself conquering the cornhole sport at the next Olympic games while wearing one of those beer dispenser helmets with a wrap around straw, I knew I’d developed a problem and made myself stop. For more information about cornhole, I suggest viewing this highly entertaining video.

Ala’ Hamptons, drinking in the Jersey Shore begins around noon and continues throughout the day. The only difference is you’re drinking from a keg instead of a bottle Stella Artois and downing jello shots instead of vintage Patron. With the average age being twenty-five instead of thirty-five, the snood factor eliminated, and any form of pretentiousness or self-respect out the window, the possibility for childish fun is quadruple what you’d experience in the Hamptons. Since there are a lot of college or fraternity/sorority reunion share houses on the shore, maturity is minimal.

Unlike the Hamptons where posh nightclubs are the 1 AM after dark activity, in Jersey you venture to spots that sport cheap liquor and seven dollar lobster, like the Parker House in Sea Girt. Five dollars gets you in, then the wrap around porch with hanging plants, softly spinning antique ceiling fans, rowdy, upstairs, Top Forty dance fest and theoretically quieter downstairs, are all yours to enjoy. The place is at full force with the energy of Pink Elephant by 10 PM. The place shuts down at 12:30, making the shore an “earlier” vacation destination than the Hamptons, which I appreciated.


Lack of cabs and lack of people who remembered to stuff their ID into their beach sarong prevented us from exploring Edgars, the lone club in this area which adopts Parker House patrons post midnight. While I’ve never considered myself a Jersey Shore type of girl, my strong craving to play cornhole again might get me back there and reporting on Edgars sooner than I think. Stay tuned.

This week’s nightlife crazy award goes to the lovely narcoleptic boy I saw in Chelsea. The young lad managed to sleep through the night undisturbed, despite his bed being the rowdy, center floor table of Cain. The music wailed at deafening megawatts while drunken revelers celebrated Friday’s long anticipated arrival with stomps and cheers. Neither this, nor the bountiful leaps of the young man in red and white sneakers beside his head, woke our Rip Van Winkle.

Napping boy was evicted onto the 27^th street sidewalk around the same time my roommate and I voluntarily left. He was still half-asleep and seemed ready to spoon with the nearby dumpster. Having drank, danced, and hovered over his snoozing body for the past two hours at the adjacent table, I felt a kinship toward the fellow and tried to halt the trash can spooning process and help him into a cab.

Every time my roommate and I prompted the boy with questions like, “Where do you live?” and “Can you say your address?” he would only slur back crudities and bark that he wanted to be left alone. He consistently mumbled something about “calling Jim” and in clumsy slumber, immediately dropped his cell phone the moment he located it. Even after we retrieved and returned his phone, Rip Van Winkle continued to rudely shun our assistance. At this point, we gave up and scurried into a taxi ourselves, hoping this “Jim” character wasn’t an utter deadbeat and might eventually come to his friend’s rescue.

If you saw a sweet blonde boy sleeping with a trashcan on 27^th street this weekend, you now know the whole story.

Anyone living in a major metropolis is the often unwilling recipient of emails, texts, and spam from promoters whose job it is to get us out having a goodtime (and for men consequently, spending money.) Some promoter messages are polite and tasteful, others unrelentingly annoying, some comedic, and many, pure trash. This astonishing example of a promoter email invitation arrives all the way from Los Angeles. While I insisted the level of douchiness meant it had to be a joke, let me assure you it’s certifiably real.

[Redacted],

I’ve been far too busy working on my tan and

researching calf implant surgery to write you a
lengthy email today… so I will simply warn you
that tomorrow night at Goa (Friday) we are hosting
[redacted] Model Management’s 5th Anniversary Party,
and the only non-beautiful people to crack the
velvet ropes will be our busboys and even they
have IMDB rap sheets that when laid end to end
would cover Fabio’s man-breasts 16 times.

Let me know if you’d like to join us. There is no
list, simply ask for [redacted] at the door and tell
him I invited you. If you have been hitting the
gym and doing your teeth whitening sessions like
you are supposed to you will be ushered inside
with the speed of a bullet train as the onlookers
corraled on the wrong side of the rope eye-fuck
you in glorious envy.

See you on the inside.

X.

P.S. If you are REALLY f**king cool and/or an
aspiring star f**ker you should also come to the
smaller, more intimate party I am now throwing
every Saturday night at a location I would rather
not mention here. Ask me about it if you are
ridiculously good looking…

One hopes this author, at least to a certain degree, is poking fun at himself and his lifestyle in a hyperbolic fashion intended to make his recipients laugh (we do truly hope, because I don’t know how safe I feel living in a world with real-life Ari Gold’s taking on promoter jobs, dictating prose like this without sarcasm.) If this LA promoter’s intention was self-mockery, I applaud him for the entertainment and putting the ridiculousness of Hollywood straightforwardly out there. This might be a more admirable approach than the often subtler East Coast promoters who are afraid to get blatant and say it like it is. East Coast promoter examples:

Promoter language: “Yeah, I guess your friend can come. Is she cute?”
Translation: I need models only, no exceptions.

Promoter language: “Not sure if I can get three guys in.”
Translation: If you’re not buying bottles, stop wasting my time.

I guess it’s up to each individual promoter to navigate disclosing the harsh cruelty of the nightlife world, while still convincing their guests to partake. Is extreme subtlety or tough love the best approach? I don’t know. What I do know is regardless of the fact that I rarely go to LA, I want to get on this promoter’s permanent mailing list.

Since its inauguration, I’ve perpetually found myself confused when writing about Meatpacking hotspot Kiss & Fly. On the one hand, they copied the décor and vibe of Pink Elephant disco ball by disco ball and are home to dirt-encrusted outdoor traffic cones and even worse, rumored B&T. On the other hand, Pink was getting old anyway, Kiss boasts an impressive ambiance, I’ve never noticed nor been bothered by the rumored B&T, and what better spot does zone-Little West 12th have to offer?

Often, you begin nights at Kiss in a desolate empty arena. I usually enter the club at 12:30pm scowling, not just because of the irritating, indoor security check point guy whose job is to annoy you into checking you coat. The dance floor’s empty, the tables few and far between, and the entire club resembles the Siberian desert. The only sound is the wind whispering across the landscape i.e. the air conditioning vents humming to the non-movement of disappointed guests. You’ll sit and start clicking on your cell phone S.O.S.ing for alternate plans and somehow, consistently, magically, inexplicably, when you shut your phone and stand back up the club’s transformed to look like this:

[All photos compliments of the talented Emma Cleary and her very large camera]

Kiss & Fly does deserve the award for consistently filling up, usually with exceptional energy. Just don’t expect it to happen before 1:30am. Recently, their Thursday night party has featured a live sax player, adding a dynamic element to the music and infiltrating the soul of the crowd. Also adding to the scene is the cabaret-style sparkle dancers, who pitch in with a dash of sensuality and exoticism.

Everyone here seems to be having a good time…

If someone could teach me how to braid my hair in this Laura Croft meets Tarzan up-do that’d be great.

And perhaps it’s true or perhaps I just like to see it this way, but I always enjoy thinking of Pink Elephant and Kiss & Fly in a kind of brutal rivalry for the same sceney house-music crowd. Whether this is the case or not, I want to know: Who is winning?

If we were to rate New York clubs solely on their bathroom facilities, who would win?

Definitely not meatpacking’s Kiss and Fly, who’ve had this lovely traffic cone in their handicapped bathroom, rendering it unusable, for the third week in a row. On the one hand, I doubt a lot of patrons frequent Kiss and Fly in wheelchairs. On the other hand, why has a dirty, painfully orange construction tool taken up permanent residence in a theoretically ‘chic’ New York establishment?

I want answers about the cone, which for me, has become one of those quirky clubbing enigmas; an unsolvable mystery. I crave to understand. Did Kiss and Fly, commended for its expensive ambiance – Romanesque arches and fresco painted ceilings – not leave room in its million dollar+ budget for a utilities closet?

Is the cone a signal that the toilet’s out of order? (A cone’s a little extreme; wouldn’t an “out of order” paper sign or locking the door suffice? This is what they’ve done in their two other “out of order” bathrooms.)

Is it intended to direct women through the handicapped entrance to the main bathroom stalls? (Drunk girls aren’t that stupid)

Is it for occasional outdoor use and the toilet’s just an odd choice of a storage facility? (Don’t think so, because the cone’s never been seen missing from its perch).

Is it some sort of secret weapon?

An object of extreme sentimental value to the owner?

Of course, the most likely explanation is that this bathroom (currently being used as the ladies room entrance way - also weird) is broken.

My next perturbing question is why has it taken the club over three weeks to fix it?!?!?

Guess they have an strong affinity for constructions tools over plumbers.

Ever notice that almost every trendy nightclub you set foot in throughout New York City has one, if not many, drummers pounding away, pumping up the crowd? I’ve started to take these party extras for granted, but the reality is that drummers in commercial clubs is a nightlife phenomenon that went from nonexistent to noteworthy just in the past few years. Clubbers accepted it, thrilled in it, and quickly welcomed these musicians at their dance floors and tables. Since then, no one’s stopped dancing long enough to analyze what this trend is all about! So I left my party shoes behind and sat down with Stu, one of New York’s most elite nightclub drummers, to pick his brain on the topic. Not only did I get a unique insider perspective on New York nightlife, I got a crash course in music as well!

Enjoy!

When did drummers in nightclubs become hot?

I’d say five or six years ago. I’ve been doing this for six years now, but it was already a kind of a thing when I started doing it. Now you see more and more of it all the time.

Is there a country that started it?

I don’t really know. I just figure everything comes from London (laughs) but I could be wrong.

Is there a particular club in New York that launched the trend?

Yes. I think the old Pangaea.

Oh! I used to go to Pangaea in London.

There you go.

And what kind of music are club drummers associated with?

Mostly house. That’s the most live drum friendly music.

Now I say I like house music, but I know house music is actually extremely complex with all these different subcategories. Can you explain some of the different kinds?

You’ve got the earthy house, I don’t know what the exact name for it is really, but you’ve got real sampled instruments, piano, singing thrown in there. It’s not so electronic and techno sounding. And that’s more drum friendly. Then you have the techno thing which is sharper, and it’s harder to get in there with a big sound and a live instrument. There’s also hip hop. I love playing drums over hip hop, but that’s harder to do because there’s so much space and you don’t want to just bash away. You want to blend in and pick your spots, but it’s so slow you’ve gotta really know what you’re doing.

What does a drummer bring to a party?

Energy. It’s a live musician. And drums are an exciting instrument to watch someone play. It’s a creative expression, and sometimes you don’t get that from the music itself unless you’ve got a really great DJ who can mix something really well.

What are the different kinds of nightlife drummers? I know there are the guys running around playing the bongos, but you were one of the first drummers I saw still with a complete set up and symbols and everything.

Yeah, well there aren’t many of us. (laughs) There are the guys who play the African djembe drum and they walk around with just that one drum. And I like that. That’s awesome. But I’ve been a drum set player all my life. So I have more cymbals and bongos, more Latin percussion instead of African. I’m more Latin, Afro-Cuban I guess you could say.

So would you say the trend started with the djembe guys?

Yeah. Although way back I saw more drummers with a rig than now.

Were you one of the first in New York clubs?

I’m not sure. Definitely one of the first ten. (laughs)

Now it seems clubs like having a sax and guitar player too. What’s this all about?

I think it’s because back in the old times clubs had shows, musicians and performances. Look at “I Love Lucy.” And then it got narrower and narrower to where you’re just packing people in with a DJ. I think now we’re back to maybe wanting more performance oriented things. And I think drumming is probably the easiest way to get in there, then sax and guitar. I’ve played with an electric violin player too, which was great.

And how do all of you collaborate? Do you talk before hand? Do you all rehearse?

(Laughs) No, No. There’s never any rehearsal. It depends on the musician. If you get someone who just wants to wail on his drum or guitar and not listen to anybody else, then you’re not going to do much collaborating. But I like to listen to what they’re doing and give them play. If you’re with other good musicians, you’ll understand what one another is doing.

So how do you know when to bang on the drums and how do you know when to stop?

Instinct. It’s all about what the music sounds like. Where can I fit something in? Does it need anything? Should I play on the beat? Play around the beat?

That’s improv, right? Technically, you’re improving the entire night.

Yeah. The entire night. I’ve played some songs so many times that I’ve developed some sort of routine, but it was never on purpose. I like to think of it as a wave. The DJ’s sort of the band. He’ll come up and get louder and louder and cut out. There’ll be that airy sound before he gets faster and faster to where the pounding beat comes back in. And I like to go underneath him with my volume like a wave, and when the music hits its peak, I like to crash over the top, playing louder and then backing down again.

Can a drummer make a party worse?

Yeah. If you’re not a good musician. If you play out of time. It just sounds like a mess. (laughs) Hopefully, that’s not me.

Tell me about how you started as a musician and how you started working in clubs.

I started piano when I was six, drums when I was eight. I’ve been playing drums all my life. I went to music school. I played in bands forever. Ten thousand bands. Then I was working at a stereo store. A promoter shopped there and he always asked me to come to his parties. I’d never been to a club in my life. He’d always invite me and I’d never go. I didn’t think I belonged in a club. I’m more of a rock, dive, CBGBs type of guy. I also always had paying gigs on the night he had his parties. So finally he said, “Why don’t you come, bring your drums, and I’ll pay you.” And I said “Really?!?” But a gig’s a gig.

And what club was this?

Dorsia.

And what was that first experience like?

Awkward and weird. I’d never been to a club before. It was a whole new experience for me. So I started playing and just tried to think about not annoying people, blending into the music, and trying to do something cool by listening to what was there. And by the end of the night, after a few drinks and a few girls getting into it, I started to get more comfortable until I got more and more gigs, getting hired at other clubs. And here we are.

So how much of this nightlife stuff takes up your work now?

I was doing four nights a week at one point. While it doesn’t sound like a lot, you’re playing for four hours with very few breaks. You’re going all night. It was rough, but I loved it. And it paid more than the blues and R&B gigs I was getting.

And what are the pros and cons of working in nightlife like that?

Pros are that I was thrown into New York City nightlife without any of the waiting in line. It was a whole new experience and whole new set of people I met. It was overwhelming in a very cool way for awhile. I loved it. It was something new. It was glittery. It was shiny. The girls were pretty. (laughs)

Girls love the drummer, just tell me.

Yeah. (laughs) Girls love the drummer.

And any cons?

You can get sucked in to a black hole of partying all night. Playing till four, then the after party. Next thing you know you don’t see daylight anymore. You’re a vampire. And you start to lack balance.

So when you did that four nights a week thing, what was your schedule?

Cain. Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday.

What other clubs have you played at?

Groove Jet, Flo, Latin night at B Low, Dorsia, Room Service, PM, and some others that I forget.

Do you have a favorite? A least favorite?

I played at the Versace Mansion through Cain. I loved that. But I’d say Cain. Not just because I work there, but because of the atmosphere: the wood pillars and the South African vibe. I like the whole scene, the staff. The security guys there are the coolest.

They protect you from all the girls?

(Laughs) They don’t mind doing that.

Something you love about New York nightlife:

I love the action. You can do any kind of style, any kind of vibe. You’ve got everything and people from all over the world.

Something you hate:

Yeah: Lindsay Lohan (laughs). Nah, people get snooty and uppity sometimes. I like open minded people.

Favorite place to chill in the city:

National Underground which is a new spot on Houston and Allen. It’s a bluesy, rockish, folk place. They have some really nice nooks and a brick cavernous thing down there. It looks like a mafia, speakeasy, Al Capone-type hang. And then I like Lit on 2^nd avenue near 6^th street. The downstairs, not the upstairs.

So that’s where we’ll find you on your nights off. Favorite drink?

Uh. Beer. (laughs)

What’s your inspiration drink while drumming?

Vodka cranberry. But that’s not because it’s my favorite. It’s just what gets handed to me all the time.

Craziest drumming nightlife experience?

I was playing at PM where they’d made a little stage which was three feet wide. They’d attached it to a runway which was attached to a wall. A wall of white cinderblock – so I had to climb it. I’d climb the wall and jump down in time with the music when the DJ would peak.

To hit the drums?

Yeah. Onto the stage from the wall. I wouldn’t climb very high but one night it was the owner’s birthday and I had a bit too much champagne before I started playing. I started climbing all the way up to the next floor and jumping down. I climbed too high and I didn’t make it on the way down.

So you’re hitting the drum with your whole falling body force?

Yeah. Oh yeah. I’d land on the stage while I’m playing. At the same time. But I didn’t make it this once. One leg hit the stage, the other didn’t, and I just fell off the side. I fell hard. And everyone watched me. (laughs)

Future plans?

My band’s The Matters of Circumstance (check out and listen here!). It’s acoustic / electric rock, kinda poppy, but it’s deep stuff as far as lyrically and musically. We have a base player and two guitar playing singers from Barbados. We’re going down there to make a record and then hopefully do some touring. And keep playing in nightclubs!

Exactly one year ago, I voyaged to the Hamptons for the very first time. The experience was not…how to put it kindly…a positive.

After drinking and changing clothes, it was time to hit our first destination. Memorial Day weekend means the grand opening of most Hampton clubs. We arrived outside of an establishment called Dune after paying twenty dollars to self park our car in a weedy patch of sand. If that cost twenty I was afraid to know the cost of valet? Fifty? It was just midnight and the heard of people already outside Dune resembled this fall’s massive immigration march in New York City. After many uncomfortable moments in line, Scruff finally picked us out of the crowd. We then past a large Maxim ad where certain douchey individuals chose to pose and have their picture taken by some kind of fake paparazzi.

When I envisioned a Hamptons club, I was thinking outdoors and on the ocean with men in suits and women with backless evening gowns sipping champagne. Instead, Dune was entirely indoors and smoky with the décor of a dive bar. It was so crowded that moving literally equaled pain. I was stepped on and shoved by some vicious Long Island girls on the way to our table, which was of course was typical toilet bowel size and squeezed between a wall and a wooden stool. For our party of twelve to fit into this area we’d have to learn the trick of the sixteen clowns who stuff themselves into one car.

The DJ was spinning a different song every thirty-five seconds. We’d literally hear ten bars of a piece of music before it changed, and we were doing transitions like Fifty Cent to the Beach Boys to Madonna to Fergie to The Red Hot Chili Peppers to Bon Jovie to Ludacris. My ears almost went into epileptic shock. Perhaps as an artist I’m overly sensitive, but songs in my book actually have a beginning, middle and end. Blending is fine, chopping them down to twenty seconds each and tastelessly scrambling them together is just unacceptable. Songs changed so often that I worried that by twelve thirty this heinous DJ would run out of material having already played every song in the English language.

As someone who goes out often, I’ve seen many drunken people in my day. I’ve seen very tipsy women leaving Marquee, I’ve seen people dancing with themselves at four thirty in the morning, and I’ve heard occasional rude remarks from people fighting over a five a.m. cab. None of this prepared me for the Hamptons, where people were just shit-faced. Behavior at the Dunes was so wildly inappropriate that it made your average New York club look like a monastery. People were dancing obscenely like monkeys, many seemed like they were attempting to imitate fourteen-year-olds at a high school dance. I saw one fifty year old man joyously try to climb the wall. The majority of the women couldn’t even stand. My male friend went to the bathroom only to witness a full-fledge fight break out – and it was only twelve thirty.

If these people were the Hamptons classy and fabulous I wanted a one way ticket back to Manhattan stat. Me and one of my girlfriends looked at each other with such confusion and disillusionment, shrugging our shoulders as to how it was possible each of the tables in this horrific institution were selling for a thirty five hundred dollar minimum. What was the world coming to?

After half an hour we escaped Dune through the back door and piled into our cars to go to Pink Elephant. I was in disbelief about what I had just seen and clung to the hope that there had been some mistake, that the fabled Hamptons nightlife was still somewhere out there.

The good news was the music at Pink Elephant didn’t make me want to knock myself out with an ice bucket. There was also an outdoor section of the club – not on the ocean mind you, but in the courtyard of some motel with fake sand. In addition, everyone from patrons to staff of Pink Elephant Manhattan was there. Creepy.

I bee-lined for the outdoor area. If I had wanted to be in a muggy indoor club I could’ve stayed in the city and gone to the bar below my apartment. While Pink’s music and ambiance was a definite improvement, the condition of the people mirrored Dune. I saw older women jumping erratically around the outdoor beds like chimpanzees and an attractive blonde hump a tree only to break into a full out striptease. Don’t get me wrong. I’m a huge supporter of drunken fun, but there’s a difference between a party and a shit-show.

The story ends with me taking a jitney back to NYC before my scheduled departure in an effort to save my soul. I’ve clearly learned nothing however, because now, one year later, I’m going to do it all over again.

Why?

Because this year I’m not a naïve outsider expecting backless evening gowns and elegant ocean side clubs. This year, I’ve mastered the game of the share house, the back up share house, and the back up-back up share house, and the sleeping bag. This year, I won’t be discovering. I’ll be aware and ready to pounce. This year, I won’t be expecting people to take care of me. I’ll be a resourceful superwomen with a premeditated plan. I’ve already negotiated 12 entrance and exit routes.

So with my fantasy Hamptons bubble already burst and the shock factor eliminated, will my feelings be as hostile as last year’s?

More about my exact plan of attack and its results coming soon…