Outside alife

alife recently went through a minor renewal for its 6th year of business. I went to visit the place last Saturday to see what has changed, if anything.

Inside, some of the columns and walls are now covered with a cartoony theme, the lounge above appears more spacious but the rest was frozen in time.

If you’ve never been to alife, it can be an interesting experience. It’s the Japanese meat market par excellence.
The place doesn’t even try to make an excuse for it. The normally shy Japanese guys, there tend to run out of manners when it comes to physical contact.

Being a Japanese club it’s certainly still very safe (though, worryingly, bouncers constantly check the dance floor), but the testosterone meter is off the scale.. above and beyond.

When a man grabs a woman

Word has it, that alife is indeed part kyabakura as some of the prettiest girls are sitting idle waiting for someone, anyone, from the VIP areas to call them in.

The VIP setting is as pretentious as it could possibly be. Sofas pointing to the main dance floor are mostly empty. But they are taken, and you can’t sit on them. So close and yet so far away..

This time around, the VIP area at front of the dance floor was reserved for some curious types, including a man in his 50s dressed along the lines of Napoleon Bonaparte (what was all that about ?).

As usual, by 1 Am it starts getting quite crowded and one hour later it’s packed with people.
Music rotates between hip-hop, J-pop, and J-disco trance remixes. Some common tunes unchanged for years, bring moments of excitement, jumping and chanting. For men it’s an excuse to “attack” from behind.. rise your hands in the air and get closer from behind. No.. the music isn’t really what this is all about 8)

Some guys will go in couples blatantly hunting for girls in the dance floor, some work their way from behind in what I call the “forklift position”, because they extend their upper arms perpendicularly as a forklift and encase the victim from behind.
At the same time, arms become a barrier and, may you have the audacity to dance nearby, the forks can extend laterally to push you away from the “payload”.

By 3 AM the desperation kicks in. Some of the girls will be drunken beyond recognition and also sought out “preys”.

The less fortunate girls may go on the attack themselves, possibly even on some rare foreigner (what’s wrong with me ? Maybe the foreigners will like me more ?).
Then it’s important to remember that social interaction there is especially frivolous. In such a competitive environment, being seen with somebody of the other sex alone is a precious token of achievement.. it’s good to have fun, but beware of the aggressive girls that start demanding drinks, smokes and whatnot… they aren’t really thirsty or craving for a cig, they are there work their leverage.

In conclusion, it’s still the same good old alife. It can be fun as long as one doesn’t take it too seriously.

Enjoy !

Enjoy !!!

We’ll all be joining friends’ home parties and ditching the clubs this year. But otherwise picking your favorite club to wait and party to the countdown and beyond could be fun as well.

In our experience, Roppongi doesn’t really offer anything special on New Year’s eve.. more noise, but that’s about it. Some bars and clubs tend to get really overcrowded.

On a more traditional note, it may be work visiting a temple or a shrine. It can be rather suggestive. A different experience, definitely a must for those that are in Tokyo as tourists. Check out the Tokyo Turism Info site.

Our suggestion on that is not to go necessarily for the biggest and baddest temple. Specifically, the Meiji-Jingu shrine will be packed full of people. Chances are that as the year will be turning you’ll be stuck in line with, literally, a million other people.
The turnout is so massive that people going towards the shrine are actually forbidden from going back, unless they are feeling sick (or pretending to ;)
So, a less popular, more accessible shrine or temple is definitely suggested.

So, whatever you pick, Enjoy and have a fun New Year’s celebration !
Also let us know how it went for you !

It gets a bit better going to places such as Atom. Fun to try, but we are still in a different world with a different kind of music, really.

Famous trance DJs do come from time to time, but they are very rare and they are all pretty much all the way to ageHa.

In those cases the club gets really packed with a lot of us gaijin clearly showing that there is a gap to fill there.

With the Velfarre closing 2 years ago, there has been little hope for those of us that are itching for that weekly fix in Tokyo.

Fortunately our friend and contributor Marc_0 (aka Matrix), a big trance fan, has been gaining momentum as a DJ.

He’s been mixing to a few minor clubs and bars bit with a discrete success. He tells us that owners are rather reluctant to let DJs play trance, but he’s been trying to persuade owners to let go of the fear and get him to play the good stuff 8)

This week he’s going to perform along with DJ Eiji, at Bar Quest on the 26th (Fri) and at Ultra Lounge on the 27th (Sat), both places located in Roppongi.

He’s assured us that he’ll be firing those trance tunes for us and as a special deal, Bar Quest entrance will be free or charge, while Ultra Lounge will be ¥1500/1D with other drinks being ¥800 instead of the usual ¥1000 !

We are definitely looking forward to those two events.. which are frankly minor, but overall worth checking out and supporting.

Anthem Night @Bar Quest, Friday 26th -> http://iflyer.jp/event/33365

Anthem Night II @Ultra Lounge, Saturday 27th -> http://iflyer.jp/event/33483

Enjoy !!

Speaking of lack of action, last weekend Mado Lounge was also not terribly active. We got in for ¥3500 with no drink, only to find out that the larger dance floor was closed.
It wasn’t so bad, but certainly not worth the entrance ticket.. beware of slow nights at Mado Lounge !

Enjoy !
DGP

Friday night gives a 6 to Heartland, a 6 to Muse and an 8 to alife.

Heartland played nice but didn’t provide the goods aside from meeting some old friends.
Muse played fair and didn’t provide tangible good: one playful girl and her future husband and one uncertain girl with an engagement ring.. ehh ?!.
Alife didn’t provide any old friend but gave a great vision… and we are all fans of great graphics.. until we get to upgrade to physics simulation.

On a side note, last week’s Xross let us down. They refused our supposedly outdated discount entry and provided us with lackluster entertainment (where were the chicks ?).

bha !

Some of you asked for more action pictures about the club scene…. we’re thinking to go suck up on clubs and get us nice shots about the action.. but we’d like to get more feedback on that. So, mail us over at feedback@tokyoclubbers.com

Write and tell us !!!

Back from a night out in Roppongi. I met MilanoCookie and Mac’n'Roe at Heartland. We aren’t really big fans of that bar so we went straight down Nishi-Azabu crossing aiming to Xross.
As we passed in front of Muse we felt somewhat compelled to get in, but I kept pushing for Xross: not yet another Muse-night, please !

We entered for the full price of ¥3500/2D. We used to get discounts when purchasing a ticket or when leaving, but that policy apparently changed (also possibly because we haven’t been bringing girls with us recently.. gomen ne !).
We got in by 12:30 AM and it was somewhat empty. As time passed by more people came in, but it wasn’t nearly as full as last time.
We suspect that alife‘s recent renewal has been drawing customers away from Xross. The club itself also hasn’t been doing very much to keep its clientèle: no more discounts, no member card thing even though we’ve been filling out forms the last few times we went (waste of my freaking time !).
By 1:30 AM the usual Japanese-disco’s Bon Jovi mix got us excited, though alcohol must have played a role as well ;)
The music wasn’t half bad.. same as usual, popular Japanese-disco stuff. Notably without young punks screaming odore. We haven’t seen those recently, could it be that it went out of fashion ? One can only hope so.

Girls didn’t seem gaijin-friendly at all. As usual with Japanese girls, the ones checking us out where those that came with their Japanese boyfriends: “I look at you and my bf gets jealous ! I’m so transgressive !” ..rightt.

In conclusion, our balance for the night is positive, but only because we had fun dancing, drinking and chatting among ourselves.
Xross was definitely not at its best, quite possibly suffering from the surge of popularity of the renewed alife.
We didn’t like the fact that Xross has been stingy with those invitations/discounts. Nor we liked the fact that we never got any sort of feedback from those membership forms we carefully filled up 2-3 times already (I give you my cell’s email and you don’t even care to spam it ?!).

Next week we are definitely off to alife. Getting in before 11 PM for ¥2500 less than Xross. Much cheaper, possibly much more interesting and a lot more crowded.. though that’s not necessarily a good thing.

Highlights for the night:

• Drunken Tequila-girl being dragged upstairs by a security guy. Did she try beat up someone ?! I thrive at the thought.
• A couple of guys wearing wool hats getting on each other’s case. What’s this ? A stupid-wool-hat gangs thing ?

We had fun, but Xross did not provide the best environment for the night.

Time to sleep !