Final night in Melbourne this weekend – It was off to Lavish! Here we go!

Lavish @ Watermark Bar
Assessment Time
: 11:30pm – 3:30am (closing time)
Address: 8/800 Bourke St, Docklands, Melbourne ,Victoria.
Website: http://www.facebook.com/LavishSaturdays
Dress Code: Seemingly smart casual. Most folk here were wearing collared shirts. Didn’t see any daggy dressers tonight. I was wearing a black fedora hat, white collared shirt, blazer, black pants, shoes, and suspenders.
Cover Charge / Entry Fee: $25 full charge. $20 on guestlist before 11.30pm.
Guestlist: Called one of the promoters from the Facebook webpage. She confirmed guestlist and gave me free entry as well as a bottle of champers. I forgot to redeem my free entry when I got into the club. D’oh! But I did get my free bottle of champagne. Woot!
Inside Watermark Bar: A dancefloor about the same dimensions at Martin Place Bar / Bamboo. A podium right in the middle with poles. A lengthy bar on the side. Very Bamboo-Like. However, behind the DJ is a lounge VIP area to hold 2 small parties. There is also a second room upstairs as a lounge, and a further 3rd level where there is another bar and lounges. Nice view of the waters – very nice. Walk out the side, across the pathway and there is a smoking area, as well as a second enclosed room. Inside the second room is a bar, small-ish dancefloor and Dj area. 6 or 7 lounges dot the side walls. It’s actually quite a big place.
Music: Main room was contemporary RNB throughout the whole night. Normal RNB tunes, and mixing done well. The latest commercial house in the secondary room. No complaints from me.
Crowd: Dominantly asian, young, dressed well.
Atmosphere: Crowded in the main room. Just the right amount of people in the house room, but the RNB room seemed more lively. The house room was much darker but still fun nonetheless.

Video: 360 View of the RNB room from the back podium:

YouTube Preview Image
Timeline:
Cutting the line
One of my friends seems to know all the promoters here. When we got there, there was a line about 30 people deep – *Groan* , luckily the promoter friend comes out, and we ge instant access right into th e club – score!! Wouldn’t it be the greatest ‘fuck you’ if the people in line knew we were from Sydney ? haha.

ABC shots – we kill the bar
All weekend we had been taking ABC shots at the clubs. (The ABC shot is Absinthe, Bacardi 151, and Chatruese – A really disgusting drink that gets you drunk fast.) anyway, all night we were ordering these drinks, chanting ‘ABC!… ABC!’. The rest of the crowd have no idea what we are on about, but the bartender girl joined us, doing the hand gestures for ‘ABC’, ‘YMCA’ style, which was pretty funny. Eventually later in the night the bartender girl says that they ran out! We exhausted their supply of absinthe! Booo 🙁

The crowd chants for me – strange yet beautiful
OK, this is quite possibly one of those bizarre yet awesome moments. I was up earlier on the podium just dancing away with a friend and I hopped off. About half an hour later I came back, and still, NOBODY was gutsy enough to hop on the podium. By this time, the entire RNB room was packed. So I jumped up and did some stupid dance with my suspenders. Suddenly I can hear cheering from the crowd – half the dancefloor turned around from the DJ to look at James do a silly dance! This was pretty cool, but I had no idea what to do. I just put my hands up and down in the air, and everybody else just followed suit. I could see my friends having a puzzled look on their faces thinking ‘What the f*ck is happening – James is popular!’ – hahaha I loved it… this will be forever a very proud moment in my amateur clubbing career.

My fan base. They cheered for me as I went up on stage. Bizarre!

My fan base. They cheered for me as I went up on stage to dance. Awesome!

In other words, JAMES TRAN HAD TAKEN OVER THE CLUB!! Well for a few seconds anyway.

A costume party arrives
We were in the house room and there were all these people! I have no idea what the occasion was but they were all dressed up as superheroes I think. Actually I’m not sure.. check this guy out:

Who is this guy?

Who is this guy meant to be?

Meeting a promoter
I was taking a break, feeling all sad, and a promoter comes up to say hello to me. We talk, and I find out he has a clubbing blog too for Melbourne! Suffice to say though it has a different angle on clubbing, and is more from a promoters point of view. Maybe one day I’ll be a promoter and use my status to hit on hot chicks.

Rip Off Rose man
We have the old asian rose lady in Sydney. She visits the clubs and flogs her roses. Tonight there was another guy flogging off roses. They were $10 each. ZOMG.. what a rip off. Well, actually, that’s normal for a rose isn’t it? But geez.

Later one of my friends gives me a white rose that a guy bought for her. Hahaha, awesome.

A Tree!
Here’s a photo of me randomly trying to climb the tree in the smoking area.

Letting the inner Spiderman out

Letting the inner Spiderman out

Coda
We stayed until closing time when they kicked us all out. It was 3.30am

Recommendation
A very good venue, one of the best asian rnb places I’ve been to. Though it can get a bit crowded in the rnb room. I would recommend it for asians visiting Melbourne.

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3 Responses to Lavish @ Watermark Bar – Saturday 19th September 2009

  1. dr_stoopid says:

    I think that fellow in the costume is supposed to be DOOM from the popular PC Shooter DOOM II, although my initial reaction was Bobo Fettfrom Star Wars.

    LOL You had a freaking pole on the podium and you didn’t know what to do?! You pole dance of course! =D

  2. James says:

    how did i miss mr. doom, you’re right!

    i think i tried to pole dance, without much success. must take classes

  3. Jak says:

    Call me old-fashioned, but I don’t particularly condone guys pole dancing 😀 I’m just saying

    And the guy in costume is from Halo. I know because he’s a friend of mine, and also because he repeatedly screamed “Hail to the Masterchief, bi-atch!!!” while he pointed the prop gun at me

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