NOVA @ Mr Tipplys

On October 4, 2014, in Commercial, EDM, House, Mr TIpplys, by J T

Reviewed by:
Rating:
3
On October 4, 2014
Last modified:October 11, 2014

Summary:

Club event promoting directly to the International Chinese community with money to spend. For the entry price of $30 it is probably not worth it if you wanted to dance. However strong crowd turnouts will ensure the continuity of the event. Not for the locals.

The event ‘LKF’ has been closed at the Civic Hotel, and thank god for that. The promoters have moved their Saturday event to another venue, Mr. Tipply’s under the new moniker “Nova”. Time to check it out!

12:50AM peak time on the dance floor.

12:50AM peak time on the dance floor.

NOVA Nightclub Saturdays @ Mr. Tipplys (Formerly City Hotel)

Nova has been running since September 2014 on a Saturday weekly basis. The promoters aim to keep out the riff raff by promoting the event as for VIP only (i.e. Men with money to spend on alcohol) and promote attractive waitresses for “one on one” service. Kind of borderline sexual. The promoters directly target the Overseas Chinese crowd in Sydney by bringing in popular Chinese celebrities or DJs.

Essentials:
Opening Hours:

10:30PM – 4:00AM

Address:

349 Kent St (The old City Hotel)

Parking:

There is nearby street parking on Kent St or at the Kent St carpark with weekend flat rate.

Venue Website:

www.mrtipplys.com.au

Event Website:

http://www.novasydney.com

Promoters:

Mizuya Entertainment, Dynamic Entertainment

Occurrence:

Every Saturday since September 2014

Dress Code / Door Policy:

Smart casual at minimum, but I got away with running shoes, a hat and t-shirt. (I had just returned from the Hardwell concert) To be sure, we asked the promoters and security if it was okay to get in looking like poor uni students. They said it was fine.

They let me in like dressed  this.

They let me in like dressed this.

Entry Fee / Cover Charge:

Tonight it was a full blown $30. It’s finally happened outside of Marquee and Ivy. Massive hole in my wallet.

Passouts: No passouts before midnight.

Guestlist: See website for details

Cloak Room: $5 initial reservation and $2 for bag re-checks. Standard for an Asian club.

Bottle Service / Table Service:

There are ten bottle service areas inside the club. Any object that resembles a table is converted to a bottle service table. The pricing per table is unknown, but typically you are looking at for a few hundred dollars per bottle. Each table has a bottle or two and some champers glasses Tonight:

Assessment Time:

Midnight – 1:40AM
Outside Line:

Approximately 60 people in line and it took about 15 minutes before we got in.

Inside:

Mr Tipplys on entry is the same as the old City Hotel was. Carpeted lounge “foyer” where the cloak room is.

As you keep walking in, the main bar is on the right as a semi-circle attached to the wall. To the left are two tables reserved for the actual VIPs later that night. There is also an upstairs area but it is closed for tonight.

Continue walking to the middle of the venue where the wooden, but dry, dance floor is. (it makes it quite difficult to shiffle on this kind of grippy dance floor) Right in the middle at the back wall is the DJ podium area, and jutting out at the front is a small T-shaped podium to hold 6 people at max. The rest of the tables dot along the borders of the room. Dance floor space can hold perhaps 80-150 people.

Continue on to the outdoor area where people get to smoke and have a chat. There are some seats and a mini-bar as well. Quite dark out here.

Bar Prices / Line:

Didn’t drink alcohol tonight, but the lines were two people deep.

Bathroom Facilities:

Relatively clean bathrooms

DJs: Don’t know her name but she looked Chinese to me. Really pale skin with strong make up.

Music Style:

Some popular songs were played but mostly EDM tunes were playing. No RnB at all heard during my time here, but perhaps it was played later.

Crowd:

Dominantly an International Chinese crowd. Chinese mainland and some Cantonese here. But all you would hear are people talking and chatting in Mandarin. A bucketload of guys too. I’m pretty sure that our group of 3 were the only Asian Australians and non-Chinese in here. Some of the Asians looked a bit dubious but I can’t judge without knowing them, but the thought always niggles in the back of your mind that if you mess with the wrong people here you could be in trouble.

Ratio:

3 or 4 guys to 1 girl. Pretty horrendous. There were some girls who have obviously gone under the knife and linger around the bottle service tables. The gold digging patterns of Asia are slowly creeping over here to Australia.

Entertainment:

MC throughout the night to get things going. Also a newly famous Hong Kong singer, Shiga Lin, came down around 1:30 to take photos and chill in the VIP area. At the time, I didn’t really care much, since I had already experienced Hardwell.

Shiga Lin. She's famous in Hong Kong. Never heard of her here.

Shiga Lin. She’s famous in Hong Kong. Never heard of her here.

Atmosphere:

When we got in at 12:30 one does expect the floor to be busy, but it was pretty bare. It’s not surprising as this is a common thing in Asia, for people to eat dinner and then rock up at a nightclub super late, then settle into their table service areas before even considering going onto the dance floor. The crowd on the dance floor .. well I don’t think they came here for the music, because only a handful of people knew the songs that were playing and they were at the front. Everyone else was just standing and trying to dance but to the beat. They had no idea what the songs were.

When the DJ started playing “Big Booty Bitches”, OMG, we went nuts, but nobody  else knew what was going on. I suspect a few Chinese songs would have made the crowd go crazy, but not tonight. Despite this, the place was pretty busy from 1AM onwards, and any crowd is better than no crowd.

People mostly kept to themselves the whole night.

Video: Video walkthrough and timelapse
YouTube Preview Image

Upon Departure

Most of our energy was used up at DJ Hardwell earlier in the night so we weren’t going hard tonight. We got pretty tired and left at 1:40AM.

Final Thoughts & Recommendation

Well, it’s probably not worth it unless you are here for a friends party or if you feel more comfortable surrounded by Chinese people speaking Chinese, in a club acting like an Asian club with expensive bottle service and entry fees. $30 was just ridiculous and at this relatively smaller venue compared to Marquee/Ivy, it can’t be justified. It just feels like a very loud bar with a dance floor. Despite this, there is a big target audience and it looks like the event will continue to run for some time. So long as its more dollars in the coffers for promoters, they don’t mind at all.

NOVA Sydney @ Mr. Tipply’s – 6.0/10

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2 Responses to NOVA @ Mr Tipplys

  1. 真是学无止境!

  2. 笑八达 says:

    感受学习的力量!

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