Best Party Dispatch 2008

A party celebrating a 900-page novel by an 81-year-old…

By Ray LeMoine
From the National Book Awards, held at Cipriani’s Wall St (funny locale, no?) , as reported by the NY Observer’s Leon Neyfak and Jonathan Liu:

“I dunno if they did it consciously but it certainly is a lot more glam than it was last year,” said the 33-year-old agent Jud Laghi, while getting a drink at the open bar on the banquet floor toward the end of dinner. As many others did throughout the evening, Mr. Laghi noted the irony of capping this tumultuous year in book publishing at a regally decorated restaurant in the thick of the Financial District.

Hosting the afterparty at Socialista? Grove/Atlantic boss Morgan Entrekin, famous for his 80s Brat Pack cocaine-ing. The party went late, and the long dispatch ends like this:

…a strange sort of tribal frenzy took over. Upstairs and downstairs, an expertly curated playlist turned a place called Socialista safe for the bookish: “Love Will Tear Us Apart,” New Order, “Common People,” “Paper Planes.”

Dancing commenced, on furniture, on bodies, even on the books laid out as party favors by Grove and Weinstein. Things had gotten fun, and as the hour sailed towards 3am, people started talking about how they didn’t want to go home. It wasn’t fiction, but it wasn’t half-bad, either.

You have to hand it to the NBA for choosing Wall St and a club called “Socialista” as their party sites. By unleashing an all-night rager, the book industry basically stuck a big middle finger up bankers’ assholes: “Who’s dancing on tables now bitches?”

 

The View From Butter Mondays

By Ray LeMoine

Buttah…

Gawker wonders today “Who Still Gets Laid at nightclubs?,” and writes about 1oak. The post highlights a recent Men’s Vogue article, by Hud Morgan, that details Richie Akiva’s Meatpacking club as the last bastion of Manhattan decadence. Writes Gawker:

But between mentions of a modelizing Leonardo DiCaprio, a sweaty Doutzen Kroes and Jay-Z’s $100 bills, a reader may start to wonder if Morgan’s marquee party boys aren’t getting a bit long in the tooth. P. Diddy, for example, is 39; Venture capitalist Vivi Nevo, 43; supermarket billionaire Ron Burkle, 56. They’re the “old guy in the club,” as comedian Chris Rock has it. Then again, pray they never grow up: They’re probably keeping the club in business.

Coincidentally, last night I was at Akiva’s franchise party—-Butter Mondays. Butter is the club/restaurant Akiva owns in Noho, and for the last 7 or so years he’s run the city’s most notorious Monday night party. More on that in a second…

Anyway, the Men’s Vogue article is made to read like an average Friday night at 1oak equals Jigga, Diddy, Leo and every model on earth. In fact, the event the reporter attended was a celeb-hosted benefit during Fashion Week. Hardly your average night in the city.

A better view of life in the Butter/1Oak post-market crash universe would be last night. No benefit. No Fashion Week. No celeb host. It’s 2:00am; a dozen waiting taxis line Lafayette St, an idling Bentley at the head of the pack. A few Euro bros in all-over print button-down shirts lurk in front of a velvet rope. I’m wearing a really obnoxious tie-dye long sleeve t-shirt (to piss off my neighbor—long story) and am with another dude and a girl but the door girl still lifts the rope. (I guess Butter prefers a hippy to any more Euro trash.)

Downstairs, Butter’s low-ceiling basement space is all bamboo and orange light. And it’s packed. TI blends to Jay Z to Weezy. But a closer look reveals that only half of Butter’s tables are occupied by bottle spreads—you know, the Grey Goose and mixer skyline. And of those tables, I notice Akiva himself is holding down the most energetic at the party. At the table next to him I see another promoter. It’s impossible to say how many of the other four or so other occupied tables were paid for as opposed to comp-ed promoter ones.

Nonetheless, the party is raging. The girls are pretty, exotic, and young; the dudes a mix of black kids, Euros, and downtown post-punks. Akiva’s “ballin out” so I go in for closer look. He’s dancing and downing shots and rapping along to Jay Z, which is actually pretty impressive given that many nightclub owners/promoters just sit around looking bored. I meet a young girl at his table from LA. She’s wasted and drapes herself on me before I get her name. She was a model, but of the far lesser LA breed. Most of the dozen or so girls at Akiva’s table are hot, yes, but only a few would actually fit the traditional NY model definition.

Looking around, I didn’t see any celebrities. Or any iBank types. There was a table of iced-out brothers but none were recognizable. When I leave at 330am it’s still crowded.

Verdict? Butter Monday is still rocking, and Richie Akiva is pretty cool for raging like he did last night, but business was hardly $5000-table-bill booming. It’s surely still one of the world’s best parties to hear rap around hot girls.

To answer Gawker’s question about getting laid at nightclubs, it’s basically fact that the social playing field has been leveled. Without one archetype (banker with big bonus) dominating the scene, female wealth is being spread around. In fact, I’d bet a Gawker or Men’s Vogue writer would get more laid at Butter than almost anyone else save a celebrity. As the stock market’s crashed, everyone who works in a non-banking but interesting field’s stock has gone up. So there are a few upsides to the economic crash.

 

TJ (Drug) War Zone

By Ray LeMoine

Chicago Club: best nightclub in Western hemisphere

Scary sentence of the day:

In Tijuana alone, a wave of gangland killings has left at least 99 people dead since Sept. 26, a death toll that rivals, if not exceeds, that in Baghdad, a war-torn city that is four times as large, over the same period.

TJ is my favorite city in North America, so this is sad news. Already this year, over 3700 have been killed in Mexico’s drug war, compared to 2700 in all of 2007. TJ borders San Diego, which means whale’s vagina, according to Ron Burgundy, and serves as the major entry point to America for cocaine and meth. Gangs are battling for control of the city, and have taken to dumping bodies in highly visible places, even schools:

…some of the gruesome details of recent killings, like the several vats of acid that were found outside a seafood restaurant, containing what the authorities said they believed were human remains. Or the two bodies wrapped in what resembled cellophane that were found near a road sign that said, “Thank you for visiting Tijuana.”

Bodies have been hung from bridges, sliced into pieces, decapitated, burned.

Bummer.

 

Fed To Supranationalize Swiss Banks

The new world order is upon us. The American government is bailing out foreign banks with Fed (taxpayer) money. Is there a precedent for this? Are American citizens now partially Swiss? I need answers!

The Fed announced earlier this week that it would provide dollars on an unlimited basis to a consortium of foreign banks, including Switzerland’s, in hopes of freeing up world credit markets that have all but ceased to function. Though the foreign banks post their own currency with the Fed in return, protecting the balance sheet of the U.S. central bank, the Swiss announcement said access to dollars through the Fed allowed them to pursue a major bailout that might have been hard to finance otherwise.

“Since the entire operation will be effected in U.S. dollars, it will not affect the National Bank’s monetary policy in any way,” the Swiss bank said in a news release.

In other Swiss news, check out Cafe Select on Lafayette at Kenmare when you get a chance. Their all-Swiss wine list offers some sweet whites. It’s a great place to get to know the culture of our new co-citizens.

 

Nas and Nachtwey…

By Ray LeMoine

Nas played a free show last night. And while I missed the show I did happen to chill with that motherfucker at Goldbar until almost 5am. Yes, that’s right, Nasir Jones, Kelis, Cee Lo, Eve, and a dozen or so others were with Christian Alexander smoking blunts and dancing at a relatively empty Goldbar. The DJ was superb, mixing old school rap, funk, and soul. 

NYMag was at the Nas show, saying he “generally just looked like a top contender in a Coolest Person Alive tournament.” Well, it’s safe to say that when Nas (wearing a blue velour track suit and crooked ALIFE hat) and Kelis (white tights, experimental jumper, Chanel bag) were dancing and smoking a blunt to some weird funk jam at 345am this morning he officially won the tournament. Further proof: Nas had no attitude—his bodyguards were dancing not being dicks—and he was friendly to any well-wishers. 

How did this party come together? Christian Alexander used to be VIP host at The Box, a crazy sex theater/nightclub downtown. He’s also an American hero, and my old pot dealer’s ex-roommate (long story). Anyway, last night I met up with Christian at about 2am after leaving, uh, The Box, having heard he set up this Nas afterparty. Without Christian, The Box misses out on these strange impromptu rap-world parties. Still, The Box has been packed two Tuesdays straight. It seems all The Box’s legal troubles—complaining neighbors, community boards, and employees—have led them to kind of re-launch. I saw a bunch of new promoters there, but no “celebrities” and few familiar faces.

Christian’s held two crazy parties this week: On Monday, he hosted a small party at La Esquina attended by both James Nachtwey and Cee Lo. Who else can get a Grammy winning rapper in the same room as the world’s foremost photojournalist—at 230am? 

Nachtwey and Nas? WTF? Only in Christian Alexander’s world…

 

Screening Tonight, NYC: Blood Trail and Moosehunter

By Ray LeMoine

Preview party tonight: filmmaker Richard Parry spent 15 (!) years following photojournalist Robert King (Polaris) through Bosnia, Chechnya, and Iraq. The resulting film, Blood Trail, premiered at Toronto Film Festival and has its NY debut tomorrow at IFC Theater on 6th Ave. Come to the friends and family party tonight! Both Parry and King will be in attendance.

We’re also showing Inigo Gilmore’s The Moosehunter, a short film about Sarah Palin, Alaska, and her attempts to band the book “Pastor, I’m Gay” (I swear). Of course, the Sox game will be on too.

Monday, Oct 6th, 7-10pm 88 Greenwich St at Rector 24th floor. Booze. DJ Anthony Pappalardo. With your host, Sean B Dorsey. Presented by Street Attack.

 

Sweet Flyers For Radio Silence Book Release Parties

Anthony Pappalardo’s book, Radio Silence, about the art and aesthetic of American hardcore, is out now. This weekend, he’s hosting two parties in Brooklyn. The flyers (shown above) are by Nathan Nedersteck, the book’s co-author, and look almost as amazing as the book. Go to these events!

 

Short Film About Wall St Crash

By Ray LeMoine

Will the sacred preppie den Bar Martignetties be among the first market-crash casualties

Anything I touch seems to get tagged with a Fear and Loathing moniker, even though I hate Hunter S Thompson. After the market crashed on Monday I worked with my buddy Gilmore to produce a short news feature for Channel4 UK, which of course they called Fear and Loathing in New York.

It was a weird post-crash night in New York: Balthazar claimed the slowest night in years, Bar Martignetties was literally empty, and Beatrice Inn yuppie free. We worked about 20 hours straight and even wound up getting assaulted by some Wall St cock face on the 7:23am train from New Caanan. Thanks to ReutersTV for editing expertise.

Watch it here…

And here’s C4’s copy:

Fear and loathing in New York
30 Sep 2008
By: Channel 4 News
Inigo Gilmore visited New York’s financial district to see how the bankers are coping.

During the Wall Street crash of 1929, prohibition was in full swing – with the manufacture and sale of alcohol banned.

So with shares volatile and bonuses under threat, what’s a Wall Street banker to do? Head to the pub, of course.

These days, in the midst of the financial crisis, bankers aren’t finding it as hard to drown their sorrows, as shares dive and their bonuses are put under threat.

So which Wall St jocker bro hangout will be first to close? Well, judging from absence of a single paying customer on Monday at 9:30pm, it could be Bar Martignetties. In the now legendary “Pink Shirts Welcome” story from the NYT Sunday Styles, Allen Sarkin desribed the scene with gusto (from May 2007):

Once inside Netti’s, the nickname most regulars use for both levels even though the downstairs, officially, is called Bella’s, the young patrons can enjoy themselves far from mocking eyes. Wearing a black-and-white polka-dot dress that was cut both low and high, Ms. Irani, 23, stood near the D.J. booth downstairs, where her fellow Trinity alumnus Nick Harvey Brown, an Englishman, was spinning 80’s music. “Stroke me, stroke me,” the speakers sang. Anthony Martignetti refers to Ms. Irani as a princess. She says she is an 11th-generation member of a noble Zoroastrian family with roots in Mumbai, but won’t confirm the princess thing.

She does have a regal way about her. Her highness ordered shots of tequila all around and a glass of Champagne for herself. “I like it,” she said, fingering the glass as it was handed up to her, brown eyes flashing. “And it likes me.”

The right to the pursuit of happiness is enshrined in the Declaration of Independence, put there by a collection of landed gentry who could be considered proto-preppies (John Hancock, Harvard, 1754). Making fun of preppies is almost as old an American pastime.

Speaking American pastimes, Go Red Sox!!!

 

John Boehner, Bailout Buster and Party Promoter

By Ray LeMoine

Not only did House Republican leader John Boehner (OH) crash Paulson and Bush’s bailout party in the Roosevelt Room last night, he also promotes the RNC’s best all night parties.

Boehner’s the guy who stalled the bailout talks last night. He hates Commies and can’t believe Bush and the GOP are about to nationalize $700 billion in Wall St assets.

But when he’s at a Republican Convention, Boehner’s DC’s own Richie Akiva! Via The Hill:

Boehner’s “Best Little Warehouse” parties got their start at the 1996 GOP convention in San Diego and continued in Philadelphia in 2000. The New York party in 2004 went into the wee hours of the morning and boasted 68 corporate sponsors, including Coca-Cola, Eli Lilly and Sallie Mae. The so-called Boehner Warehouse Party will live on in Minneapolis-St. Paul, although House Minority Leader John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) name will not be found on any official material or invite.

And please don’t call it the Boehner Warehouse Party anymore, even if everybody knows that’s what it is, GOP lobbyists warn with a wince. New ethics rules passed in 2007 bar corporate-sponsored parties honoring individual members of Congress, and corporations and lobbyists are on high alert not to violate them.

I atteneded the final night of Boehner’s party this year. It was held in a 2000 capacity space, split into two rooms, with live rock and blues in each, and a bunch of open bars. At about 330am I beat up a young Republican after he knocked off my Convention hat. The cops were called, and they threw me out, then shut the party down.

 

The End of Nightlife? Or a New Beginning?

By Ray LeMoine

We never really liked those banker dudes anyways…

A lot of hype about the market crash’s effects on nightlife have been spewing forth. Mainly, people are saying that without jr i-bankers the bottle service model—where nightclubs only let in those who buy $600 tables—will die, and with it New York nightlife as we know it. A few corny clubs (Myst, Prime—both of which I’ve never even heard of) have announced they’ll no longer require a bottle service for entry.

In order to gauge the effect of the market crash on nightlife, I stopped by The Box, Beatrice, Hotel Delmano, and Apothke over the past few days. Guess who’s gone missing (to some extent)? Dickheads with cop haircuts in suit-vests and ties. And now, guess who’s still out? Yup, hot chicks. From what I saw, The Great Manhunt of 2008 has never been more fierce, and if anything, more girls than ever are on the scene.

So the end of investment banking means more girls for anyone not in banking. It also means a few of the lamer clubs will become more like your Tunnels and Twilos of yesteryear, where all you need to get in is a cover charge. But NY’s economy is diverse enough to sustain a handful of premium clubs—The Boxes, 1Oaks, Marquees, Beatrices, SubMercers.

See, unlike the 30s, when America was a third-rate power, we now have the most diverse economy in world history. After we won the war against Germany and Japan, we wound up with a third of the world’s wealth. With our newfound, unprecedented $$$, we made a deal to rebuilding Europe and Japan. Included in that deal was a clause stating that US culture and product gets unrestricted access to these markets. This gave the US the chance to build a large “creative economy.”

Despite the market crash, NY’s creative class remains in tact. Industries like television and fashion have never had more cash. Even Hollywood is having a decent year, with Batman grossing a billion worldwide. Live music is played in NY more than ever (motherf–king My Bloody Valentine are playing tonight for heck’s sake). Advertising is still based here. The art world hasn’t slowed much (see: Hirst, Damien).

All this makes me believe that New York will survive this “greatest collapse since the Great Depression” without shanty towns on the East River. People are right to be worried about the nationalization of a trillion in Wall St assets, but the IRS, another huge federal agency, runs just fine.

Fear not, party folk. As a bunch of entitled sociopaths (and last week’s short-selling was sociopathy) with Roman numerals at the end of their names downsize, the rest of us can enjoy one aspect our victory against the Nazis wrought: the rise of the American creative class.