Nightlife
Picks
Saturday nite, and poor Max is feelin' lonesome. Now, I'm
not a dude who usually cops to such goofy emotions, but
my little chickadee, the luvly Chameleon Ross, had begged
out of our usual weekend date. I thoughtfully complied.
Sensitivity: It's both blessing and curse, lemme tell ya,
boys.
And so, seeking lusty adventure (or at least a place to
hang my hat and hit the video crack), I ended up cruising
Southeast Portland. That's when I caught sight of a sign,
glowing electric-white: The Egyptian Club. I'd once overheard
some punky-cute chicks chatting it up at a bus stop, and
visions of pharaohs, harems and other totems of masculinity
danced across my brain.
Upon entering the joint, I was caught off-guard by a disco
remix of Melissa Etheridge's "Come to My Window" pounding
from the jukebox. (A disco remix! Who knew?) And after I'd
bellied up to the bar--skipping a girlish concoction called
The Nile in favor of a classic Bud--I saw a note pasted
to the wall. It said something about this being a "women's
club." All are welcome but should act accordingly. "Women's
club." Hmmm. What exactly did that mean? I swiveled on my
stool for a quick scene survey. The couple shoving bills
into the video poker machine? Women. That duo shooting pool?
Women. The group playing "spin the bottle" at the table?
Uh, women.
OK, Max got it--ladies lovin' ladies.
And, make no mistake, Max is down with it. I accessed my
tattered memory and extracted a favorite Jonathan Richman
song, one where our melodic protagonist recounts the night
he found himself in a women's club after being bored at
a not-so-women's club earlier. The chorus: "I was dancing
in a lesbian bar/In the first bar folks were drinking sips/But
in this bar they could shake their hips." With that in mind,
I sought out the boogie.
I found it in the "Tomb" room. Big enuf for a half-court
game of hoops, it was as dark as Lon Mabon's heart, padded
with wall-to-wall dames, and when the DJ dropped the needle
on New Order's "Bizarre Love Triangle" (one of my classic
"Max Trax"), I had to hit the floor.
I was about to descend into my patented disco split when
I did a double-take.
There was my dear Chameleon, engaged in a full-crotch grind
with a big-boned gal wearing grease in her hair, a white
T-shirt and rolled up dungarees. The look on Chameleon's
face was pure Emmanuelle. I was angry...yet oddly
aroused.
But I didn't want her to see me seeing her, so I exited
the Tomb and was slyly slippin' out when an arm yanked me
aside. "We need more people," the buzz-cut babe said. I
looked up to find myself in a karaoke lounge. Thinking a
rendition of "Stand by Your Man" would be just the medicine
my jealous heart needed, I filled out a slip with my new
stage name--"Loser"--and awaited my turn.
WHERE
WE WENT:
The Egyptian Club/Room/Tomb
3701 SE Division St., 236-8689
Karaoke every Saturday.
NIGHTLIFE
EVENTS:
KARAOKE
Micro-stewed sing-alongs
LaurelThirst
2958 NE Glisan St., 232-1504
9 pm Mondays
SOUL DJs
Soul Night at the Alibi
DJ Gabe spins singles from the '50s and '60s
Alibi Restaurant, 4024 N Interstate Ave., 287-5335
9 pm Mondays
Fat Tuesday
DJ Aquaman spins '60s and '70s soul
Viscount Ballroom, 722 E Burnside St., 233-7855
Late-night Tuesdays after live groove-jazz by Porterhouse
Soul Kitchen
DJs following live soul by Tahoe Jackson and Black Angel
Dante's Caffe Italiano, 1 SW 3rd Ave., 417-1747
9 pm Thursdays
Exodus
'70s soul and funk
1201, 1201 SW 12th Ave., 225-1201
9 pm Thursdays
COMEDY
Ed Hart
Verbose jocularity
Harvey's Comedy Club, 436 NW 6th Ave., 241-0338
8 pm Wednesday, Thursday and Sunday, 8 and 10:30 pm Friday,
6:30, 9 and 11:30 pm Saturday, March 15-19. $8-$10.
ComedySportz
Battling for laffs
1963 NW Kearney St., 236-8888
9 pm Friday, 7:30 and 9:30 Saturday, March 10-11
$10, $9 with can of food for the Oregon Food Bank
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Willamette Week | originally
published March 15,
2000
|
