EDC NY 2013 Part 2/3

When we last left our motley crew of EDC-goers, they were making their way back to the LaGuardia Airport Hotel and prepping themselves for the after party event at the currently hot club 'Pacha' which I'm sure is Spanish for something trendy.  Pickup lines were being practiced, cell phones were being recharged, and expectations were growing high for the night.  After getting all prim and proper, the crew took one giant leap into the EDM World and started a voyage into the concrete jungle that is New York City.

EDC NY Part 2/3: Fear and Loathing in Pacha- The Journey Rages On

Things were off to an up-close and personal start when we crammed 9 of us into an SUV on the way from the hotel to Pacha.  Let me tell ya, there isn't a better way to bond with friends and new acquaintances than a crammed cab ride of about 40 minutes.  I was really looking forward to the crowd at Pacha, because I had a feeling it would be a mix of people.  By mix of people in this instance, I mean the normal club goers who would be all dressed up and such, and the riff raff that Pacha was letting in tonight due to hosting the EDC after party.  Rumor had it that the dress code was lifted for that night so that people could make it there in time, so that was pretty considerate of the good folks at Pacha.  This being said, it seemed to me as if there would be a great mashup (that's an EDM term, you guys) of regular people and overly tired EDC-goers who were still dressed like assholes, but in a club.  I was considerate of my appearance at the club, so I shed my jean vest in lieu of some black jeans, a sweet Japandroids t-shirt and a new button up that really made me feel good about myself.  I would consider myself more of the 'regular' people crowd at Pacha, as opposed to my buddy Steve, who was dressed more like the EDC asshole who was at this nice club in a tank top.  At least both sides of the coin was represented in our group.

Dress to impress, Steve. I'm not impressed.

The first thing after getting dropped off out front of Pacha was that I was a big fan of the Pacha logo which consisted of two cherries.  It made me feel like I was playing a slot machine or something.  If there is one fruit that can show some class for a club, it has to be the cherry.  Anyways, after paying our chauffeur off, I became somewhat nervous that we were told to "go around the back" of the club, through an alleyway and a weird parking garage thing to enter the club.  Since there was a line out front, it seemed strange to me that we had to go to the back entrance because we already had tickets to this shindig.  In short, I thought we were going to get jumped.  I can't speak for the rest of my friends, but I had my hands in my pockets grasping my cell phone and wallet extra tight while walking through this abyss of despair.  After getting somewhat lost and confused, we made it to the backdoor and were greeted with indifference by the bouncers who gave us pretty awesome 21+ bracelets that instructed us to "keep calm and rage on" which was kinda cute.  Upon entering the club, I made a beeline to the side bar to grab myself a Monster Energy drink to wake myself up and prepare my bod for the massive amount of dancing that I was about to do.  My first true NYC overpriced club purchase happened here, where I forked over 7$ for about 1/4th the normal sized can of Monster.  I wanted to question the mathematics involved by paying about 3 extra dollars for 1/4th the normal sized can, but I was there to have fun, not do math.  After downing my 3 sips of energy drink, I was revitalized and ready to show up the Empire State with some real Ocean State style dancing.

Pacha, from the balcony and with confetti

The headlining DJ for this after party was Steve Angello, who makes up 1/3rd of Swedish House Mafia, who has had some kinda popular songs over the past few years.  While the opening DJ was pretty good, the wait started to grow and grow and us club goers were getting impatient for Steveyboy.  To kill time we ended up having a dance off on the third floor of Pacha, which was entertaining to us, mostly because we were all delirious from living the EDM dream for 18 hours already.  While it was entertaining showing up Sarah, Paula, Ricky, and especially my foe Chris with some killer moves, all I can imagine now is someone else watching us all dancing and thinking we all belong in a mental ward.  When I wasn't dancing, I was pondering life and my surroundings.  One thing that hit me, and kept being in my thoughts for the rest of the night, was that Pacha was definitely a club that Stefon from Saturday Night Live would enjoy.  From that point on, I couldn't really take the place seriously.  While contemplating the events of that day, Joe Rippolone had the quote of the day by saying "The beautiful part about EDC is that it's so cheap that anyone can come.  I saw a couple of bums in there today. Hehehe".  At that moment in time, it was worth spitting out some of my 10$ Coors Light on the dance floor.

Stefon is a regular at Pacha

As we waited longer and longer on the 2nd floor of Pacha following our Dirty Dancing: Havana Nights style dance off, I really started to take notice of the VIP section we were standing near.  Like most VIP sections, it had the standard velvet rope entrance, with nice looking tables and couches, and nerdy kids who put the tabs on their Dad's credit cards, but something in the area caught my eye.  At first, I thought it was a column/support beam that was made out of glass.  Upon furthur notice, I realized that at the bottom of this glass cube was some tiles and a drain.  It was at this point that I turned to some of my posse (I think Matt, Kyle and Sarah?) and asked the absurd question "Is that a shower?".  I nailed it.  About five minutes after spotting the shower head, a girl in a bikini entered this cube like she was ready to do battle, and threw off her robe revealing a bikini, and just started showering right then and there in the middle of the club.  It was kinda concerning at first.  The first thing that came to mind was "what a useless shower. She still has a swimsuit on...kinda".  I mean what kind of a person showers with a bathing suit on?  This then reminded me of when I was 4 years old and I once showed up for bathtime wearing my swimming trunks, and getting mad at my mom for not letting me wear them in the bath like the kids in the commercial for some stupid bath toy.  I guess back in '94 I didn't realize just why these kids were allowed to wear a swimsuit in the bath, but it made me relate to this girl who was showering in a bikini in a club in New York.  What am I talking about right now?

Waiting for Guns N' Roses

Moving on, this girl kept showering, and drawing heart shapes on the steamy walls of the shower, making a lot of immature people attempt to write their phone numbers on the wrong side of the steam, which was amusing to watch because they all failed.  I'll tell ya, seeing a kid attempt to write his digits in steam, but on the wrong side of the glass is awesome.  It's about as graceful as watching a ballerina fall.  So Steve Angello was still keeping everyone waiting.  Let me tell ya, it was beginning to seem like this guy thought he was Guns N' Roses in 1988 showing up 3 hours late to their own show.  The only problem here is that when Guns N' Roses did it, you had all 5 guys there.  At this after party, it was for 1/3rd of Swedish House Mafia.  If Axl Rose were to show up by himself to an after party show, people would become all angsty and restless, which is what the crowd started to do at Pacha for Steveyboy.  Finally around 2 a.m., Steve graced us with his presence.  It was nice of him to join, but it hit me real quick that the angle that I had on the balcony  made it impossible for me to actually see him.  For all I know, it could've been Carlton from Fresh Prince blowing our minds away by dropping bass etc. I kind of gave up on caring about this point rather quickly, and started to become one with the music.  The set he played was pretty awesome, and the usage of smoke machines and confetti really spiced up the night.  I was somewhat disappointed that he never played Avicii's new single 'Le7els' or some Guns N' Roses songs, but I was happy overall.

Following the epic dance off

As we made our way out of the club early when the clock struck 3:00, we realized that we had to wait for the same chauffeur who dropped us off earlier.  We had a feeling that it might take a while.  This guy was a real stickler.  On the way there he kept telling us that he might get in trouble for having 9 people in a SUV and he could 'get a ticket', whatever that means.  He wanted my poor friend Paula to duck her head a bunch of times, like when we got to a toll booth and a cop was standing right in front of us.  He just needed to chill.  Maybe he should start listening to EDM and reevaluate his life.  Anyways, we were hanging around a street corner, and we were all pretty hungry, so we hit up a hotdog stand that was nearby.  My buddy Steve referred to this late night snack as 'street meat', which kind of ruined my appetite.  Street meat.  Sounds like a bad nickname for a guy in a frat.  Things got real weird when my friend Sarah gave me some of her pretzel out of the goodness of her heart, and my foe Chris took a bite out of the pretzel, and then proceeded to (while still biting) fling the pretzel in the air and onto the ground in one fell swoop.  Bamboozled, I really let him have it, calling him a terrible friend for wasting a pretzel like that.  He proceeded by buying a pretzel for us to share, and specifically asking our fellow street meat vendor if he could give him the saltiest pretzel he had, because Chris is selfish and likes extremely salty pretzels.  I was standing on this street corner in NYC on a Saturday morning at 3:30 and thinking to myself "This pretzel sucks" when our chauffeur finally pulled up to our curb.  Praise Jesus.

Don't trust this man with a pretzel. Or sunglasses.

As if Chris couldn't have killed our delirious buzz any more, we had just left in the SUV when Chris realized he couldn't find his prized Pacha sunglasses that set him back a whopping 12$.  The ride turned from telling awful stories about each other into Chris complaining that he couldn't find his glasses.  I'm sitting in the back thinking "Who cares, man?  What do you need sunglasses at 3:30 for?" and contemplating if I just wanted to hand him 12 buckaroos in exchange for him shutting up about his lost glasses.  The rest of the ride was uneventful for the most part, with Chris complaining in between sobs over his Pacha shades that most likely fell when he was flinging my pretzel with his teeth like he was a circus performer.  Serves him right.  If you reading this ever take away one thing from my blog, it is to make sure you don't lose your shades when tossing a pretzel that doesn't belong to you with your teeth.  It's the simple things in life, really.

This night would've sucked without a Ricky photobomb.

We finally made it back to the LaGuardia Airport Hotel absolutely exhausted and in need of sleep and showers, but also to recharge our batteries for Day 2...or as you will soon know it as Part 3.

To be continued......