What might be unbeknownst to many of you is that I consider myself a bit of a history buff. Not in the scholarly, “I majored in Ancient Greek history and now write thesis papers about it” kind of way, but more in the “I watch the History Channel a lot when I’m stoned and I like random historical facts” kind of way. Mythology, The Bubonic Plague, Easter Island. You name it, and I probably know a minute amount of info about it. More specifically than that, I’m a sucker for things like holidays and the anniversaries of certain historical events. Now not all of these historical anniversaries can be happy moments. In fact, I would say fucked up moments get remembered just as much, if not more, than happy events. Today is no different, as it is the 16th anniversary of the United States’ fourth deadliest nightclub fire: The Station Nightclub Fire. You can read more about it here, but all you really need to know is that during a concert at the club, some pyrotechnics went off and caused the whole place to catch fire like a marshmallow being held to close to a campfire. This led to 100 people dying, 230 people being injured, and the owner of the club and the manager of the band being indicted for criminal charges. Now although I’m an asshole, the point of this blog isn’t to joke about this fire. In fact, a friend of mine’s older cousin actually died in this fire, so I’m not here to make fun of her, or any, of their deaths. Instead, I’m simply using this anniversary as a segway into something I’ve been saying for years. Situations as horrible as this exemplify my feelings on something simple about the places that they occur: Fuck nightclubs.

I believe I’ve touched on this a bit before, but seeing as my brain function recently is similar to that of Detective Hayes in True Detective, I cant remember shit anymore. As a drinker of alcohol and a haver of fun, you would likely assume that I love clubbing. Well that’s where you’d be wrong, and I would actually go as far to say that I hate clubs. I’ve never understood the fascination with waiting in line for an hour, paying a huge cover fee, and then drinking overpriced drinks and dancing to repetitive music while surrounded by the worst personality types that exist. The superiority of dive bars and even just a chill night in with your buddies watching the game should be about as apparent to everybody as a pedophile at a kids talent show, yet somehow these clubs remain packed around the world every night. How is being packed together like sardines in a hot ass room a good time? If I want to drink, I want to be able to do so immediately. This isn’t possible at a club, because to get a drink you have to shuffle through what looks like a still crowd shot from a zombie movie in order to reach the bar and pay 15 bucks for a bud light. Another thing that pisses me off is these places never have sports on. Their TV’s are always turned to weird channels that are displaying a fish tank or lava lamp patterns and shit like that. Weird flex, but okay. And if I asked to put the game on, it would draw attention to the fact I’m not wearing tight enough pants or dancing to whatever Calvin Harris remix is playing, and I’d likely get kicked out. I guess a big part of the appeal of clubs is that everybody thinks they’ll get laid because they’re always filled with hot chicks. This is true, but you can’t hear shit inside of a club because the bass is making damn sure none of us will be able to hear when we’re older. Part of the very limited amount of game that I have lies in the fact that I’m funny. If you take conversation away from me, I’ve got nothing. What, I’m supposed to dance to impress women? I dance like I was born before the polio vaccine was invented, so cross that plan out. Plus all of those hot chicks will be in the VIP section anyway, swarming like bees around the dudes with money who are buying them shit. Seeing as I’m not a famous rapper or The Wolf Of Wall Street, you can bet your ass I won’t be in the VIP section getting bottle service with models. I’ll be cramped together with all of the other plebeians contemplating why we decided to come here. And I guess to come full circle, being packed together in a club sets off my claustrophobia like no other. Maybe it’s just my macabre and paranoid nature, or possibly whatever drugs I happen to be on while at clubs, but sometimes I just can’t help but think, “What would happen if shit went down right now?”. When I say shit going down, I mean things like The Station Nightclub Fire or the Pulse Nightclub Massacre. You’d be fucked because you physically can’t run anywhere. Everybody is trapped standing ass to pussy/dick inside of a dark, cramped room. This hypothetical scenario becomes even worse when you realize that now not only will I have to do from fire/bullets etc., but I’m also gonna die surrounded by people I hate, sweating my balls off, spilling my 15 dollar beer, all while an EDM remix of “thank u, next” plays in the background. What a fucking nightmare.

To sum up my points: Fuck clubs. They’re overpriced, hot, crowded, and predominantly occupied by people that peaked in high school. Tossing back pints at your local dive bar or playing beer pong at your friends apartment is almost always a better time. Unless of course you and your friends have come across some somewhat pure molly. In that one and only scenario, drop that shit and go nuts. Dance until the soles of your shoes catch on fire, but just make sure you extinguish your shoes properly because we don’t want another Station Fire on our hands. Come on, you really thought I was gonna make it through this whole blog without at least one joke about that fire? You guys must not know me as well as I thought. Anyway, to close out this blog here are 2 funny standup clips about nightclubs. The first is Aziz talking about the stereotypical music they play, and the second is Louis CK talking about the people you see at clubs.