It takes a rare combination of qualities to last for more than a decade in Bangkok’s fickle club scene. Venues and party zones can go hot or cold between paychecks, and only a handful of names remain from the early nineties. Navigating through a changing political obstacle course, these clubs have succeeded in bringing back regular customers and many have also been able to woo the next generation, but what is it that unites them in their continued survival?

We sat down with representatives from QBar, Tapas, Lucifer, Speed and Narcissus to find out for ourselves.

Still a household name, QBar was the city's first New York-style lounge club when it migrated from Saigon to Bangkok in 2001. With a focus on large measures and recognisable DJs, QBar set an international precedent for Thailand.

David Jacobson, the club’s American owner, began the first incarnation of QBar in Vietnam in 1991, but he was to be thrown out of the country two years later.

“They wouldn't give me a reason why, they just said my visa's not renewed... I've asked a lot of people and nobody could give me a definitive reason, even now,” he said.

“But it seems to be that it was a big embarrassment for them. I opened [QBar] through a Vietnamese contact... We got so much press and became so famous and... it was an embarrassment for the government because we'd gotten inside the National Theatre, which was the building you had to walk through to get to the bar.

“We got so much publicity that no bar in the world that size was getting. It was truly amazing. Everybody was coming. John Kennedy Jnr was hanging out [there]...Robert de Niro was hanging out.”

Bangkok itself was a different city back then, recalls David.

“Most of the bars were either German, English and Irish pubs and hotel bars, which were conservative by nature... And the only bars that were different were a couple of hi-so Thai bars that really only catered to Thais, and they were very good-looking but they weren't paying attention to either the drinks nor the music.

“So I decided that Bangkok could use a DJ-driven place where the staff actually know their liquor, has a huge variety of liquor. Back in America, we call [drinks] by the brand. We rarely say gin and tonic, we say Bombay and tonic. Nobody was doing that here, so we decided that we would actually train our staff to know all the brands and we would carry the widest variety of alcohol as possible.

“We've had the Black-eyed Peas hang out [at QBar in Bangkok] and No Doubt... There has been a lot of international guys, like Colin Farrell. When they come through town, celebrities want the professional bartenders.”

And where the celebrities go, the rest of us want to follow. Note, the mischievous organizer of the Dude/Sweet parties, recalls his early encounters with fame.

“I was always starstruck. I always got excited to see these famous people, usually spotted in magazines. Not a lot of kids my age went out in those days, so I always had stories of celebrities to share with my classmates. They got excited, and it made me feel really cool. But you have to understand that I was only 16.

“[Back then,] Silom Soi 4 was a big hit. It was a place for hipsters. During my high school heyday, I usually hung out at Glitz. It was opposite from Soi Aree. The area now houses a shopping mall.

“I remember that I started clubbing for the first time when I was 15. There was no ID check. Back then, I didn't drink nor smoke. The club that popped my cherries was Rome, Silom Soi 4, currently named Sphinx. Everyone went to Rome during that time. They played stuff like Bananarama.

“Glitz was a real teenage hangout joint. It stayed open until 4am. Fresh-faced celebrities, young models and new singers all went there. The music played was Thai mixed with cheesy Western songs, in the same fashion as today's Seventy's Bar in Luang Suan.”

In such a limited musical climate, it’s not hard to see how a policy of Latin, deep house music with live percussion helped make ‘Tapas’ stand out on Silom soi 4. Opened by a group of friends in 1994, the venue has developed a fiercely loyal crowd, and is today one of soi 4’s last thriving non-gay clubs.

Even QBar’s owner, David, digs the music. “Tapas still has one of the better music policies in the city,” he enthused. “Although I'm not really crazy about the drinks there.”

Part-owner and familiar face to Tapas' regulars, Khun Lek recalls how the institution came about.

“First, we opened a bar/restaurant here with Latin music and later our friends liked to hang around after dinner. They felt like they were at home. We served food for just two years. And after that we renovated into a club. It was just one room back then.

“We always played Latin, deep and funky house. Sometimes we have guest DJs, but normally we have Thai DJs playing house, deep house, Latin, funky house... The percussionist comes on Thursday, Friday and Saturday.”

Narcissus, one of the city’s largest nightclubs, opened in 1993. Today, its tacky ancient Grecian pillars aptly reflect a venue that has clearly passed through its golden age. The club opens up like a UV-lit stately home onto a dated dance floor where weekenders go through the motions. The sparkle has clearly gone, but Narcissus continues on month after month.

“It’s only interesting when they get some big name DJs, but enough of Paul Oakenfold, please. He is not that good these days,” says Misty, a familiar and fabulous face in Bangkok’s club scene.

A pair of lost-looking foreigners tell us they are in the club because they “found it on the internet,” while a elderly Thai man told us he liked the place because “it has good air conditioning.”

Jeff, an American-educated former club affiliate, explains the real attraction behind Narcissus and how things have changed since it first opened its doors.

“You want a big club with this music, high ceilings, there's only one place: Narcissus. There are so many clubs that are big, but they're for a Thai crowd, Thai music, Thai pop - it's quite different.

“Before we had live music and bands. Three years later, the club changed the theme to underground house music. Back then the underground music would start at 2am until four in the morning.

“Where the dance floor is... there was a stage for the band. It was a Filipino band playing pop music. But afterwards, they stopped the band and did the whole club theme."

A DJ called Mikey Mike, from Silom soi 4, was instrumental in changing the venue’s musical concept, recalls Jeff.

“Our owner saw [Mikey Mike] there and asked him to do an underground set after 2 o'clock. He said he would do it for a little while, and then the club started rocking. Everybody came here after 2am. So, they decided to change the whole night to a Mikey Mike night... and a full night of dance music.

“Back in the day, we had a second floor, but we closed that down. So with the second floor, it was 2,500. But with the big parties we close off the parking lot outside and put out some speakers. Last New Year there were like 10,000 [people] out there. I stepped out and after five minutes I was like, ‘Fuck it, man, I'm too high for this, I'm going home!' [laughs]"

Bangkok’s clubbers are a fickle bunch, though, and what’s hip one month is easily forgotten the next, recalls Note.

“I've noticed that Bangkok's clubs and pubs always change their names and decorations every two years, but the owners are still the same people.

“I think it's because of Bangkokians' behaviour that get bored after two years. When the revelers start to move around, the owners feel compelled to freshen up their venues, pretending that it's a completely new place, to attract the same customers who like to talk about spanking new clubs.”

It’s a compulsion that these older clubs have resisted over the years, but have their visitors changed even if they’ve stayed the same?

“Before when the club was rocking, we had all the trendy people, the actors and models,” recalls Jeff from Narcissus. “But afterwards, when the laws changed, not many of them came out anymore because they were afraid to be in the news caught in a 'bad' place. And then when the locals come, they don't like the music, because the music is more for [cutting-edge] people. We had to change the music down to almost like pop and that's very bad. We can take care of the small group of customers that we have left, but we cannot pull all the cool people back. I mean, we even played ‘I'm a Barbie Girl’ - that's terrible [laughs] - but we had to do it.”

“The crowd does change,” says QBar’s David. “The original crowd was 100% hi-so Thai. We knew that crowd was transient. They would come first with the all the press. And then the farangs would discover the bar. The farangs coming in would [dissuade] a certain number of hi-so Thais because they don't want to be with farangs.

“When a new hi-so bar opens, all the hi-sos tend to go to that bar because somebody important's opened it and everyone wants to be there and the bar runs out of business in 2-3 years. There's nothing keeping them there. We knew that eventually a large part of our crowd would be farang because of the international drinks thing.

“Of course, once farangs starting coming to the bar, working girls start coming. This is a problem with any bar in Thailand that has farangs... Working girls follow farangs, farangs bring them in. And then the girls...bring their friends in. This is always a constant battle [at Q Bar]."

It's a battle that many of us have witnessed, but how are clubs attempting to counter the bar girl 'invasion'?

"We've cut many things," explains David. "Originally... you could hold the bottle for three months, but four 'working girls’ would take three months on one bottle. Now it's only one month...

“Another thing we've done recently is the upstairs and balcony: no hookers. To the girls we say, there's a VIP party tonight. That way we can have couples and wives and people who don't want to be around that.”

But, is an influx of working girls too much for the average clubber? Misty, a familiar figure in Bangkok’s club scene, thinks so:

“My Spanish female friend once said: ‘Q Bar is full of old men and hookers these days’ and I quite agree with that. One time, my then boyfriend - young and cute, Irish and not old - got approached by this Thai girl upstairs while i was downstairs asking him if he was interested in ‘going to her place and have sex with her for 2,000 baht.’ That was not normal. I mean, a girl wouldn’t go ask someone like that in a nice decent club, right?”

One undeniable change is that the clubbers who first propped up these bars are today slightly longer in the tooth.

“The generation of people who go out has changed,” says Tapas’ Khun Lek. “Now we’re older and not young anymore. And the new teenagers go to other [clubs]. It’s more our friends who keep coming here.”

The Cheers aesthetic of somewhere “where ev-erybody knows your na-a-ame” is an important one to Jade, 28, a regular at Tapas.

“For me personally, it's like my second home. That's where all my mates are and I never call them and say, hey, I'm going to be there. I just bump into them randomly. I just feel really safe as a girl going there by myself."

The feeling of safety is a familiar draw for Tapas’ female regulars.

Misty recalls: “Last year, I went to Tapas and had way too many drinks but I still managed to climb up the stairs to the third floor and pass out on the couch there. The staff were kind enough to let me sleep there until 3am when they were done with the cleaning and about to go home. So nice of them but so unfabulous of me!”

Lucifer began in 1997 as a spin-off from Radio City, becoming the DJ-driven nightclub above a live music venue. Jeffry Columbres, Clubs Manager for the group that owns Lucifer, classifies its musical policy as “progressive house, tribal house, techno, trance, electro, all this kind of stuff.”

“The people change,” says Jeffrey. “And the time limits changed a lot and the behaviour of the people who used to come out to party and enjoy themselves in the club. But for me, the music progresses and changes every year.

On a typical Saturday night, he says Lucifer receives around 300 guests, but six years ago, they regularly had “somewhere around 700-800 people in and out.”

“Back then, you could party up ‘til dawn. Five years ago, there was nobody else doing [trance music] apart from Narcisuss. Now everybody's doing it.”

Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery for QBar’s David. “Glow in particular, and the location before it, Faith club were both obsessed with QBar. The first time I went to Glow, I thought, ‘This is just like QBar!’ And then when Glow started, they did the liquor thing and they actually paid one of my best bartenders a fortune to move.”

When ‘copycat clubs’ take an existing formula, it doesn’t always work out, recalls Jeff from Narcissus: “When we were big, other clubs would open big, but not this big… Then for four or five years, Ministry of Sound was open. But they didn't do too well because they quit after two years.”

Speed opened in 1996 and was one of the first hip hop clubs in Bangkok, although it would not be the last. Currently the dominant form of music in Bangkok’s nightclubs, hip hop still has its detractors, having bred what Misty terms “ridiculous gangsta-wannabes.”
 However, Note has a soft spot for Speed. “I once threw my party at Speed because, to me, it holds historical value in the Thai music scene. I also want to have a party at Route 66, but I don't think they'll ever let me do it!

“When I was in the university… if we ended up in Soi 4, it would be Deeper, next to Speed, which played a lot of techno and rave. It was a groundbreaking thing for Thai club scene. But I liked Speed because they always played something that we could yell along to such as Wanda Jackson or Madonna's 'Like a Prayer' to MC Hammer. The place was much smaller, and it was hot as hell."

We asked Khun Tee, Speed’s manager about the impact of early closing times and policy clampdowns over the years.

“At first, business was affected, but now it's returned to normal. Customers were annoyed at first when the raids started, but now it happens everywhere, so people have gotten used to it,” he said.

David from QBar is candid about the effects of licensing hours and police drug swoops: “Nothing hurt our business more. Nothing. When we first opened the bar, we could open as late as we wanted. And that was great. We had a busier second year than our first year. Then they start closing the bars at 2am and we still had a busier third year than the second and a busier fourth year than a third. Great. Then they came in and closed at 1am and hotels 2am. And it became an uneven playing field. People would start leaving at a quarter to one because it would take them hours to drive across town.

“Now, corruption has come back. And, as you know, there's after-hours bars all over the city. And they will never let QBar and Bed stay open late because neither one of us are really willing to pay a third of our income - we won't do it.

“QBar plays by the rules and that's why QBar has never been closed by the police... We think it's terrribly unfair the way the system is now, but there's nothing we can do about it.

“The closing hours thing is really political. When Thaksin became PM, he said that Thailand is being influenced by foreigners...Thai Rak Thai after all - Thai Love Thai. Girls in spaghetti straps, Western music, drugs. ‘We have to save Thai people.’ And I thought he was also trying to rid Thailand of the reputation of cheap sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll. So, in a way, I understood in what he was trying to do.... Now I don't believe it because when you do what they've done: closing bars at 1am, piss-testing... you drive kids into partying in hotel rooms, houses, parks where nobody can check how old you are. So when you drive that kind of thing underground, the results are usually very negative.

“Also, the way Thaksin has unofficially zoned Patpong, RCA - real sex with all the chinese massage parlours - obviously they weren't going after the sex trade or the drug trade... It was just a PR campaign, it's a way to drive the general business into the hotels and who owns the hotels?

“They should be applauding bars like Q Bar and Bed Supperclub, as international clubs in Thailand, bringing in the world's best DJs and better drinks. They should be supporting these kind of bars. But instead it's Nana Plaza and Patpong."

The first of Bangkok's many nightclub drug raids police was at QBar, remembers David.

"It was all over Thai television. All the Thai clientele who came here got scared to come... Then eventually they started busting other bars, they started busting everybody.

“And then about a year-and-half ago, they had another big one at QBar... There was around 400 people in the bar and they piss-tested everybody and amazingly, not one person was positive. They got really upset, because they had television crews and there was nothing to film. So then they went around and checked everybody was over 20. And everybody was over 20. That we do check.

“So, then they came up with the new law: everybody has to have an original passport. Which of course is not a law. Every embassy in the world will tell you not to carry your passport. So they brought that law on the spot and they took hundreds of people to jail. We had the Israeli ambassador in the club that night. He had diplomatic immunity, but they took the papers and threw them on the floor... it was bad.

“It was very negative on the police... My managers had go down to everybody's hotel and bring them to go to the station and this took them 'til 10 o'clock the next morning. They then went to my manager and said, ‘And where's your passport?’ He didn't have it so they locked him up.

“It was hard, but it was a huge embarrassment for them and they have never done that again and they never will. The police who come to QBar are embarrassed because they know this isn’t a drug bar.”

Lek from Tapas says that the new opening hours have changed the way people party.

“[Clubbers] have changed their attitude. People go out earlier. Because if it’s open late, they come late. It affected business only on the first day because the customers didn’t know. And then when they did, they started to come out earlier… It’s changed, y’know, because it’s difficult to take drugs. But it’s good for business and alcohol sales! [laughs]"

However, earlier closing times don’t always apply at Tapas, says Jade.

“[The new laws] didn't make a lot of difference for a lot of locals because if you're really regular, they have a lock-in.”

Jeffrey from Lucifer agrees that clubbers have adjusted to the licensing hours by starting their night earlier.

“At the beginning, when they started closing early four/five years ago, it did have an impact, but now everything has adjusted so people who used to come out at midnight, now come out earlier at 11pm.

“Before, when [Lucifer] started, people just thought this kind of music was just for drugs. But actually, you don't have to take drugs to listen to any kind of music. Most people accept this now, it's not for drug-users or junkies.

Partygoers have even become used to the drug swoops, he says.

“For Lucifer, we don't really care because we're quite clean... actually, let's just say ‘we're clean’. We've checked ID since the beginning. We haven't let under 20's in since 1998.... The only thing that pisses people off is when [the police] use urine-tests. It takes a lot of time... it takes, like, four hours before the last person leaves.”

Today’s harsh curfew is a far cry from what many visitors to Bangkok expect when they first arrive. However, the city’s reputation as a 24-hour party venue is not completely unfounded, says Jeff from Narcissus.

“From 1994 until 2002, the place was crazy. Back then, the police didn't care about what time we closed. So we sometimes started on Friday at 10 pm and it would go on until Saturday noon! [laughs] That's how crazy it was. I know kids came over at 8am to party until close. It was a crazy seven or eight years and after the politics and new laws where gas stations have to close at 10pm and clubs close at 2am, plus the drug problem because in those crazy seven years, every kind of drug could be found here [in Narcissus]. Y'know, ecstasy, cocaine, weed, everything was here. I think that made it the best show [laughs]. But after the laws changed, we just do a normal club.

“People got afraid. We used to party until six o'clock in the morning, but we have to close at two. Back in the day, that's when we would come out so it's ruined the whole of Bangkok, it's not only our club. Every place closes at 2am, so that's why I think Bangkok is so quiet now. It has affected every club and every night scene.

“People are not coming out earlier. That's not how Thai people go out. Thai people come out like 12. 18-year-old kids want to hang out so bad they come out at like 7 o'clock, but grown-ups start at 11/12.

“Before we also didn't have the ID policy, so after that, we had to check every single ID. But sometimes grown-ups don't carry ID, so we couldn't let them in. It's bad.”

Narcissus had a reputation as a ‘drug club’ during it’s heyday, as Misty reminisces.

“One time while I was waiting in a long queue in the girls’ toilets, I had a small chat with this girl from Australia. It was a nice little chat then she just told me to open my mouth and before I knew it she put some ‘E’ in my mouth. I think that is a pretty normal thing to do in Narcissus...”

However, Thailand just wasn’t ready for drugs, according to Jeff.

“I think Thai people take drugs the wrong way. They take it and they go nuts. So the police catch them and close the club down - it's all messed up. Thailand never had this kind of drug before: ecsatasy, ketamine, cocaine...they just smoked weed and that's it.

“In the mid-nineties, from soi 4, a small group of people who went to study abroad brought [drugs] back. So it started from a small group and that crowd followed Mikey Mike here and it expanded. It got to the stage where drugs got into the wrong hands, like Thai prostitutes, and it's gotten bigger and bigger. So the police have got to do something, it's their job to prevent society from going down... But then people just change their ways and go take [drugs] in apartments.”

The raids took their toll on specific areas of the city, Note recalls.

“Four years ago, Silom began to slump down with the frequent drug raids, and ID check gets real serious since 1999, and there were newer places around Or Tor Kor or Ratchada Soi 4. I guess people wanted to try new things too.

“RCA (Royal City Arcade) started to gain momentum in 1995. Route 66 was one third smaller than its current size. Hip hop wasn't well known in Bangkok then, so Route played what we like to call "Red Beat Dance," which was already lame back then. How to explain it? Well, just think of a dancey version of ‘My Heart Will Go On’.

“RCA also went through its ‘recession’ period during 2000 when Ratchada Soi 4 was at its peak. But when all the clubs on RCA strip decided to have a facelift, it was a comeback time for them.”

It’s a comeback that shows little sign of abating, as Q Bar’s David attests: “The clubs on RCA are much more professional and better than five years ago, much better DJs, much better music and decor. I think RCA has become much better.”

The club zone has attracted a younger breed of reveler. “Just Thai teenagers and foreigners” according to Tapas’ Khun Lek.

For hip hop-playing Speed, also on Silom, the revamp of RCA has intensified competition.

“Hip hop is everywhere now. Different groups like it in RCA and a different group like it at Speed,” says Tee.

Narcissus, which plays house/techno music, is struggling, admits Jeff, but they can’t jump on the hip hop bandwagon without losing their core clientele.

“The thing is, I think this kind of scene only works in Europe, y'know: the house scene. At the moment Thailand loves hip hop, but we can't give them hip hop because of the old clients that we have,” he explains.

Having a firm music policy is important in maintaining a loyal crowd, says Tapas regular, Jade: “The place is not going to go into hip hop like the rest of the world. And people really enjoy the live percussionist. Now he's become really famous, he played at Glastonbury last year.”

However, rather than build the fame of its home-grown musicians, some capitalizing clubs have come to rely on pre-packaged international acts. Jeff, from Narcissus, talks us through the club’s ongoing relationship with Paul Oakenfold.

“At first, the owner didn't know him that well. Paul Oakenfold was just passing through in like 1997/8 and he didn't want much money. So he came down and we booked him and it turned out to be a crazy night. Then the owner knew who he was and they became friends. My boss gave him lots of girls, partied with him and took him to Chiang Mai to his place. I guess he loved it and he comes back every year.

“The first time Oakenfold came, there weren't many people, maybe 600. But the second year, when people knew who this guy was, they came. It's strange, even with the new laws, we can hook like 3-4,000 people.

Narcissus now finds itself having to rely on theme parties and ‘big name DJs’ in what has become an far more competitive market.

“I think we made a good connection with Tiesto so he might come back again,” offers Narcissus' Jeff.

Meanwhile, Jeffrey from Lucifer has also been looking overseas. “We've been inviting a lot of Japanese, German, French, English DJs,” he told us.

Maintaining a close relationship with international acts has worked well for Q Bar, which seems to have become the default home for hip hop acts in Bangkok.

“Ice-T, Jazzy Jeff… Kid Koala was my personal favourite...it was one of the few times, the audience was just staring at the DJ's hands...He was incredibly talented. You just never know sometimes, there will be a great chemistry,” says David.

“You can go to bigger clubs, some people would rather see DJs in places like Astra. I think it's fun to see DJs in a relatively small club. Almost every DJ wants to back come and play because it reminds them of the clubs they started in.”

But, how has QBar, a smaller-sized venue, managed to bring in so many international names?

“The resident DJs are very good and they know everybody playing in the world. A DJ is usually touring and he might have a free day in between, and it became economically more reasonable than to pay for a major flight. Then you get sponsorship...and that helps,” says David.

“You don't look to make a fortune on these nights or any money on that night, you do it to keep your name out there - you refresh the bar and you introduce it to a new crowd who hadn't been to the bar previously.”

So, how have the ‘dinosaur clubs’ of Bangkok survived? Is it music, friendship or knowing how to make a good long island iced tea?

“It's the sound of the music,” replies Lucifer’s Jeff. “We don't sing around with R'n'B crazy ideas. We never tried to change it into hip hop or anything. It's a concept and we have to stick with it. And we get new music out every week. We have survived through word-of-mouth.”

For Tapas, its regulars are the secret ingredient, says Khun Lek. “Because the customers are close friends, y’know. We know everybody who comes here and everybody keeps in touch. The “family” calls or sends SMS because we know each other.”

For QBar’s David, the quality of the drinks and service is most important.

“Anybody can open a nice-looking place and anybody can have good music nowadays, but it’s a combination [with] the professional bar staff that have some idea.”

For others, the answer is simply to trade on past successes and hope it will all turn out right in the end.

Jeff: “To be honest with you, the business here is just surviving right now, it's not going that well, But I guess it was so big back in the day that people recognise [Narcissus]. Whenever we have parties they come and whenever they have big name DJs, they come. But the rest of the week is so-so, not too good.”

For those clubs in financial trouble, there’s always the infamous “models’ night.” The gimmick has spread throughout the city, with varied success.
David disagrees on moral grounds.

“We don't think it's a really great idea to reward people because they're genetically perfect. Usually what happens is that guys pay to get in and models don't talk to them anyway... The clubs who started [models night] are really not that interested in making money, they're interested in getting models in....What they do is get market shares and destroyed businesses for a lot of bars because sure, why not go drink for free and eat for free...

"It's probably the worst thing that ever happened to the business in Thailand.”

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