12:00amCELEBRITY PERSONALITIES
@ Joe's Pub

The "Celebrity Personalities" party puts quasi-famous Manhattanites like Ellen von Unwerth and MTV's Ananda Lewis behind the wheels of steel as D.J.'s, but some drive better than others. "I'm glad he's making it as an artist, because if this was my bar mitzvah, my dad would demand money back," said a fellow artist of Tom Sachs's musical skills on a recent night. Sachs struggled through his playlist -- Enya, Tchaikovsky, Jonathan Richman's "I'm Straight" -- as he took requests from friends and technical tips from the club's sound man. Luckily, not every customer was so picky. Over on the red-lit room's plush banquettes, a group of Wall Street types wondered, "Is there a cocktail waitress or something?" perhaps worried that the beautiful staff would sneer at their ties and briefcases. The tourists crowding three-deep at the bar paid even less attention to the D.J. -- their eyes were on the VIP booth. "Hey," said a production assistant from Miami, "isn't that the Victoria's Secret model?" 425 Lafayette Street (212-539-8770)
M.E.

1:30amFLASHBACK THURSDAY
@ Culture Club

"I like to play to all different types of people," says Grandmaster Flash, hip-hop pioneer and, more recently, D.J. at Culture Club's "Flashback Thursday" party. "I like to see a 21-year-old dancing next to a 42-year-old, a black next to a white next to an Asian." On a recent week, though, he mostly saw white twentysomethings dancing next to other white twentysomethings. (The party did draw three dwarfs, but they were also white and in their twenties.) On the second floor, which hosts the weekly "Trans Am" party, about twenty other partyers were agape at four bleached blondes gyrating, unironically, it seemed, to Lita Ford and the Scorpions. Which isn't to say Culture Club is stuck in 1983: One reveler came dressed as a platform-heeled club kid circa 1989. In a bid for diversity, Flash plans to expand his playlist and let the décor of the eighties-themed club -- an actual DeLorean and murals of Madonna and Molly Ringwald -- evoke the greed decade. "I refuse," he says, "to play just old-school stuff anymore." 179 Varick Street (212-243-1999)
ETHAN SMITH

1:45amPHYSICS
@ Vanity

Just before midnight at the drum-'n'-bass party "Physics," there was plenty of room for parking on the dance floor: A single thin man with dreadlocks stood motionless, nodding his head to the spastic beats. A sign of the times for the futuristic dance scene? Hardly. By 2 a.m., the disco-ball-illuminated dance floor was packed with agile break-dancers, hipsters waving their rum-and-Cokes to the beat, and a few music geeks craning their necks toward the D.J. booth. "We've got a crowd that really likes to party, but we've still managed to remain on the cutting edge," says "Physics" promoter and D.J. Roy Dank. And if Vanity, with its Persian rugs and $6 gin-and-tonics, seems like an unlikely space to host drum-'n'-bass cyberfunk grooves, no one seemed to mind. The club was packed, the crowd was calling for a "rewind" (dance-floor slang for an encore), and the thin man with dreadlocks was lost amid the dancing throng. 28 East 23rd Street (212-946-1998)
ETHAN BROWN

2:00amSHAG
@ Shine

At Shine's "Shag" party, silk ties get loosened, leather bags get tossed on red velvet couches, and the uptowners make it worth their cab ride by taking full advantage of the dance floor -- and one another. To the tune of D.J. Greg Poole's eighties hits, the young, moneyed crowd drops hundreds of dollars on bottles of Ketel One, dances atop the banquettes, and tries to lick Armani his and hers cologne off each other's necks. But that's only until 2 a.m.; then the uptown girls and guys climb back into cabs, and the turntables are turned over to D.J. Mateo DiFontaine of the Fun Lovin' Criminals and JUS-SKE from the Danücht crew for hard-core hip-hop. One week, Demi Moore and D.J. Muggs and Sen Dog of Cypress Hill were even dancing together. "It's a last-destination spot for the downtown crowd on Thursday night," said co-promoter Jason Strauss. "It's a great way to prepare for the weekend." 285 West Broadway (212-741-1700)
J.S.

2:00amPUSSY
@ FC29

"Pussy"-party emcee Lora Marie teetered onstage in high heels, an enormous green feather headdress, and a jeweled G-string. "Viva Las Vegas!" she called, waving a milky-white arm at the sparse crowd. "I wanted to have a place to expose women's creativity -- hence the name 'Pussy,' " says Mo B. Dick, host of the mostly lesbian party. "There's a female bartender, female D.J.'s, female dancers, a female show." There was also a partly male crowd -- two fat, bald guys bouncing to the Austin Powers theme song in the corner. But everyone pushed his or her way to the bar to load up on $5 beers (Joan Jett had a Red Stripe and snagged a Heineken for her dark-haired friend). Onstage, a pubescent Liberace confessed, "I remember being sexually attracted to . . . men." "Eeew!" shouted a girl from the audience. By 2 a.m., only a handful of hard-core women were left -- but they weren't going anywhere soon. "C'mon!" challenged a woman in an electric-blue I EAT 'EM RAW T-shirt. "Dance with the dykes." 29 Second Avenue (212-777-9660)
ERIKA KINETZ

FRIDAY

12:45am
FLOAT

Times Square is now more Disney Store than decadence, but the neighborhood still holds a few clubs where you can get goofy (with a lowercase g) without tripping over the Griswolds. Friday nights at Float even offer a way to do so in high style: The club includes two VIP rooms with a $250-per-four-person-table minimum. On a recent night, though, the downstairs dance area evoked nothing so much as the old 42nd Street -- only with cosmopolitans filling in for 40-ouncers. Around 1 a.m., three tough-looking guys in polo shirts charged onto the dance floor looking to push someone around -- but the crowd was so busy buying one another $6 beers that few even noticed. Indeed, the only things that did take male clubgoers' eyes off their dance partners were the two women doing a faux-lesbian grind on a translucent platform -- a distinct, if unknowing, nod to the neighborhood's past. 240 West 52nd Street (212-581-0055)
JOD KAFTAN

1:00amGBH
@ Cheetah

When "GBH" -- the name stands for "Great British House" -- moved from the cavelike Vanity to the plush Cheetah, it also traded its English and Irish expats for laddish loyalists of an entirely different stripe. Heineken is still the drug of choice, but the shiny-shirted weekend warriors buying drinks for ladies in black miniskirts and go-go boots are now from the West Side instead of from Western Europe. On a recent Friday, three thirtysomething women on an after-work bender danced around a buff accountant type to the house beats of "GBH" resident D.J. Anthony Maccaroni. Downstairs in the lounge, D.J. Frank Delour spun hip-hop as partyers kicked back on crowded banquettes and gave their feet a rest and their livers a workout. Co-promoter Thomas Dunkley says he has a top English D.J. from the cutting-edge Sheffield club Gatecrasher on tap for winter, but the "GBH" crowd may be more interested in what's on tap at the bar. 12 West 21st Street (212-539-3916)
D.S.