Truth Ends Up at the Orbit

Underground party promoters are breathing new life into a club scene dogged by the deaths of mainstream night spots like the China Club, Stringfellows, Trancas and others.

One such attempt was Aerial, an ambitious Saturday-night affair at the Hollywood Palladium that shut down last fall after crowds often fell to half of the venue’s 3,750 capacity. The club was a radical departure from other Saturday-night affairs, with freaky go-go-dancing performance artists and hyper dance music--both fixtures of the underground.

Now, with the opening of Orbit in February, another set of underground promoters hopes they have the right formula for bringing the ambience of the underground to the masses in the 1,000-capacity Variety Arts Center in downtown Los Angeles.

But can Orbit fly?

So far, it soars. On a recent Saturday, the five-level building was packed with party-goers as a fire inspector marched through and ordered the doors shut to the 100 or so who waited outside.

The club’s promoters, known as the Artist Groove Network, use the first four levels and plan to open the fifth, which would bring the club’s capacity to near 1,100. This would make Orbit one of the largest regularly scheduled clubs in the region, topped by the 1,500-capacity Mayan downtown and the grand elite clubs of Tijuana’s Zona Rio. Further, Orbit’s promoters hope to take over the building on Fridays.

The strategy of the Artist Groove Network--composed of club promoters Daren Carroll, Lou Gaes, Brad X. and Xavier--is one borrowed from Truth, which employs different rooms at the Park Plaza Hotel to give patrons a choice of music. The Artist Groove Network helped organize Truth before it started Orbit.

Orbit is visibly a progeny of Truth. It employs the smorgasbord method of entertainment with three rooms that are clubs within the club. But while Truth was an event that brought out the diverse, oddly dressed crowds who frequent underground warehouse parties, Orbit is a club with a more conservative clientele.

“There are a lot of poseurs,” says Orbit customer Colleen Dunn, who sports black boots, black jeans and a black tank top.

Indeed.

In the funk room, where Rob Harris and Mike Messex mix the sounds of the 1970s with hard-core hip-hop from the inner city, there is more black clothing. And the crowd in the “rave chamber,” where Deejay Dom T. of London plays the house and techno, never really gains the energy of a true underground rave.

But many--even patrons of the gritty underground scene--are pleased with Orbit’s uptown-underground ambience. One can find a free-lance go-go dancer shakin’ it. And film loops--another fixture of the underground--portray amoeba-like graphics on the thick adobe-style walls.

Richard Barala, a clean-cut 27-year-old, is an Orbit fan because the club weeds out those under 21. “The underground crowd is too young now,” he says.

Name: Orbit, held every Saturday from 10 p.m. to 4 a.m. at the Variety Arts Center, 940 S. Figueroa.

Cover: $15. Must be 21.

Door policy: The doormen are amicable, except when a fire inspector forces them to close the doors to dozens of patrons. So it is wise to come early.

Drinks: Beer starts at $2.50, mixed drinks at $4.