There’s a New Gal in Town

One thing hasn’t changed at Cowboy Boogie, even on the night each week the country venue goes urban hip: Buxom beauties still perform the tush push to the unbridled delight of whooping, hollering onlookers.

No, it’s not the rigidly choreographed tush push familiar to acolytes of Dwight Yoakam and Co. And nobody wears snakeskin to the new, Monday night Doll House, a Unity Productions promotion. Patent-leather platforms, stretchy mini-dresses and baseball caps prevail. But dance is a universal language, and its essence endures. A gyrating pelvis by any other name. . . .

Don’t panic, two-steppers. The Boogie is still predominantly country, although during the week deejays stir Top 40 into the mix after 10 p.m., says owner Jack Wade, who has kept the club thriving since 1977 with such flexibility.

But the club has long been closed most Monday nights, and Unity decided to risk going head-to-head with Club Rubber in Costa Mesa, says Unity’s Darryl Garcia. He is banking on the excellent rep Unity has built with Thrive and Club Cream, two of South County’s most popular promotions (at Metropolis and the Shark Club, respectively).

Evidently North County’s mostly mainstream, mall-ready set was primed for something new, something huge--the Boogie’s main dance floor encompasses about 4,000 square feet--and something live. A jamming sound system and roomy elevated stage showcase local alternative, disco, ska and house bands when Doll House DJ Daniel Parks (from Thrive and Cream) isn’t spinning a groove thing.

By 10 on a recent night, the line out front numbered around 100. Within the hour, the club had reached its capacity of nearly 1,000, with a much longer, wider queue of impatient 18-and-overs trailing from the door to the vast parking lot.

Inside, hormones raged wall-to-wall, from the upper-level lounge with pool tables and dartboards to the two big bars, which serve $2 you-call-its until midnight. Afrodisiac and Dial 7 easily drew a clutch of groupie-sorts up to the lip of the stage.

The Boogie is fairly devoid of cowpoke decor. Skinny tendrils of colored lights fan out, octopus-style, along the low, dark ceiling, from which a disco ball also hangs. Country-phobics have nothing to fear--unless it’s secondhand smoke.

Hard-core dancers, be they West Coast swingers or technophiles, don’t puff like some of the patrons who come to ogle or be ogled or to listen or drink more than to move. Also, not so incidentally, the former group fills up the Boogie’s two other small dance floors. Two Mondays ago, Doll House denizens didn’t seem brave or driven enough to venture onto either, leaving the isolated spots aching to be used and abused.

*

GRAND AGAIN: “Grand Ball” redux is scheduled for Aug. 15, once again at the Sheraton Hotel Newport Beach, 4545 MacArthur Blvd. Put on by promoters from John Dominis, the Shark Club and Club Rubber, its first outing in June drew hundreds. Doors open at 9 p.m. (714) 833-0570.

BE THERE

The Doll House, Cowboy Boogie, 1721 Manchester Ave., Anaheim. 9 p.m.-2 a.m. Monday, Cover: $10 for patrons 18 to 21; $5 for 21 and up. (714) 502-8747.