The Days of Wine and Ravers Are Here

Wine? Women? Song? Yeah, we’ve got that. And we’ve also got a fashion show, performance art, a live Web cast, and a hammering drum ‘n’ bass house mix.

So boast the Wine Brats.

In other words: This is not your great uncle’s wine tasting--string quartets and Riedel crystal. The Brats, an Internet-based collective of 20ish and 30ish wine enthusiasts, have long been ready to leave their keg parties and their blue books in search of a more sophisticated spirit.

In the last of five wine raves it has hosted around the country with Elle magazine, the Santa Rosa-based organization re-imagined Santa Monica’s Gotham Hall, with its Seuss-ian decor, into a series of tasting rooms Thursday night. With video screens flashing microscope-slide images of Cabs, Merlots and Chardonnays, and the steady pulse of deep bass, ravers dined on Maryland Blue Crab cakes and salmon tarts, sushi and vegetable rolls. Dozens of wineries--from Silverado and Meridian to Zabaco and Australia’s Alice White--poured freely as guests in leather minis and motorcycle boots shared tasting notes with those in trench coats and Sketchers.

Part tasting, part mixer, part fund-raiser (portions of the $45 door fee benefited the L.A. Free Clinic), the raves help the Brats take their virtual message--”Wine for the People!”--to the streets. (You, too, can join the revolution by navigating to https://www.winebrats.org.)

“I got into wine very early because I liked to cook,” says Brendan Eliason, 24, the Brats’ national director of education, “and the problem was that it was really, really tough to find people my own age who were into it. I’d go to tastings with people who’d been tasting wine since before I was born!”

Eliason, who works for a Geyserville, Calif., winery, eagerly gave ravers a quick lesson in the elements of smell and taste, and a brief tour of the tongue’s flavor centers: “It just takes practice, lots of practice to develop a great palate like, say, Robert Parker [who publishes the revered industry bible, ‘Wine Advocate’]. And that’s our mission. We’d really like to take the fear out of all of it. And just remember: Wine rewards education! But if you don’t want to know, it still tastes good.”

Kriss Reid, 31, of Diamond Bar and Lauren Pantos, 32 of Newport Beach have just formed the Orange County chapter of the Wine Brats. “I always wanted to start a wine-tasting group,” said Pantos over the whir of a machine crushing out wine-spiked slushies.

“One thing that I’ve really resisted,” says Reid, nodding toward the glowing slush machines, “is that ‘white Zins aren’t for real wine drinkers’ attitude. But now I’m coming around to see that that’s just another entree to the world of wine. It’s a first step.”

“We really want to keep it affordable,” added Pantos, “And let people know that it really is about asking questions. Wine is really a personal experience. And you can only determine what you like by experiencing it.”

Wine Brats was founded in 1993 by wine industry scions Jon Sebastiani, Jeff Bundschu, Mike Sangiacomo. Brats’ executive director, Joel Quigley, 38, says the group numbers more than 16,000 and has not been shy about promotion: “We’ve gotten the word out not just on our Web site, but through e-mail, direct mail, hip, hot alternative radio stations that hit that 24-to-44 demographic.” He’s already dreaming of new venues, bigger crowds and greater influence.

So en garde, old guard: Taste that!