Inside Vancouver

Party in Space: “Space Cruise” Coming to Vancouver’s Granville Street

by Remy Scalza in Uncategorized on April 2, 2014

You may find astronauts like these on your Space Cruise. Photo credit: Ahmad Hashim | Flickr

Are you ready to board a cruise ship to another galaxy?

Throughout April, downtown Vancouver’s FanClub is transforming itself into a “Space Cruise.” Confused? Don’t worry – This requires a little explaining.

Space Cruise, according to event organizers, is a “charmingly campy Caribbean cruise meets Star Trek, with a hint of Cirque du Soleil and more than its share of sexy.” Think of it as interactive theatre for grownups, staged inside a cavernous nightclub on Granville Street.

Step inside the doors of the FanClub and you’ll find all the trappings of a cruise ship. Your cruise hostess will help you to your seat and prepare you for the voyage ahead. Meanwhile – mainly to add to the general absurdity – burlesque dancers will take the stage, while a live band rocks away in the background. And did I forget to mention there’s a trapeze artist as well, swinging from the ceiling in a skimpy outfit?

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Party in Space: “Space Cruise” Coming to Vancouver’s Granville Street

Free Live Music on Granville Street in Vancouver Every Saturday

by Remy Scalza in Uncategorized on February 12, 2014

Photo courtesy of Vancouver FanClub

Music fans know that it can sometimes be a challenge to find places to catch live bands in Vancouver. The bars and restaurants in the city that do specialize in live music often either charge a hefty cover or wait until the wee hours of the morning to bring bands on stage.

All of which is why a new music series in the heart of downtown Vancouver on Granville Street is such a find. Every Saturday afternoon, from 2 p.m.-7 p.m., New-Orleans’-style supper club Vancouver FanClub hosts Saturday Jams. I checked out the free event on a recent weekend and it was, well, music to my ears.

The FanClub opened about a year ago as a new project from the owners of the Yale, Vancouver’s venerable and now defunct blues music club. They’ve tried to recreate the look and feel of New Orleans music hall – and spared little expense doing it. Continue reading:
Free Live Music on Granville Street in Vancouver Every Saturday

Tango comes to Downtown Vancouver

by Remy Scalza in Entertainment on April 22, 2013

Photo credit: parakulturado | Flickr

Ready to tango?

Few dances are as sultry, as storied or as elegant as the tango. Now, Vancouverites can get a taste of sensual Argentine rhythms on the heart of Granville Street at downtown’s Vancouver FanClub.

Every other Sunday, the New-Orleans-style supper club transforms itself into an authentic afternoon milonga – a tango dance hall. Traditional tangos and valses echo through the atmospheric club, while dozens of dance partners – many done up in dapper suits and sensual dresses – step across the floor.

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Tango comes to Downtown Vancouver

Win tickets to Vancouver Dine Out Fest’s wildest party – Dinner at the Birdcage, Jan 31

by Remy Scalza in Events on January 21, 2013

Combine great food and cocktails, a New Orleans-style supper club and Vancouver’s most fabulous drag queens and what do you get?

Quite possibly one of the can’t-miss events of the 2013 Dine Out Vancouver Festival (For details on how you can win free tickets, read on).

On Jan. 31 the Vancouver FanClub hosts Dinner at the Birdcage, a culinary drag spectacular starring the city’s celebrity drag queens. Over a three-course dinner and cocktails, soak up the sights and sounds of 11 outrageous performance numbers on FanClub’s stage from the likes of drag legends Joan-E, Carlotta Gurl, Coco and others.

Haven’t been to FanClub yet? The brand new venue on Granville Street brings together live music on one of the city’s best stages with a southern-style barbecue menu and great drinks. French colonial doors, wood floors and a second-floor balcony looking down on the action all lend a New Orleans music hall feel. It’s a fantastic (and still relatively undiscovered) place to grab a drink and a bite to eat and see some great live blues and jazz shows.

FanClub is serving a deluxe barbecue menu for Dine Out, the citywide restaurant festival running Jan. 18-Feb. 3 that features hundreds of discount menus, plus dozens of creative culinary events. Continue reading:
Win tickets to Vancouver Dine Out Fest’s wildest party – Dinner at the Birdcage, Jan 31

Free live music at New Orleans-style FanClub on Granville Street

by Remy Scalza in Entertainment on November 26, 2012

Photo credit: Vancouver FanClub

There aren’t many places in Vancouver where you can here a really good live version of Marvin Gaye’s I Heard it through the Grapevine on a random afternoon – and even fewer where you can hear it for free.

Without much fanfare, what may be Vancouver’s best new venue for live music opened on Granville Street recently. FanClub – operated by the owners of the city’s beloved (and currently closed) Yale blues bar – occupies a New Orleans-style music hall space on the corner of Granville and Nelson Streets. French doors lead into a bar room with soaring, 30-foot ceilings, a second-floor wrought-iron balcony and – front and center – a huge stage for showcasing local and out-of-town talent.

Most nights of the week, FanClub features ticketed performances by blues, roots, rock and jazz musicians, as well as DJs spinning house music until the late hours. But – for live music lovers on a budget – FanClub also offers free shows: often in the early evenings on weekdays and all day on Saturday.

I stopped by over the weekend for the Saturday jam session, a sort of open mic that attracts dozens of bands from throughout the Lower Mainland for their 15 minutes of fame. By 3 p.m., the room was packed and buzzing with more energy than lots of late-night venues on Granville Street. Continue reading:
Free live music at New Orleans-style FanClub on Granville Street

Best Club in Vancouver You’ve Never Heard of: New Orleans Comes to Granville Street

by Remy Scalza in Entertainment on September 30, 2012

Photo credit: Vancouver Fanclub

There’s a new addition to Granville Street’s bar scene – and it just might be the best venue for live music in Vancouver.

Last month, with very little fanfare, Fanclub opened at Granville and Nelson. Even from the outside, you can tell there’s something special going on. In the style of the New Orleans clubs its modeled after, Fanclub is essentially open to the street: large French colonial doors open up to let the sounds of the party going on inside lure passsersby on the sidewalk outside.

Inside, the club is gorgeous – an unexpectedly high-end music venue on the gritty end of the Granville Street drag. In traditional music hall fashion, it’s an open design, with a soaring 30-foot ceiling and an upper balcony area where you can look down at all the action below.

Down on the main level, there’s a big, horseshoe-shaped bar on one side of the room and a large stage on the other. The interior is all dark wood, accented by rainbow coloured lighting, which I guess lends a New Orleans Mardi Gras type feel. There’s also an intimate cocktail bar tucked away in a wood-paneled backroom, when the music gets too loud.

Which brings us to Fanclub’s raison d’être – the music. Continue reading:
Best Club in Vancouver You’ve Never Heard of: New Orleans Comes to Granville Street