Lanzhou Nightlife, China
First off, it's important to know that the Chinese like to follow suit, and the crowd. If, for example, two restaurants sit next to each other and the joint on the left has no customers while the place on the right is packed, nine times out of ten the average Chinese patron will wait in line at the busy place. Logic? The vacant restaurant must be bad if nobody is going there. So the cycle continues.
The same goes for the bars and discos. Small bars are a dime a dozen and usually run down and hold no real attraction other than serving the neighbouring proximity or circle of close friends. Discos here are sinking pits of big bucks. Black, dark, neon lights, mirrors, coloured lights, smoky mirrors, plush couches, dark mirrors, peg lights, dangling lights, black bars, dancing girls, dancing boys, dancing boys dressed like girls, flashing lights, Chinese deejays, African deejays, working girls, army bouncers who drink more than patrons, ear-splitting sound systems and the same twenty tracks played over and over. This is a staple, a must for all discos in this city.
To break from the crowd and invent a different idea would be risky at best. And yet every bar that sinks a couple of million RMB into some lavish pretence of a good time usually finds their doors closed after six months. Old news perhaps, daddy big bucks is going to another joint perhaps or the classic game of chance where maybe on one night there are more people at disco bar A then disco bar B thusly prompting the easily swayed crowd to continue funnelling their massive numbers towards disco bar A's delight and disco bar B's doom. It's a catch-22. You can't change ideas because there's a good chance that if the "right" people don't like it then the "other" people won't follow and if you try to open a disco you must follow the game plan and hope the cards fall your way.
Three out of four seasons, the streets are alive with beer, smokes and pool tables. Beer gardens are the only gardens that grow freely here. They don't cost anything to get in and they don't cost much to stay. They range in many sizes but they are all vivaciously loud. Most of the gardens are accompanied with Muslim ran roasted lamb stands. But if the beer gardens close to early for you then the next best thing is to find a "fire" bar. They never close, they are usually fairly dirty, full of very drunk men, serve only the cheapest beers and roast up an assortment of assorted meat and veggies.
Live entertainment is interesting here. It is difficult to find original music played live and impossible to find an original music venue. If one is new to china then going to a show bar where local heroes sing copies of copies of copied songs will not seem overly obnoxious at first. It is when one has stayed here long enough to become familiar with the one hit wonders being circulated rather perversely that one realizes the show bars are nothing more than richly produced over sized karaoke rooms. The entertaining value lies in the austere nature of the local performer's act. They do take their covers seriously.
As for me, I often go to the largest of beer gardens. They are full of familiar faces and I usually get caught up in cheering old bar friends and playing Chinese drinking games. During the cold months, I'll frequent the discotheques for the good prices on whiskey, the dancing girls and "to feel the warm thrill of confusion, that space cadet glow" after which I'll hit a friend's local dive bar set up for live music and saddle up with a guitar and drunkenly belt out some incomprehensible English songs to an appreciative crowd if not an amused crowd.