A Hot Night in New Orleans
Dear HiHo Lounge,
It was Friday night. I had some friends coming from out of town and I wanted to show them a good night out. I had heard that Clockwork Elvis and the Billion Dollar Baby Dolls Burlesque troupe were going to be on the same bill, performing at was one of my favorite clubs before Katrina. Yours.
It was going to be a night to remember, one of the best local bands playing a gig with one of our city’s best burlesque troupes (my wife and I are friends with at least three of the girls in the group) at one of the greatest music halls in the New Orleans area. I couldn’t wait.
When I first arrived there, everything was fine. We were about thirty minutes early, meaning we showed up when the band was supposed to take the stage, and the place was empty. But after standing around for a few moments, we noticed something, it was dead hot in there.
We brushed it aside though, got some drinks and took our place for the show. However, our decision to stay was one we’d quickly regret. As bodies packed into the room, thing went from uncomfortable, to dangerous.
It’s Called Air Conditioning
That’s not only stupid and inconsiderate, but outright dangerous.
The four of us, me, my wife and our two friends, made it through Clockwork Elvis’ set with no problems and through most of the Burlesque acts. However, just before the two groups were going to do their joint program, I looked down and noticed that my shirt was soaked with sweat.
I tapped my wife, who was standing in front of me and asked her if he was alright. I knew she had a history of overheating and grew very worried about her. She said she was fine but, when she spun around to watch the show, the room spun around her. We had to get out. Our friends were, by this point, equally eager to leave, so we made our way through the crowd and out the front door.
There, we found a very large crowd of people all experiencing the same problem. I could hear them whispering about how they “almost passed out” or “felt sick”. My wife, for her part, could barely stand, she went around the side of the building and dropped to her knees, almost ready to throw up, pass out or both. She looked physically ill. She had only been drinking Diet Coke and water all evening, not a drop of alcohol was in her system, yet she was falling down like a drunk on Bourbon St.
We all rushed to her and, fortunately, she quickly recovered enough to walk. We rushed her to our car and turned the A/C on full blast, she slowly began to come around and feel better. We immediately sped off, everyone was fine, but the evening had been nearly ruined.
A Damn Shame
What makes this so frustrating is that both of the acts were able to pull through the temperature extremes and put on a Hell of a show. Both the band and the troupe were impeccable. We would have loved to have stuck around after the show and talked with the band, the girls, tipped, drank more and had a lot more fun, but no, we had to beat a hasty retreat due to your lack of temperature control.
Thanks a bunch.
Running an event under these conditions, without at least taking some precautions, is not just unkind, but dangerous and shows a flagrant disregard for the safety of your visitors. If your A/C was working, it wasn’t working well enough, you could have brought in more fans or a backup cooling system, but instead you let us sweat and some of us almost passed out due to heat exhaustion.
Think for a second what would have happened if my wife had gotten hurt? What if she had passed out and hit her head or something else had happened to her? I wouldn’t be hashing this out on a blog, I’d be letting my attorney handle it. You’re lucky that this is nothing more an open letter of complaint and not a lawsuit.
And think about my friends for a moment. They came from out of town to see how things were going in New Orleans. Your screw up not only caused both of them great physical discomfort, making one of them feel ill, but also made the whole city look bad, at least until we were able to rectify that later in the weekend by showing them a good time elsewhere.
If we, as a city, are going to recover, we’re going to need establishments like yours to pull your thumbs out of your asses and treat your customers right or, at the very least, not try to kill them. If you couldn’t get the A/C fixed or provide an alternative, you could have at least posted warnings at the door so someone like my wife, who is prone to overheating without warning, would be able to avoid it.
You screwed up bad, you nearly hurt my wife, you embarrassed me and I am mad as Hell about it.
Making things Right
If you want to make things right with me, here’s the deal. First, apologize for what happened and explain exactly what went wrong. My wife was not an isolated case and there are others wondering the same thing so I suggest you do this on your own site as well as on this one.
Second, refund our money. I won’t bother with the amount we paid for drinks because it was only four Diet Cokes, (besides, I’m nice like that and the bartender was cute) but we did pay ten dollars in cover for a show we couldn’t enjoy, couldn’t see all the way through and put at least one of us in a bad spot health-wise. I think a refund is more than reasonable.
Finally, fix the damn problem and prove to me that it is fixed. I’m not setting foot in that place until I know it’s safe. The neighborhood around it is bad enough, but to think I might be in danger of being hurt inside the club is truly a stunning realization for me.
If you do those things, I might head back out there for the next concert you have that I want to see, otherwise, I’ll wait for the video to appear on YouTube.
Bottom Line
In the end, it’s going to be a long-ass time before I go back to your club, barring some severe effort to make things right. I remember watching Local H perform there years ago and loving the place, Now, I can’t even stand the thought of driving by it.
You screwed up and you screwed up bad. It’s time to own up and make things right.
Otherwise, in the immortal words of Local H, “That’s it, I quit, I don’t give a shit!”
Words to live by, especially when someone screws you over.
Comments
4 Responses to “A Hot Night in New Orleans”
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I’m one of the above mentioned friends. Hello, everyone down in the Big Easy from the Mile High City.
Now, first, I’d like to thank all the performers at the nightclub. Very good performances by everyone, even though it was freaking hot. To HiHo Lounge: Like the OP said, there was no excuse. I’d like to think this was just an isolated incident, but you guys should get your AC fixed, really. I’d hate for you to drive off other visitors from an otherwise awesome display.
Thanks for the hospitality, but next time? Make sure the AC is plugged in, OK?
Hey guys, DC here. I am the singer in Clockwork Elvis. First let me express my deepest concern for any damage or discomfort you experienced coming to our show. Its hard enough to get people to spend their limited time and hard earned money in New Orleans these days. With an experience like you had I can imagine your feelings are validated. It was equally hot on stage and in back. My shirt was as soaked as if I had just stepped out of the shower. And my white jeans? Let me just say I KNEW I should have worn underwear. I have spoken with the owners about this issue as the performers were just as concerned as the patrons. As a matter of explanation here’s a few points…
1 - This was the biggest crowd the new owners have had since they opened and they had no idea what to expect. This in no way excuses the situation simply explains.
2 - The next investment they have planned for improvements to the club is re-insulating the ceiling and installing an AC system that can turn it into an icebox even in the hottest of months.
3 - The performers were paid out of the money taken in at the door. If you would like to come to another show, either by Clockwork Elvis or the billion Dollar Baby Dolls get in touch with me at clockworkelvis@gmail.com and I will make sure you get into any show you like on us. Reverend Spooky is my girlfriend and I’m sure I speak for her when I invite you to any of our shows on us.
We work really hard to put on a good show and give people an experience they wont forget. Any factor that detracts from this is of great concern to us and I we will make good on our entertainment promise. We’re doing an X-Mas show at the Hi-Ho on Dec. 8th. Not only will it be cooler but their will hopefully be even more improvements made to the club. Let me invite you to the show on us.
Once again, my apologies to you and yours for an un-enjoyable night. I hope you give us the opportunity to make it right. regards, DC
Just so you know…. they do have a working a.c. but body heat combined with breathing combined with a big crowd of people= really hot in a small club with tall ceilings. Also I did see the club owners bring out and set up 3 fans while I was there. And soda(even diet) massively dehydrates your body even while drinking water with it. When someone prone to passing out is chugging soda in a hot steamy club in New Orleans in the middle of summer, what did you expect to happen? Did you even consider contacting the owners privately like a gentleman as opposed to airing your dirty laundry in public? Probably not. Instead of making demands and coming off as a jerk, why not get in touch with the actual venue and request an explanation and reparation? Most clubs when approached properly will bend over backwards to accommodate their patrons. There is also the added fact that as hot as you were, the band and performers had to be 10 times more hot considering they were the ones under the stage lights and expending all that energy.
DC & Wayne: First off, my sincere apologies for the delay in getting your comments up. I’ve been away from this site for some time and just noticed the comments in the moderation box.
I want to reiterate that I have no quabbles with either Clockwork Elvis of the Baby Dolls. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you are the best two acts in the city, bar none, and I certainly do not want to deprive you of any revenue or do any harm to your reputation. My quabble with with the Hi-Ho.
On that note, I will not take you up on your generous offer for a free show. As much as I appreciate the sentiment and respect you for offering it, I want to make sure you get every dollar you deserve. My wife and I are also friends with a few of the Baby Dolls and want to contribute to them as well. I know that you and they both work very hard.
I am glad to hear that the Hi-Ho is addressing these issues and, with that in mind, you can count me in for the Xmas show. I’ll be there with the missus in tow.
I can also appreciate the physics of the situation. But I think that the moral of the story is that, just because the fire marshal says you can cram this many bodies into your club doesn’t mean you should.
There were other factors and the club didn’t consider them. It’s a shame not only in the problems we had, but the problems it makes for you and the Baby Dolls.
Anyway, thank you very much for commenting here and I’m sorry again about the delay in getting these comments live.
I wish you the best of luck and I’ll see you at a show in the near future!