*The views expressed in Truesday are those of the author and do not represent Austinist as a whole. Thank heavens.* -The Editors

Bro-dawgs, huddle around the Axe Body Wash fountain and check this out: There’s a new lounge opening up where that freakshow movie place used to be, and it’s gonna be sweet bangin’ with more honeys than we’ll be able to drug in a single night, and more lesser bro-hams than we’ll be able to successfully fight. It’s called Pantina, or Pantera, or Pangina. I think it’s Italian for “Orange Man Cologne” or something. It’ll have that gay-dude music pumping that hottt chicks dig, but no dance floor to make us feel all awkward about being confused by rhythm. All we have to do is prowl, bro. It'll all be OURS for the taking. And they’re promising celebrities too, so I’m totally gonna bang Jessica Alba if she ever shows up in the VIP.

They’re promising to keep out all the shitheads too, with the velvet rope. You know, all those long-haired science-fair-nerds in t-shirts, glasses and sandals, yeah them, fuck those nerds. Their vegan girlfriends can come in though… as long as they’ll eat sausage! Fuck yeah! Five it out, bros! Boo-yeah! We’re cool on the velvet rope ‘cause my squat spotter says he’s gonna be working the door, so it’s on like Space Invaders. Plus they got that bottle service shit, like what we rocked at Rain in Vegas that time when Chad puked on that bitch who was obviously a lesbian. VEGAS BABY! Remember that shit, man? Man, we’re so crazy. Speaking of crazy, this ultra-lounge is gonna have animal heads and African shit all over the place like we’re in the Outback hunting wild bears and shit! IT’S GONNA MAKE ME SO PUMPED I MIGHT NEED TO WRESTLE ONE OF YOU RIGHT NOW. Fuck, it’s gonna be so awesome. It’s about time we got this kind of action here in Austin. This city NEEDS this club. This city NEEDS US to be IN this club like whoa. If they don’t let me in, then it’s obviously a gay bar for nerds and losers.

Or what about the future provided by Blade Runner, eh? Fine-ass robots (some designed to have affairs with, I might add), constant rain, and flying cars. No one is seen cleaning for shit. Mmmmm, the goodness.

But what exactly should we consider progress? Is all change: progress, just because it’s different? Or is some of this bullshit just a re-hash of poor judgment from the past?

Case in point: Pangaea.

Dear lord, please explain to me how I’m supposed to equate velvet ropes, celebrity pandering, and bottle service with the theoretical pre-tectonic-drift “oneness” of all the continents on earth? Is it bad irony? Will Thunderbird be on the list for Bottle Service?

Anyone remember Bar 415? I think it was called that, anyway. It was next to Speakeasy, in the spot where Sky now hits that same alleyway (before that space went all the way up to Congress). It was supposed to be a chic spot with phones at the tables (everyone had pagers back then), plush interior, exotic dancer clientele, and expensive drinks. Never heard about it? Of course not. It was way before its time, and there simply weren’t enough people of that ilk here to fill both it AND Speakeasy. So the market gave it a stillborn reception after it opened.

Not that anyone would remember this either, but around the time that 415 folded, about ten years back, there was an opening of a club called TWIST on Neches between 5th and 6th. When it opened, on Halloween night no less, it was a grand spectacle. We were told that it would be one exquisite room with open-air opulence, a fine assortment of liquors, and a true Urban/European flavor. The place was practically built from the ground up at huge expense to the owners, one of which was dating one of my good friend’s ex-girlfriends. Somehow we were penciled onto a “guest list” or some shit for the opening extravaganza.

Waiting in line to get in was where I was first offered cocaine here in Austin, by a complete and total stranger. I was absolutely trashed from a series of costume parties earlier that night where I came dressed like a dirty trucker (mesh-back BFI hat, plaid poof vest, work boots caked in mud, dirty t-shirt, and fake green teeth – no one recognized that I was in outfit, which is both hilarious and sad). Dude just walked right up to my filthy looking, drunk-swaying ass in line and asked if I “needed” some coke. Honestly, I had never considered that people would actually buy that shit here in Austin, until that point. The lack of that particular culture was one of the big draws to bring me here in the first place. This just never felt like a stimulant town to me before that, and my opinion of Austin changed a little bit right then. Not necessarily negatively, but definitely different.

Regardless, when we finally got over the velvet rope and inside, the whole place looked like a big-ass circus tent exploding with pseudo-prosperity with a HUGE bar in the middle. Credit cards were flying across the suffocatingly immense bar with witless abandon. House music ooncing away. No dance floor. Titty dancers walking around, apparently paid to play hostess, checking on the clientele. The place was absolutely ginormous for just a bar (this was before anyone had the audacity to claim a “lounge” design). I love booze, but that place was just too much of a blatant altar to the stuff.

About a year later, Twist closed and reopened as Texture, which was an actual club, which made more sense to me. Then that closed and reopened as something else, which I believe also sold its sign. Nowadays the space is an international club of some sort. I haven’t been in it in years, but I still hear the oonce-oonce when I stumble by.

Point is: there have been many iterations of the Pangaea model here before. It isn’t “progress” per se. It’s simply a nightlife design that’s been repeatedly applied in our flip-flop city to no avail. But who knows, this time it might catch on. Vicci is still around and charging $10 cover. I pegged that atrocious monstrosity-joint for dead after six months of operation, and I was wrong-wrong-wrong about that. Perhaps that’s the litmus test for market acceptance of what Karma’s been trying to get done for years now (they had bottle service when they opened back in 2005). So perhaps Austin’s ready to support an operation like that of Pangaea. Maybe there really is a shift occurring beneath our open-toe’d feet.

Get ready for the yam-tans and flexed chests, for on our collective horizon there’s the beginnings of a proper bro-down.