Ed. note: In just 9 days, Pink Sock’s own DJ RAD will join Mixtape’s Shea Van Horn, Autorock, the Fatback DJs, and a bunch of ravers from Baltimore at BYT Presents 2010: A Space Fantasy. Tickets are selling fast and at only $45 for an open bar all night it’s the best deal in town – but they’ll be $80 at the door! Get yours now before they’re gone.
All words: Bil Todd
Photos: Danko, Chris Svetlik, Shauna Alexander
Inflatable pink dolphins adorned with Christmas bows?
Yep.
Pink Christmas lights, disco balls, and over-sized mistletoe?
Uh huh.
Naughty elves in pink and white candy-cane tights and hot-pink tank tops? Slutty Santa navigating his drunken way through a gyrating sea of boys and girls?
Yes and yes.
So was the scene Wednesday night as Ryan Duncan the second installment of Pink Sock to the Wonderland Ballroom in Columbia Heights.
Duncan (aka DJ RAD) and his band of mischievous elves transformed the upstairs at the Wonderland Ballroom into a cozy, electric-pink winter wonderland. Complete with assorted stockings in all different shapes and sizes hanging from any possible fixture, as well as nude, poster-sized black and white prints of media sponge Levi Johnston affixed along every wall, it was the holiday party we always wanted, just never knew it before now.
Infectious feeling of good tidings and cheer pulsated throughout the Pink Sock crowd as the place quickly became saturated in a snow storm of guys and girls, gays and straights, Jews and gentiles alike. Those who happened into the Wonderland Ballroom for a quick drink or bite to eat could not resist the lure of the Pink Sock party above them, and quickly found themselves navigating the stairs in an attempt to join in on the festivities. There was an immediate warmth percolating throughout the crowd, and you couldn’t help but also feel totally stoked to be there.
Guest DJs Aaron Riggins (WTF, HHHH), and DJ TMY (Aural Pleasures, MAISON DC) got the party started quickly, spinning music that ranged from obscure disco and electro to a few gay guilty pleasures to keep the pace up and unpredictable (the crowd got totally groovy to some electro polka that DJ TMY mixed into his set – completely rad and unexpected). Resident DJs Bradley Portnoy and RAD took the reins soon after and led the crowd even further into the excessively glitzed-out holiday explosion that was Pink Sock Presents: Pink Stockings, wrapping the rest of the night with shiny sounds of 80s new wave, 90s house, and a bunch of other awesomeness that I was too busy dancing to even remember.
The stage in front of the DJs soon became a platform for debauchery, as naughty elves, Pink Sock’s Slutty Santa and outrageous party-goers were seen in the most compromising of positions, making out and spiraling into a haze of cheap beer ($5 PBR and Whiskey shots all night!) and holiday cheer.
Columbia Heights hasn’t always been the party destination for such an eclectic mix of gays and their friends, but Pink Sock drew a truly diverse crowd, including several smokin’ hot lesbians. If you weren’t at Pink Sock for the Pink Stockings holiday party, you missed out – but never fear: Pink Sock is the third Wednesday of every month.
