The booze hound

Is this the end of White Rabbit?

You may have noticed black clouds gathering over Beijing recently, and four unnamed men arriving on horseback at the gates of the city...

While we wondered briefly whether it was the 2012 Mayan apocalypse come early, we soon learned it was something far, far worse: White Rabbit had closed.

Due to the party poopers in the local fire bureau – who are concerned with silly things like stopping a deadly inferno and don’t seem to care one bit about minimal techno – Beijing’s dance music sanctuary has been shut for the rest of the summer, with no one holding out much hope for a resurrection.

The owners are searching out new venues as we speak, so don’t book your ticket to Berlin just yet. Time Out rang around a few local DJs to gauge their reaction to the news only to be met with a brief moment of contemplative silence followed by a howling maelstrom of anguished weeping.

DJ Blackie is flying his mum over to give him a hug, Mickey Zhang and Dio have entered into a suicide pact, and Patrick Yu is on an IRA-style dirty protest, refusing to wash and covering his home in faeces until the Rabbit reopens.

Now that’s commitment. The one upside to the closure is that you’ll be able to patronise Beijing newcomers with stories about how wonderful the club was in its heydey, how you could see DJ Couldn’t-Make-It-Back-Home and MC Incredibly Average just dancing away in the crowd, like regular people!

We were really one with the artists back then man, you really should have been there. Meanwhile, following in the footsteps of Q Bar – who have scored a big hit with their fully renovated terrace – Alfa, Beijing’s other long term, high quality yet affordable hotspot, has undergone a rebranding, introducing a delicious new European menu.

We’d like to recommend their fantastic selection of mussels as a personal favourite. Other ambitious renovation plans are set to follow, with the management planning on installing a large water feature and a whirlpool under a glass dancefloor.

The owners also plan to open a new private members’ club in Sanlitun called The Apartment, which will be decked out to look like a 14th-century Belgian monastery. Either that or an apartment; can’t remember which.