Man-Ray   

21 Brookline St
Cambridge, MA 2139
617-864-0400
www.manrayclub.com

Directions   Email   Send to Cell  

Looking to join a coven or learn more about the skin-whitening properties of arsenic? One glimpse of the flowing cloaks and exquisite pallor of ManRay's regulars, and you'll know you've come to the right place. On a typical night, this Central Square club morphs its neighborhood into a scene from a vintage vampire film -- complete with scuttling urchins, caped predators and a permanent fog of ambient smoke. Inside, the atmosphere conjures the closest thing Cambridge has to a demimonde, with patrons tricked out in their best bondage gear and Bride of Frankenstein hairdos.Khakis and baseball caps are verboten, but costumes borrowed from 'Blade Runner' are encouraged -- as are fetishes ranging from S&M to synth-pop (yes, old timers, Joy Division is still spoken here). As with any club, ManRay's gravity quotient relies largely on its crowd, which, on 18+ 'Crypt' nights and 19+ 'Fetish Fridays' can resemble Pee-Wee's Playhouse (albeit in black and on morphine). Other highlights of the weekly schedule are 'Campus' Thursdays (often voted Boston's best gay night for its "alternative boy-pop and high-energy house music) and 'Transmission' Saturdays (assuaging generational nostalgia with "retro new wave, techno-pop, electro-clash and disco trash"). -- Julia Clinger