Best New Club

The years when rock clubs and discothèques were mutually exclusive are behind us. Electronic music is no longer the sole province of the DJ; rock is no longer just for guys with guitars. Funk-punk, electroclash, glitch-hop, broken beat -- these days, virtually every subgenre you can name is a schizophrenic mix of sounds. Nightclubs need to be able to handle them all, and Mezzanine does it as good as or better than any. Swanker than the hippest house clubs, yet with a ravelike ambience that keeps the proceedings intimate, Mezzanine can host all-night multimedia DJ-a-thons (like the Ninja Tune label's famed Zentertainment USA tour) as proficiently as it can the Bay Area debut of U.K. garage/hip hop hybrid Dizzee Rascal. The club even holds the occasional rock show. And its sound and lighting arrays are among the best in the area. Mezzanine may not be the future of nightclubbing, but the venue certainly offers a glimpse of it.