CW Update: Pleasure Island VS CityWalk (Part 2)

Yesterday we looked at Pleasure Island's array of dance clubs and today we're going to do the same with Universal's CityWalk. The biggest difference between the two sets is the Pleasure Island closed in 2008 while CityWalk continues to this day. However, CW's main dance club was The Groove but it shuttered during the covid19 closure and never reopened. Instead, it was converted into an escape room. There remains a rumor at CityWalk that the escape room is going to close and The Groove is coming back but we've been hearing that for close to a year and nothing has happened.....yet. During the early years of The Groove, they played a lot of what we now call Classic Dance and some world class DJ's played there. During the later years The Groove was mostly Top 40 and Hip Hop.

With The Groove closed, Red Coconut Club became CityWalk's main dance club. Not really sure what they feel their niche is supposed to be since it's not open nightly and we've even found it closed on weekend nights, at times.When it is open, the music format is mostly Hip Hop.

CityWalk's Rising Star remains a popular karaoke venue and gets crowded. We mention it here among dance clubs because between karaoke sessions a DJ does play Top 40 hits and the dance floor in front of the stage can get pretty jammed.

Latin Quarter was a long-running Latin club late at night once the LQ restaurant closed. While the music was indeed Salsa, Bachata, Merengue and Reggaeton, resident DJ Leony (USA), who also had an EDM mix show on XM Satellite Radio, used to drop EDM sets in here too. It was the closest thing we had at the time to Mannequins. Unfortunately, CityWalk closed LQ and converted the space into a Mexican restaurant.

Bob Marley's A Tribute to Freedom remains in business and is a restaurant that becomes a dance club at night. There is a live band with a DJ between sets and the music from both is nearly all Jamaican Reggae. The dance floor can get crowded. Not mentioned in this article is Pat O'Brien's and Margaritaville. Both have semi-popular bars but no real dance club aspect. As always, we'll report on any changes that might happen including at Universal's Epic Universe theme park which is supposed to open next May.