| Xtasia’s – West Bromich.We visited Xtasia’s on August Bank Holiday Saturday in 2008 which is the clubs weekly couple’s only evening. We have been meaning to get up to Xtasia’s for a long time, the distance from London only preventing us from visiting it sooner. The people behind Xtasia’s have been running parties for about 20 years now. The parties started their life in hired nightclubs until eventually they based them in the permanent premises where they now reside. Cost for couples on a Saturday was £25 which seemed very reasonable, a call to the club before our visit resolved any problems or questions we had and although their web site is very informative it really needs re-modernising and some stronger pictures of the clubs best features which are not shown at their best on line.The ClubXtasia’s is in what use to be an actual nightclub, so consequently all the décor and layout reflect that. If you have read any of our reviews before you will know we love a place we can both dance and get naughty in, so Xtasia’s has for this very reason always really appealed to us. The club is located just off West Brom high street, set behind a rather raucous Jamaican pub which many have commented on is noisy and intimidating and they’re not wrong, however, the people sitting outside the pub really didn’t bother us and seem to be very bored with people coming in and out the club, they certainly didn’t pay us any attention. Cost for the night is a reasonable £25 per couple. On the night we visited the Jacuzzi was not working, so it and the sauna area was shut but we were informed of this before we entered the club. Consequently we can’t comment on those areas of the club in this review.Upon entering we were greeted by several staff in uniform and Jonathan the owner, whom booked us in at reception after all the usual formalities with no problems. We read the rules and then were taken on a tour of the club by a helpful blonde lady, whose name I must confess we have forgotten but she was great. Upon entering the club staff will take what you need to leave behind in cloakroom storage. Once this is done you walk along a long corridor which has toilets located on the right and then stairs at the end which leads up to a landing area that looks down with a great view, on to the dance floor. From this landing area behind you is a dimly lit large play area that was previously the clubs upstairs bar but is now filled with several chesterfield sofas and booths, where people can play with each other discreetly but in the open. At the end of this area, the old bar itself has been converted to a play room surrounded by blinds where you can look in or enter if invited. On the right hand side of this area is a lockable grope box and beyond that a curtained section that covers a dark room, where people play standing up. We thought it wouldn’t be used much as it seemed way too dark, and well, standing up has its limitations, but later on it was totally packed and we couldn’t even get in this small space. Next to all the sofas are conveniently located rolls of kitchen towels and though it didn’t seem it at first, this was the most popular area of the club to play in, with no less than 38 people in it at one point (plus probably another 20 or so in the dark space) and yes I did count. Once you’re in this upstairs area and sit down, it’s not quite as dark as it first appears but does make for a very horny atmosphere which obviously worked well as it was busy until closing. From the staircase you descend into the main part of the club which is focused around a very large dance floor straight in front of you. As you come down the stairs you will see once you reach the bottom that there is a set of doors that leads back underneath the upstairs play area. On mixed nights this whole down stairs room beyond those doors is for couples only, so a mixed night, couples are well catered for. It’s pretty large with some fetish equipment, sofas and some smaller play areas off to the side and located at the end. As this was a Saturday couples were playing all over the club so this area didn’t seem to be utilised too much though we expect on a mixed night it would get much busier. The dance floor itself is the biggest we have seen in an adult club of any of the clubs in the UK. The dance floor is in places screened by trees, yes trees. Xtasia’s unique facility is a curtain which comes down and covers part of the dance floor when the slow songs are on. We were the only people on the dance floor as this curtain began its descent, by the time it hit the floor there were 30 couples in it with us. Mostly dancing continued inside the curtain, mostly. One wonders what sight would greet the club if the curtain was suddenly retracted with great speed. On the right hand side of the dance floor is a great deal of seating and booths. On the left side is the long bar which is licensed to serve alcohol, and also has a wide selection of soft drinks. Xtasia’s does not serve food, (Unless you count Tic Tacs) but it does have the cheapest bar prices of any licensed club on the scene we have been too. There are also several bar stools in this area. At the far end of the dance floor are more toilets and the DJ booth in the right hand corner. The music played was very mixed from pop, to some RnB, and a bit of everything though I have to confess I never thought I would be shagging in a club to the sounds of Leona Lewis (Though I am sure a great many people in the club had thought about doing other things with Leona Lewis….) At the far left hand side of the club, by the end of the bar are two sets of stairs, one going down leads to the Jacuzzi area, but we didn’t get to see that. The other goes up to a loft area which essentially is a long thin corridor with several play rooms on either side of it. As this literally is located in a triangular shaped roof area we were told it was somewhat cramped for play and this was not an unfair comment with all the rooms having sloping roofs with the corridor itself being the only bit we could stand up right in. This area was also incredibly stuffy and humid to the point that it made us feel ill, so it was the first and last time we went up there all night. Also located at the back of the dance floor is a door that leads to a large outdoor covered smoking area which is a hive of social activity through out the night. There is no lack of seating here.The NightXtasia’s has to have been one of the friendliest clubs we have ever been in. Once our initial nerves had gone we spoke to all kinds of people fairly soon after arriving and more as the night went on. We were told it was a slow night (With it being bank holiday and we had just missed an SDC party which several people told us was incredibly busy) but there was still well over 50 couples in and even though the dance floor wasn’t too busy, we made the most of it when we could. The staff were polite and helpful and we did not witness any of the leering mentioned in other reviews going on, at least not on our visit. They also kindly called let us use their phone to call a cab when we left. We had also heard that there was a tendency for more watching than playing going on at this club and perhaps on some nights that maybe the case, but on the night we went it was the reverse. We also didn’t see many people wandering around on their own, couples here did tend to play as couples. Xtasia’s has a reputation for having a crowd that is more towards the south side of 35. Certainly the crowd did feel younger than most other places, but it’s hard to say exactly what ‘Young’ is on the scene these days as everyone has different definitions. If you want to know if there was a lot of fit looking people here, the answer from us would be a firm yes, but then one woman’s John Holmes is another woman’s John Major, so who are we too judge? There was a good eclectic mix of people and we
Date: 26 August 2008
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