Jason Genegabus photos

It hasn’t taken long for Doraku Sushi to build its late-night following.

Then again, I guess it helps when you’re savvy enough to enlist the services of current leaders in the local club scene from the jump.

In a city where promoters control where the masses party, it’s so necessary to build relationships with the people who can reach hundreds of their closest friends via text message or MySpace bulletin.

Flash and Matty Boy Present made the first move, launching the bi-weekly “Supper Club” on Feb. 8. It’s going to be interesting to see what they do with that party once they launch “Candy Bar,” a new weekly at Pearl Ultra Lounge on March 14.

That’s also the next time F&M are supposed to be at Doraku. And they still do “Release” every Friday on Kauai, too.

Architechs Hawaii partnered with Tantriq on the Sunday of President’s Day Weekend to host “Buddha Khan” at the restaurant, and I’m told the Architechs are in talks with Doraku owner Kevin Aoki to hold down the first and third Thursdays of the month, starting in March.

And last weekend saw the launch of “Naked Rhythm,” a new Saturday weekly with Hot 93.9’s K-Smooth and DJ Betty on the decks.

Here’s the party flier, courtesy Jay P Productions:

I paid a visit to Doraku on Feb. 22, and almost immediately made a fool of myself when I took a picture of Aoki and his sister, Echo Aoki, without paying enough attention to realize who I was talking to.

Oops.

Got another picture later of the two with Flash Hansen and Matty Hazelgrove:

F&M resident DJ Byron the Fur was in the building early.

I like how the DJ booth is set up so it’s exposed to the rest of the Royal Hawaiian Center. It helps draw people in, while leaving plenty of room elsewhere to eat and mingle.

There was free sushi early, and lots of people were ordering off the menu as well:

I didn’t get to try any of the food, but I’m hoping to do so really soon. You can read what the Star-Bulletin’s Nadine Kam thought about the menu in her review that ran in the paper last weekend.

The headline for that story read: “Doraku Sushi bound to attract hip late-nighters.”

That’s for sure:

Minus the Bear showed up for a few drinks before their concert at Pipeline Cafe the following night. Happy birthday Giselle!

More birthday celebrations:

And a few more shots of last Friday’s crowd:

This entry was posted on Friday, February 29th, 2008 at 5:21 pm and is filed under Nightlife, Clubs/Bars, Picture Blogs, Adventures in Clubland. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.