Although Gruv has been open since late October, it has only recently come up on the Puget Sound radar of Thursday night hotspots. In addition to dollar drink specials for everyone, Gruv features KUPS DJs Eddie Lee and Nick Carroll, which means a vast improvement to the music. The venue features a large stage and impressive DJ booth on one side of the club, and booth tables with a bar on the other side.
Gruv, located on 6th Ave., currently occupies the space that was previously Hells Kitchen, which has now moved downtown. Though the door person will usually try to charge an astronomical cover to men, prices for cover are usually negotiable.
As one Puget Sound alum said: “They tried to charge us $60 for our group, but when they saw we were going to leave, lowered it to five a head and then made it free eventually.” He went on to say that the place was hurting for numbers.
Most people who I asked about the venue said they would not be going back for a variety of reasons.
As student Emma Tribble said, “A guy came up and started dancing with me, when the song was over I told him I just wanted to dance with my friends. He looked upset and walked away, and then five minutes later his sister came up to me and tried to convince me and my friends to give her brother a chance because ‘he’s a really nice guy’.”
Molly Gibson said, “You should always go with a good group of friends.”
Many other women shared similar “creeper” stories and several people said you should only go after having a few strong drinks. Consensus was that Gruv is more fun in a group and is not a repeat sort of place. On the positive side, the drinks are cheap on Thursday, the music is improving and the bathrooms are very clean for a club.
In addition, if you are looking for some food to soak up the alcohol, they have everything fried under the sun. This includes chicken fried bacon, which I have yet to fully understand.
And apparently the manager, Calvin Murphy, is a long time Tacoma DJ, so perhaps the non-club-appropriate choice of Wonderwall was a one time thing at the beginning. But now that KUPS is involved, the music is sure to improve.
The club also has some great bones: good lighting, comfy chairs, no wait at the bar, the floors aren’t sticky and there’s no broken glass on the dance floor.
So while there may be some interesting encounters, if you’re with a good group of friends, it might be a venue to check out, as they appear to be working out some of the initial kinks.