Nightclub

A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighting displays, and a stage for live music or a disc jockey (DJ) who mixes recorded music. Nightclubs tend to be smaller than live music venues like theatres and stadiums, with few or no seats for customers.

Nightclubs generally restrict access to people in terms of age, attire, personal belongings, and behaviors. Nightclubs typically have dress codes to prohibit people wearing informal, indecent, offensive, gym, or gang-related attire from entering. Unlike other entertainment venues, nightclubs are more likely to use bouncers to screen prospective patrons for entry.

The busiest nights for a nightclub are Friday and Saturday nights. Most nightclubs cater to a particular music genre or sound for branding effects. Some nightclubs may offer food and beverages (including alcoholic beverages).

In some countries, nightclubs are also referred to as "discos" or "discothèques" (German: Disko or Diskothek, outdated; nowadays: Club); French: discothèque; Italian, Portuguese, and Spanish: discoteca, antro (common in Mexico), and boliche (common in Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay), discos is commonly used in all others in Latin America). In Japanese ディスコ, disuko refers to an older, smaller, less fashionable venue; while クラブ, kurabu refers to a more recent, larger, more popular venue. The term night is used to refer to an evening focusing on a specific genre, such as "retro music night" or a "singles night". In Hong Kong and China, nightclub is used as a euphemism for a hostess club, and the association of the term with the sex trade has driven out the regular usage of the term.^{[citation needed]}

In the United States, New York increasingly became the national capital for tourism and entertainment. Grand hotels were built for upscale visitors. New York's theater district gradually moved northward during this half century, from The Bowery up Broadway through Union Square and Madison Square, settling around Times Square at the end of the 19th century. Stars such as Edwin Booth and Lillian Russell were among the early Broadway performers. Prostitutes served a wide variety of clientele, from sailors on leave to playboys.

The first nightclubs appeared in New York City in the 1840s and 1850s, including McGlory's, and the Haymarket. They enjoyed a national reputation for vaudeville, live music, and dance. They tolerated unlicensed liquor, commercial sex, and gambling cards, chiefly Faro. Practically all gambling was illegal in the city (except upscale horseracing tracks), and regular payoffs to political and police leadership was necessary. Prices were high and they were patronized by an upscale audience. Timothy Gilfoyle called them "the first nightclubs". By contrast, Owney Geoghegan ran the toughest nightclub in New York from 1880 to 1883. It catered to a downscale clientele and besides the usual illegal liquor, gambling, and prostitution, it featured nightly fistfights and occasional shootings, stabbings, and police raids. Webster Hall is credited as the first modern nightclub, being built in 1886 and starting off as a "social hall", originally functioning as a home for dance and political activism events. Reisenweber's Cafe is credited for introducing jazz and cabaret to New Yorkers.

The jukebox (a coin-operated record-player) was invented by the Pacific Phonograph Company in 1889 by its managers Louis Glass and his partner William S. Arnold. The first was installed at the Palais Royale Saloon, San Francisco on November 23, 1889, becoming an overnight sensation.

The advent of the jukebox fueled the Prohibition-era boom in underground illegal speakeasy bars, which needed music but could not afford a live band and needed precious space for paying customers. Webster Hall stayed open, with rumors circulating of Al Capone's involvement and police bribery.