Austin Social Scene

We wanted to dance on New Years Eve, so we bought tickets to the NYE Gala at Marchesa Theater.
There were two bands that played and they were good, so I have no complaints about that.
Unfortunately, the bar was understaffed, and one bartender had to leave to go bus tables. This meant a trip to the bar for a pair of cocktails resulted in a 15 minute wait, and that is no exaggeration. Instead of dancing with my wife, I was in the crowd, also impatiently waiting for drinks. The bartenders were doing their best, there just were not enough of them, especially when paying premium prices for the cocktails.
The big disappointment for the night was that when Midnight rolled around, I went to the bar in the dance hall and asked to get our champagne.
I was then told that it would be $ 4 per glass, or $ 20 for a bottle, and it was a pretty nondescript champagne at that.
If you charge me $ 120 for two tickets, at least GIVE US FREE CHAMPAGNE at midnight. Every other New Years Eve party I have EVER attended in Austin at least gave you free champagne.
That slight was just enough to keep us from ever attending again.

This review is for their annual New Years Eve party.
First, I want to make sure you know that I did have a wonderful time. I would (and will) go again, however, I did have to subtract some stars and here is why.
My friend and I got a hotel room at the Doubletree (see separate review). My friend arrived first at 3pm. The room was booked in her name. She was told that the room wasn’t ready yet and asked to take a seat. When I arrived at 4pm, she was still waiting. So I joined her in waiting. She kept checking in with the front desk. Our room wasn’t ready until almost 5:30pm!!! Why am I talking about this on the Austin Social Scene review? Well, that’s who caused the problem. Austin Social Scene pre-​assigned the room numbers to each guest. Normally when you book a room at a hotel upon arrival they look at what is available and assign you a room at that time. I do believe the exception to this would be if you have requested to be next to another person’s room.
Why, oh why would they do this? It seems ridiculous for this to be their method. People were arriving an hour after us and going straight to their rooms. The only reason we got into our room when we did is because I went to the front desk to nicely ask why the room wasn’t ready if check out is 12pm. Anyhow, please take note Austin Social Scene.
The other star was subtracted because of one little reason. So the tickets are $ 60 each and it’s cash bar, not open bar. I was really surprised to find out near midnight that it didn’t include a glass of champagne! I had to pay $ 4, which, sure isn’t a lot of money but seriously… that also means it would’ve cost them an additional $ 4 to provide one glass.
Otherwise the party was a lot of fun. There was rarely a wait in line for the bar. We could also go up to our room and have a drink (but not take it down). Bring your own cooler and ice. The ice machine was getting a work out and was empty by the time we got in our room. We stopped by almost all of the after parities. Some were raging and some were tamer with people having drinks and hanging out. So pick your poison until you find one you like. It seemed like most of the guests had gone to this party for several years and knew each other. There were many tables in the main ballroom but we didn’t sit at any of them. They were claimed and people were kind of territorial about them… which I don’t get because who wants to spend the night sitting at their table? The bands were great. I always enjoy Suede and LC Rocks was a lot of fun too. I liked how they rotated by having Suede play a one hour set and then LC Rocks played a one hour set, etc…
So as I stated, I would go again. I hope that they will do a better job managing the rooms next time and consider including one glass of some cheap champagne in the ticket price.