Chicago Nightclub Blocks Patrons in for Half an Hour While Celebrity Ashlee Simpson is Interviewed

The night started off well enough. I had been told media check-in was at 8:30pm and I arrived right on time. The bouncer confirmed my name on the list and I headed into the bowels of the club. My guest, Marq Withers of Disonic, arrived shortly after, dropped my name at the door, and was ushered inside.

We were at the Rockit Ranch Winter VIP Party with a private performance by Ashlee Simpson at The Underground. I had received a personal heads-up from my contact at Rockit, and also a media "Invitation to Cover" and was looking forward to talking with her. She loves Chicago and dates Fall Out Boy's Pete Wentz, a Chicago boy, and I wanted to get her take on the city and her favorite spots. Josh Kelley's appearance a few weeks before at Rockit Bar & Grill had been hosted by the same company and my quick chat with him had gone so well the opportunity to have another nationally recognized artist extol the virtues of this city was exciting. Unfortunately, it didn't turn out that way.

Marq and I talked while I waited for instructions. And waited. And waited. The room began to fill up and Alpana Singh walked by us. He's an enormous fan of the Master Sommelier, so he introduced himself. That was to be his saving grace for the whole fiasco.

We kept waiting. I approached a person also wearing a media badge and he told me we were supposed to wait by the stairs. So we waited. And waited. I confirmed with another media wrangler where I was supposed to be and she pointed me up the stairs to the raised section by the stage and said that's where Ashlee would be and I could wait there. So we moved. And waited.

People kept piling into the club and we were jostled and pushed and shoved. I was almost thrown off balance a few times by enormous purses large enough to hide a Volkswagen. The cocktail servers were polite. The bouncers, in their mock-commando attire, were aggressive. The poor guys sweeping up were just trying to do their jobs in a place where they were deemed nearly invisible by the moneyed clientèle, but they still had to maneuver in the over-capacity crowd.