A clean slate, a fresh start—it’s what we all needed.  And that’s the genius of GENESIS—the first circuit party of the new year.  After all, “genesis” means “birth”—and after 2008, a year bittersweet at best, we needed rebirthing.  Out with the tired and weary—in with the shiny and new.  So let’s get this year started right—and where else but Genesis?  Simply put, Genesis is a party on the lip of legendary—born on a sandbar that knows legendary parties.

This year’s edition, Genesis VI, took place at Mansion (formerly Level, 1235, and Paragon—see above note about ‘legendary parties’)—and right from the get-go, you knew you were living right.  A resplendent Michael Stanley was doing host duty in the Main Lobby, creating a meet-n-greet cocktail affair as the boyz air-kissed and schmoozed.  All day, the Beach had been buzzing; Genesis tix were selling like crazy.  The boyz were back, after Christmas with the ‘rents and the in-laws; our circuit family was home again.

Mansion has that Miami glam style: Vegas excess tossed with Italian rococo, resulting in an amalgam of Roman arches and tropical foliage, chandeliers and pole dancers, video scrims and swags of sheers.  It’s our version of Hefner—the Circuit Boy Mansion, with boy bunnies bouncing up and down the multiple staircases. 

At eleven a.m., our Mansion was packed—from the back of the house all the way across the massive floor right up to the lip of the stage where the ever-ebullient Tracy Young reigned.  As she (and Lea Lorien) had it, “Do you feel you're in a dream?/Is it real or hardly what it seems?”  Amen to that—or as one Lancaster, Pa. boy put it, “If this is life, it ain’t so bad.”  Amen to that, too.

For no matter what you thought about the past year, you still had to marvel that we were all here at Genesis VI.  Or as one holiday song has it, “Counting my blessings”—and weren’t we lucky?  There we were, partying on the Beach—while parties in New York got shut down. The joy of Genesis VI was that the whole affair appeared almost effortless—even as you were cognizant of all the hard work behind the scenes: the sound checks and the tech rehearsals, the prep work and the myriad details—all those hours put in just so that we could make merry and gay.

And there was Flavio Nisti as VIP host, working a sequined GENESIS tee as well as—gagging!—black Louis Vuitton motorcycle boots—and presiding with his effortless charm over a gaggle of Tracy devotées, including Mark Nelson, Ric Sena, Hilton and Mel, Dale Stine, Billy and Luis, Victor and Shane, Doug and Josh, and Dora. 

And amidst all the VIP mayhem, there she was, Tracy, the cynosure at the center, as buoyant as she was focused, searching for just the right beat.  Whipping through pages of CDs, she’s gonna find what’s she looking for, the song she knows is gonna send the boyz over—into collective ecstasy.  And she does!  And the party KICKS!  From “Free My Love” and “Someone to Hold” and “Make My World Go Round” and “Counting Down the Days” to J.Hud’s “Spotlight,” Madge’s “Miles Away,” and Starkillers’ “Diskoteka,” the woman WORKED!  She made the beat go BOOM, papi!

Even the most jaded friend of ours, someone usually loath to admit awe, was heard to exclaim, “Such an intense party, MY GOD!”  Yes, there was no doubt: Mansion for Genesis VI was Tracy’s house.  “Welcome to my house—bang, bang.”  Illuminated by lasers, pole dancers writhed beneath crystal chandeliers, singing “Let me lift you up…Let me lift you up…  All I know is that I want more.” 

More, more, more.  There was so much going on, the gayz broke the ATM.  No more money in the house.  But who needed money, when you had music?  For as Celeda put it when she hit the stage, “Music is the answer.”  The underground circuit legend ran through her hits, from “The Underground” right through to “Amazing” and “Dirtyfilthy,” and as she sang “I feel it comin… I feel it comin…” there was no question she spoke the truth.

Talk about edging!  We were all on the verge—which was just where Tracy wanted us.  “Burning, I feel something burning…” Fixed on our pleasure, she kept her focus, keeping us on our feet as we worked it out all over the floor and up in the mezzanines and all along the staircases.  The Mansion was on fire!  And Ceevox was singing, “The deserts can turn into oceans, baby.  Whenever you want me, I’ll be there.  Cause I believe in we.  I still believe in we.”  Because here’s the thing: given the obstacles we face, as a community, as individuals, we gotta hang together, stay strong together.  We’re a community that loves music and dancing; we’re not fighting or killing.  We’re living to love. 

And on New Year’s Day at Genesis VI, Tracy Young insured that we all still believe in we.  She made believers of us all.  She kept us deep in the music all through the first day of 2009—birthing us anew and sending us back out into the world, reinvigorated and ready to face the challenges of a new year.