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It depends - I would say none are particularly noteworthy, but Dallas is probably the most comprehensive and diverse, with Houston being a bit more "laid back" but still quite comprehensive. They have a bit of a sense of place, however faint - especially Houston.
Phoenix (and the much ballyhooed Scottsdale) is more of a $2 corona and jaeger-shot town - sort of a Casablanca refuge for the transients from the Midwest, the people who gave up on SoCal, and the people who want Vegas without the Vegas. At the expense of sounding snobby, you would be hard pressed to find any place there where intelligent people might congregate to have a few low-key drinks and converse - eventually body shots, beer-ritas and cougars will crush the scene. It is a tale as old as time, or in Phoenix's case, at least 15 years old.
Hmm... depends on your scene I guess. I've always heard that nightlife in Phoenix is extremely spread out if you want to bar hop. Houston and Dallas have good nightlife in a different sense. Dallas does the upscale nightlife scene very well, but has some fun quirky bars too. Houston has a fun laid back vibe and bars are a little more sprinkled around rather than being in concentrated districts.
Having partied in all three, I would say the following:
Dallas has the best clubs of the three as well as the best gay nightlife.
Houston has the best and most quirky bars and has a very unique atmosphere.
To be honest, I didn't care for the nightlife in Phoenix nor Scottsdale and found it pretty uninteresting. I wouldn't say it's boring, just nothing stood out to me in the nightlife of the Phoenix area.
If I had to pick one, I would pick Dallas because I'm more of a club person and i like the music played at the Dallas clubs best. But I can see a good case for Houston too.
I've never been to Phoenix. I've had a great time going out in Dallas every time I go there and I live in Houston and never have a problem finding places to go to for a night of fun. The only thing that kills Houston's nightlife for me is the lack of good public transportation. It sucks going out for drinks and only being able to have one or two drinks because you have to drive back home. I'm sure Dallas and Phoenix are the same way. Dallas is a little further ahead of Houston with public transportation but no where near where they need to be. Public transportation is crucial when it comes to having a good nightlife.
I've never been to Phoenix. I've had a great time going out in Dallas every time I go there and I live in Houston and never have a problem finding places to go to for a night of fun. The only thing that kills Houston's nightlife for me is the lack of good public transportation. It sucks going out for drinks and only being able to have one or two drinks because you have to drive back home. I'm sure Dallas and Phoenix are the same way. Dallas is a little further ahead of Houston with public transportation but no where near where they need to be. Public transportation is crucial when it comes to having a good nightlife.
In Dallas, I don't think public transportation plays a big part. The only nightlife areas that are served by rail is either the upper end of Uptown, Deep Ellum or the Downtown area near the bars/clubs in the Main Street district. With that said, it doesn't seem like many people here take rail to go to the bars like i've seen in the Northern big cities. Dallas concentrates a lot of it's nightlife scene to specific areas that really helps keep things walkable or a short cab ride home. I will say when I was out in Houston in the Montrose area, we went to JR's we had to have the bar call a cab for us, we waited a short while, the cab showed up and we left. In Dallas, you can walk out and there's a row of cabs waiting, you just hop in and go. I guess having more venues in close proximity helps aid this as it would create a more lucrative environment with cab companies as it creates a steady stream of business. I just walk to the bars that I go to for the most part though. They are 1.5 blocks from where I live.
Never had to call cabs in that area. Never even had to wait.
I had lots of fun in phoenix but it wasn't multi dimentional as the other two.
Houston seemed to me the most diverse in terms of caribbean, Asian, South western etc offerings
I don't find the houston scene to be spread out at all. When downtown is the spot, they are all in a small area, when richmond was the spot, same, montrose is the same, washington ave is the same.
R1070 if the nightlife is around uptown it is beneficial to you but what about the 95% of other residents who do not live around downtown?
I think the two of us get very different perspective visiting each others cities. I live about a mile from downtown to I am really near everything, but when i visit dfw, i am never near uptown so nothing send close to me.
Same with you, when you visited you said you stayed in katy instead of near midtown so your experience was that everything was far. I guess its just perspective from where you stay.
In phoenix i stayed near downtown, in tempe and in scotsdale. Although the areas were not that larger they seemed hard to navigate. Especially tempe. Found cool hole in the walls but they were kind of hard to find.
I wouldn't be able to give any advice for a 30-year-old nowadays, but I've clubbed in all of these cities during different times and although I still have friends in all of these cities, they really do not frequent the clubs like when we were younger:
I loved Dallas during the mid-80's and spent some time at the legendary Starck Club (I was young) and in the early 90's at places like (then) Village Station. Dallas always seemed to have a pretty great club scene.
Although I missed the days of the original Club 6400 in Houston, I did spend quite some time in Houston during the late early 90's at places like Numbers, Xcess, Power Tools, and Avalon, but also places like Rich's and JR's. I had a great time partying there.
After moving to AZ in late '92, I spent some time frequenting The Works in Scottsdale which played some great music thanks to 7-year resident DJ Markus Schultz who spent much of his 90's in the Phoenix area. Phoenix has a different type of nightlife scene as the nightlife is split up into different parts of the metro with many of the higher-end clubs located in Old Town Scottsdale, the university crowd hanging also in Tempe (Mill Ave.), and a combo of things in downtown Phoenix. Scottsdale has had some fine clubs throughout the years, but I don't frequent there as much anymore. With downtown Phoenix continuing to grow (it has needed to), more and more people are taking notice and new venues are opening downtown. The gay bars/clubs (there are many) are primarily located in and around downtown and midtown Phoenix.
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