An unassuming tourist type at an unassuming football bar tells me this: "New York restaurants are crazy! There's a club in every basement!" I nod my head. He means RdV, the bass-thumping club below Bagatelle. "No," says the unassuming tourist, "We were in some East Village pizza restaurant or something!" Jesus, it can be tough keeping up with the NYC Jones. There seems to be tons of hidden gems that try to stay away from the people like me who can write about them, Twitter about them, Facebook about them, and ultimately ruin them. Some things are worth keeping a secret, but when the party is in the basement of Coffee Shop or some media lunch spot that regularly gets off on decent press, it's easy to broadcast. Some other things will remain a mystery, until I can fully understand if it's an actual basement party or simply a couple of bus boys getting high between shifts.

As the holidays near, it's fun to roll the dice on what former hotspot will have a revival, or what invitees may finally get a glimpse of the most exclusive space by way of special event invitation. This week alone the The Bowery Hotel had a major resurgence, proving it's a party player by hosting the annual Humane Society’s Cool vs. Cruel benefit, back-to-back with tonight's Art Rocks! event. Same with the six-thousand-foot "local hang'" -- The Ainsworth -- which was ground zero for Stylecaster's Short Films Premiere Party. Sienna and Savannah Miller hosted a dinner to celebrate their spring 2010 collection at the Royalton (not exactly the downtown scene we'd imagined for them). Party palaces also revive with extreme makeovers' the closed 105 Rivington space -- a splinter off of the Rivington Hotel -- is getting a redux. It will be called CV, and it had a little show-and-tell this past Tuesday. All in all, the holiday times bring a little nightlife cheer in the form of new beginnings at old places, reminding people how awesome some of our nighttime landmarks can be.

Jeff Zalaznick transitioned his career from mergers & acquisitions to breakfast, lunch, and dinner. The editor-in-chief of AlwaysHungryNY.com and founder of DinePrivate.com was once a J.P. Morgan employee before finding his passion and his business partner, famed restaurateur Joe Bastianich. The native New Yorker talks about his newest online accommodation for private dining.

Every field of endeavor has its icons, and nightlife is no different. To be an icon in this world, one has to be successful and stay relevant. After all, you’re only as good as your last party. For every genuine icon, there are swarms of scenesters who occupy the pantheon in their own minds -- putting the “I” and “con” in the word. But it takes a certain amount of swagger to succeed in this business, so they should be forgiven. Besides, they are always the easiest people to shop for around Christmas: any mirror will do. Listed below are my six New York City club icons -- solo artists and teams -- and the up-and-comers with the potential to replace them, if only their predecessors would move to India (or somewhere even more remote, like Brooklyn).

Once again, the landscape of nightlife is a'changing. Sometimes, you have to stir up the water to catch a few fish, which is exactly what happened to us. East Village Monday-night favorite Le Souk lost its liquor license, forcing patrons to take their business to Le Souk Harem, but it's the neighborhood that's the real loser. Wandering aimlessly in search of something new and good on Sunday night, we found a new party at White Slab Palace. Places we'd long since wrote off somehow hit the spot if not filled the void. An object lesson on wandering outside your comfort zone.

Being a partier used to be as simple as throwing on a clean tee and getting out the door. Now, it's work. The Jane was once our last great hope; it's now all but shuttered. Just when we feel we've found our new home, a place where -- if not everyone knows our name, at least they know our label -- it loses its license, lease, or cool. If we were lazy, we'd advise you to try the Boom Boom Room every single night of the week, but if on top of the world isn't really your scene, here's what's been moving and shaking amongst the movers and shakers this week. We'll be trying them out one by one, consumed with the determination to find our Beatrice Inn incarnate.

In his Panopticon writings from 1787, philosopher Jeremy Bentham described a prison with a column serving as an all-seeing eye at its center. Inmates lived in constant fear, aware of the possibility that they were being watched at all times—that, as George Orwell wrote of Big Brother in his prescient 1984, “Every sound… was overheard and except in darkness, every moment scrutinized.”

The Boom Boom Room, the hipster aerie on top of the newish Standard Hotel is the talk of the town as Fashion Week comes to a close. What happens to the space after this week when the Fashion Flock flutter away is subject to much rumor and speculation. The story that I kept hearing was a collaboration between man about town (but currently in Rome) Paul Sevigny and Rose Bar pharaoh Nur Khan. I repeated the rumor in a throw-out-the-line-see-what-fish-I-would-catch gambit in a post a couple days ago. Nur and I finally talked and he told me "Paul and I are flattered, and this is news to us. We've been discussing a project together, yet I'm focused on Rose Bar." Paul, of course, is killing it over at Avenue with his Tuesday night there a smash success. He's even blowing up the Thursday there as well. Yet, the story still makes sense. I absolutely believe Nur, but if not him, who? The question is whether an operator is needed at all, or will a good doorperson, well trained staff, and a beautiful room with views for miles and miles and miles be enough to drive the place and therefore the hotel.

Talk is cheap, but keeping a nightclub operating is expensive. Rumors around town have spoke of the imminent demise of Meatpacking District newbie Griffin barely three months after opening. I'm not a fan of the place and have said so more than a few times. However, as much as I would like the place to sail into the sunrise, I am unfortunately attached to it. Griffin was designed by Lewis & Dizon, and I'm the Lewis guy. My partner Marc Dizon is the strong, silent type and did a great job of making the old PM space seem like a brand new bag. I stayed far away, contributing from our office and an infrequent visit. My presence on the property was limited due to my allergies -- I'm allergic to assholes and liars -- so I elected to keep my distance while Marc did the heavy lifting. Now the nightlife blogs are predicting death by grifting and incompetence, and I wanted to find out what's up.

Just heard a very realistic rumor that East Village hipster standby The Annex has been sold and will become, of all things, a sports bar. In honor of the decline of yet another club kid landmark, the infamous electro-nu-rave Ruff Club party will be throwing a final hurrah for the sweat den it made popular on September 11, bringing out some underground all-stars: the Misshapes, Spencer Product, and the Ruff Kids. Another fond farewell to a Friday night hotspot that many called home.