CLUB REVIEW : The Maxx Becomes a Junkie-Palooza

Club Junkie, the Tuesday night metamorphosis of Hollywood’s Maxx club, looks every inch the backdrop to a Nine Inch Nails video--a banned Nine Inch Nails video.

The atmosphere is mini-”Lollapalooza,” complete with impromptu body-piercing on the patio, and tattoo sessions and S&M; revues in the main room. This week’s scene included some teasing bullwhip spanking at 10 p.m. and a midnight performance by Idol Hands, a punk-cum-grunge band whose lead singer punctuates his howls by periodically dropping his leather drawers--yes, totally.

Club Junkie, whose name is meant to refer to those L.A. scenesters who can’t get enough of after-hours fun, successfully aims its music selection toward the alternative-at-heart crowd by playing nearly all post-modern Angst tracks.

The deejay, a recent Chicago transplant named Big Dad Dennis, spins the likes of Nine Inch Nails, Rage Against the Machine and Front 242. Periodically, he loosens up the lineup with a little old-school Eurythmics, but his decision to mainly keep the music as current as possible is in sync with the club’s “Blade Runner”-like atmosphere, which often appears so modern you feel as if you’ve already stepped into the future.

* Club Junkie, 6423 Yucca at Cahuenga, (213) 368-8820; $5 cover charge, women free before 10 p.m. Parking available on the corner of Yucca and Cahuenga.