Wave (Waikiki Hawaii Club/1980-2006)

The Wave – Waikiki Tank

If you partied in Honolulu anytime between the 1980s and the early 2000s, chances are you ended up at The Wave — Waikiki’s legendary late-night dance club where surfers, drag queens, military boys, club kids, locals, tourists, and insomniacs all collided in a neon-soaked fever dream. With its cavernous dance floor, pounding music, and blissfully anything-goes energy, The Wave became one of those rare places where every kind of nightlife tribe showed up and somehow made perfect sense together.

Though not officially a gay bar, The Wave was absolutely part of Honolulu’s queer nightlife ecosystem — the kind of place where you could dance until sunrise, flirt with half the room, and discover that island nights have a way of loosening every inhibition. For decades, it stood as a cultural equalizer: glamorous, gritty, inclusive, and uniquely Hawaiian in its blend of chaos and charm.

By the time it closed in 2006, The Wave had already earned its status as a Waikiki legend — a club that shaped generations of late-night stories and helped define Honolulu’s modern dance culture.