Earlybirds Club Is Bringing Its 6-10 PM Dance Parties To Venues Across The US

The Earlybirds Club’ slogan says it all: “A dance party for ladies who have sh*t to do in the morning.” The concept is simple – a chance for women to get together and dance to their favorite tunes, yet still get home early enough to get a decent night’s sleep – but has made a huge impact, as Earlybird Club events have expanded from a bar in Chicago to 1,000-capacity venues across the U.S.

Noting that live music has been a big part of her life since she was young, with formative concerts including the Jackson 5 in 1984, New Order and The Cure in 1990, and the first Lollapalooza in 1991, co-founder Laura Baginski tells Pollstar that a Jessie Ware show in 2023 party inspired the launch of Earlybirds.

“The joy I felt dancing with a throng of people to incredible music was something I really missed during the pandemic. It sparked a fire in me to experience that communal catharsis on a regular basis, but at a much earlier hour! At my age (49), I need seven to eight hours of sleep to be a functioning human the next day,” Baginski says.

Baginski and co-founder Susie Lee, who have been friends since high school, teamed up to launch the first edition of Earlybirds Club in February 2024 in the backroom of The Burlington bar in Chicago. The event (and many subsequent events) featured Lee’s cousin, DJ Helean, as the DJ for the night. To get the word out, Baginski and Lee simply emailed the ticket link to their friends, who “sent it to their friends, and so on until it sold out!”

Asked if that first event lived up to her expectations, Baginski says: “It was the dance party I dreamed about going to growing up in the Chicago suburbs, where there was nothing like that available to me as a teenager. The atmosphere was supportive and joyful – no judgements, just leaving it all out on the dance floor. Turns out many others were craving the experience of moving our bodies to nostalgic music, combined with getting home at a reasonable hour, so you can tackle your to-do list the next day. It’s so freeing to be older and truly give zero Fs about what you look like while you’re dancing. You have complete permission to be ridiculous and scream-sing the lyrics and forget about the heavy things happening in the outside world.”

Three months later, the capacity for Earlybirds Club doubled in size with a May 4, 2024, event at the 200-capacity Color Club, and by November, the concept expanded to New York with an event at the Parkside Lounge on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Baginski says, “It was the first test of whether the concept would work outside of Chicago. And it definitely did!”

As demand for Earlybirds Club events across the country continued to grow, Baginski notes there was no way she could continue booking small venues on her own. She explains that it was incredibly time-consuming to figure out which markets were right for Earlybirds, “research venues in other cities and email the talent buyers over and over (and over!) without getting a response.”

By early March 2025, Earlybirds had enlisted the help of Paladin Artists agent Jaime Kelsall.

“It was time to call in the big guns to support our growth, and Jaime is definitely that. Because of Jaime, we are booked in bigger rooms with better deals than I could have negotiated on my own. Our calendar is filled with dates in cities like Austin, San Diego, Boston and D.C. She has been instrumental in our ability to achieve all of this in just 16 months,” Baginski says.

Last month, Earlybirds Club hosted its biggest hometown show yet with a June 13 event at the 1,100-capacity Park West in Chicago.

“We are now going into 500-cap rooms in various markets across the country, and those are selling out months in advance,” Kelsall says. “And in going back to those markets the next time around, we’re now looking at 1,000-cap clubs. The demand is there to step into larger rooms, and it’s also extremely evident how many cities we need to get to to provide for these women who are just so hungry for an event like this. I mean, it’s really endless. So while the demand is there, we’re going to do our best to get there.”

Kelsall emphasizes that beyond the early-evening hours, a big appeal of Earlybirds Club is the vibe that co-founders Baginski and Lee have been able to create. Women of all ages are welcome, with a majority of attendees aged in their 30s to 50s.

“It’s a safe, fun, nonjudgmental space where you can just let loose and let your worries go for four hours … And well deserved. Women are badasses and they deserve a great night out every once in a while with their friends,” Kelsall says.

Kelsall notes that the playlists often center around music from the ’80s, ’90s and 2000s – “the stuff that I listened to (laughs) when I was in college actually going out to 1 a.m. parties.”

In adding new markets, Kelsall says Earlybirds is basing that on demand online from people who have signed on to the website and said, “Hey, I live in XYZ. Please book a date here.”

Though DJ Helean initially played all of the dates, as Earlybirds continues to expand, the team is sticking to its solely Friday and Saturday bookings but doubling the markets on the same day and hiring DJs in different cities. Kelsall adds, “The game plan moving forward is to be able to identify DJs in each market that can participate whenever we come through town.”

Upcoming events are booked through December, including shows in markets such as the Bay Area, Denver, Seattle, Chicago, D.C., Philadelphia, San Diego, Jersey City, Brooklyn, Los Angeles, Austin, Boston and Phoenix.

“We are constantly announcing events in new cities and return dates in cities where we’ve already had successful parties. We plan to have a regular presence (at least quarterly) in every city we can, run by local ambassadors who are trained to deliver our mission and successful formula with a roster of local DJs. And, of course, many dates in our hometown of Chicago,” Baginski says.

She adds, “We will never cede too much control of how our parties are run, though. It’s essential to maintain the inclusive, loving, supportive vibe and to donate 10% of ticket proceeds of every event to different local charities that uplift women. We see Earlybirds Club as more than a dance party: It’s a reclamation of what it means to be middle-aged. It’s allowing yourself time to feel free and uninhibited when your life (and the world) can seem overwhelming. It’s giving back to the community and doing as much good as you can.”