While the UAE’s spa scene never ceases to throw up weird and wonderful treatments, the actual premises that host them are a rather more staid medium. The design language rarely significantly deviates from pastel shades and water features, soundtracked by new-age music. Sure, there are variations in treatment-room shapes and sizes, and occasionally you’ll get a high-rise view into the bargain, but the basic building blocks can begin to blend into one for the regularly pampered.
That’s seemingly something that the gents-only Jazz Lounge Spa – located on Umm Suqeim Road, about 10 minutes’ drive from Mall of the Emirates – is attempting to address, with an altogether funkier take on the surrounds for a massage. A floor mural of piano keys and walls full of framed photos of a plethora of musicians throughout the ages decorate the corridor from the reception area to the treatment rooms, with colourful guitars propped up at various junctures. The theme was continued in my treatment room, albeit in a subtler fashion, with trumpets suspended from the ceiling, glinting in the soft light. It’s a bit like going to the Hard Rock Cafe for a rub-down.
I selected the nicely themed Jazz Quartet Massage. Despite that name perhaps suggesting a four-handed treatment, it was actually a four-in-one experience that combined acupressure-point stimulation, stroking techniques, hot “trigger” stones and a hot compress. Rejuvenating tense muscles and nerves is the stated aim, which I can report was largely successful.
As is nearly always the case in such circumstances, my diminutive Balinese therapist belied her stature with her ability to apply significant strength where required – I asked for medium-hard pressure, and things might have become a tad uncomfortable had I requested anything more stimulating.
After an opening foot ritual, I was face down and being prodded all over with a combination of hot stones (“hot” at times gave way to volcanic-lava levels of temperature, particularly on tender extremities such as the soles of my feet) and similarly warmed-up gauze compress bags. The heat served to ease aching joints, however, and a clever combination of lavender-oil-based hand strokes between the hot elements of the treatment kept me from completely burning up.
It’s not a complaint you’ll often hear, but at 90 minutes, the massage almost felt overly lengthy. Despite the disparate techniques, there’s perhaps not quite enough variation in sensations, with the dual heated attacks somewhat blending into one after a while. A concluding head massage with the aforementioned scented oil did at least help to erase some of those grumbles.
The Jazz Quartet Massage hit a few off-key notes, then, but as a remedy for boredom at attending anodyne spas, the Jazz Lounge Spa is playing to its strengths.
• A 90-minute Jazz Quartet Massage at Jazz Lounge Spa, Al Barsha, Dubai, costs Dh420. Call 04 345 0036 for bookings
aworkman@thenational.ae
