Yesterday I asked the concierge at my Hotel & Spa where the best bar bar was in town. You know, a bar bar. A dark, most-likely long and skinny bar with a long bar down one side to which a gentleman can belly up and order a cold one (not Fat Tire). He told me of a couple places on Pearl Street which is the lame, over-touristed pedestrian mall with new brick buildings built to look old. I skeptically examined his two recommended joints last night and was quite disappointed. Even after examining the part of town near the university, I was still disappointed.
So I trucked D around town to bar after bar, decreeing each below my standards. What standards, you ask?
Quality Bar Standards
- Be dimly lit
- Primarily a bar, not a restaurant
- Have quality music (i.e. stuff I like like Yo La Tengo & Whiskeytown)
- Have an actual bar to which a gentleman can belly up
- No string of branded major-label beer flags
- Not a chain
- Good, decent folks
So last night after dinner I was scoping out the town knowing that D and I would be looking for a quality establishment tonight. The one place that looked as if it has potential was called The Attic. It was an upstairs establishment and fit many of the above criteria: dimly lit, no beer flags, actual bar. But for the other two I was unpleased. Reggae music piped from the speakers and hippie trustafarian Boulder types hung out.
Tonight I reserved it as a last option, and then needed to pull it out. We got skunked at a number of joints, none of which D understood for he does not share my scruples for such things. We popped in The Attic only as a last resort, and when I heard The Verve wafting down the stairs my hopes rose. As we sat down I noticed that last night's trustafarians were replaced by regular folksy folk, and there was decent art on the walls (no beer flags). A hit! As we ordered a round of Left Hand Sawtooth beers and Yo La Tengo's "Tom Courtenay" began playing, I knew this was the place. Our waitress was cute, too.
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