The bar: Sophie's 6th and Avenues A and B
The Scene: A good crowd of gritty escapists, who wouldn't be seen anywhere but the East Village's authentic longstanding Dives. I've heard locals of the area call it "a place they grew-up with, which makes sense as it is cheap, hip and notoriously relaxed on carding minors. A good place to see a really drunk person, if that sort of thing entertains you. The bartenders are generally tall and well-tattooed. The people are friendly and the atmosphere is open, but cliques formed within can be seemingly judgmental.
The Space: Dark, curiously smoky (despite being technically non-smoking), the bathrooms are the only extension to the open room, with enough room for a tables, the bar and a pool table. The bathrooms have great user-edited graffiti knife-fights. Neither the space nor the vibes seem to invite dancing, but during the right song someone will make-do.
The Juke: An old, beat-up, slightly-sticky 100 album, with plenty of bartender mixes and somewhat local music. Seems to a have a good mix of "bar-rock" with leanings towards the louder and edgier. Positioned awkwardly near the pool table, but with enough room to deliberate without getting jabbed in the kidneys.
The song: Radiohead "Creep." Creep launched "the biggest rock-band in the world's" career with a post-grunge whine-fest that still influences rock's landscapes thematically, but draws off the the early-nineties aesthetic musically. The selection seems way to cliche and mainstream for the bar, so they P-button may be lying (this does seem like the kind of place where a bar-tender would frustratedly unplug the box). However, there are some valid reason's why "Creep" might have made it honestly. It is a great depressed, loner, bar song (and there are no-shortage of them here), the chorus: "I'm a creep. I'm a weirdo. What the hell am I doing here?" resonates with this set; as a frequent member, I would know. The sing-a-long-ability also makes it a good replay option. The fabled predilection for under-age girl patrons makes a humorous implication. The pre-chorus: "I thought I was special, so fucking special," isn't taken as ironically here, as you'd think, people here do seem to think they're a little special.
The Bar: Cherry Tavern. Between 1st and Avenue A on 6th St.
The Scene: A mix of Hispanic billiard sharks and the younger set looking for a cheap drink. A genuinely hip feel, not too crowded unless it's a weekend, drinks are reasonable and the bartenders are generally pretty friendly. Got a strange feeling of deja vu after coming from Sophie's, but The Cherry isn't quite as run-down and hence not as cool. It does have better drink specials though.
The Space: A smaller bar, that fills the small room. The back has just enough room for the pool table. The bathrooms are well graffitti-ed and are just big enough to make-out in, in a pinch.
The Juke: Prominently featured right across from the bar, the juke was playing even though it was "Ipod night" (a troubling new trend in many bars with good jukes). It was well audible from the bar, but at the booths the clatter of the pool table, and the robust resonances of a small concrete room make for a less pleasant listening experience. Well stocked with eclectic, but not very unique selections.
The Song: NWA's "Straight Outta Compton" was a pioneering hip-hop hit introducing the world to two who would become some of the industries biggest players in a "Hey, Hey were the Monkees" sort of way. The first track on the bands seminal album of the same name it is one of old school hip-hops essential tracks, but this is no old school hip-hop bar. In fact I don't recall ever seeing any one in hip hop gear here, African-American or otherwise. I was so confused by the selection that I asked the bartender if he could shed some light and he was just as incredulous. When I told him about my experiment, he ponied up 2 bucks to put on the top five selections (even proving that turning it off doesn't effect the memory, by giving me a quick demo) Beastie Boys, Radiohead, and Nirvana were among the other selections, which made more sense. The bartender was baffled by the absense of the Talking Head's live version of Psycho Killer (from "Stop Making Sense"), which apparently gets played "every night." The song still felt wildly inappropriate in the setting, the energy was too high, but the tough guy pretensions seemed to resonate well off of the pool table.
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