Broadsheet

um...
Cross Street Market, Federal Hill
The Wharf Rat, Fells Point (many many good dives in that hood)
Does the Hon Bar qualify as a dive?

 

God that sounds like such a great way to spend a Friday night!! Why didn't you tell about your dive bar thing before? We could've saved ££'s; mind you we wouldn't have seen Tom Ford in the flesh either, so I guess it balances out>

C

 

My friend's house kind of looked like a dive bar by the time everyone left last night... also, there is nothing funnier than drunk people trying to present a recognizable charade of "Drew Barrymore".

 

Zenchick's question (please pardon lack o' link; I really need to be working on an overdue freelance article rather than writing this) perhaps suggest the need for a DB typology. Some first attempts:

DBWBs (Dive Bar Wanna Bes): I think the Fells Point Wharf Rat qualifies well here. I mean, I like the place, but can a place that pushes its own beer be a real dive?

DBXovers (Dive Bar Crossovers): Broadsheet Broad's loving portrait notwithstanding, Racer's DOES host Baltimore's annual Real Ale Festival; at the least it "goes both ways." Other loyalists here include the Mojo (ne' Cafe Tattoo), Peter's on Ann, and -- at least for a few moments yet -- Dizzie Izzie's in Greater Remington. Then there's stalwart Jilly's on Reisterstown Road.

No, Really: the key element of a true dive bar is that it is a place wherein you are concerned for your own safety. I've felt that way at Zissimo's in Hampden, several roadhouses on Hwy 1, and would tend to expect to feel that way in any number of places on Holabird or Broening Hwy. And the interesting part is that being in a crowd in these places only increases one's exposure. Any pair of folks can slum it now and then, but woe to the yupsters who are seen to be self-consciously descending on the hardest bar in Arbutus or Dundalk.

Whatever the hairsplitting, though, a tradition is indeed born. Eventually, incorporation of a roulette wheel to choose the destination may well be in order.

Gotta run but, as an unrelated aside, to any who care, there currently appear to be available singles at CYard for Opening Day. I have a new staff person starting that day so, sadly, can't make it. But if you want to, and can, surf thee promptly to demOs.com (urm, whatever) and procure thee some.

Final futile threadless note: Go Cyclones! At least don't embarass yourselves against the 'Heels. Please.

 

Hmmmm - City Paper's Dive Bar category lists these 12 spots. I agree with Mt. Royal Tavern, but not sure about Charles Village Pub? Racer's gets a Dive Bar nod. How would you classify Midtown Yacht Club?

 

In light of you most recent post, perhaps the best way I can put it is this:

REAL dive bars have a client base that consists more of characters out of Tom Waits songs than listeners to Tom Waits songs (and by the way, just for the record, at least of late, there is in fact no donut shop at 9th and Hennepin -- I checked a few years back -- no, really).

Fake dive bars, of which CVP is CERTAINLY one, are not disreputable, and should certainly be on the DBF radarscreen moving forward.

The Rendezvous, on 25th, is perhaps reverting from Fake Dive Bar to Real Dive Bar, given the cogniscenti's migration to The Ottobar and Dizzie Izzie's. The Yacht Club is at most a fake dive and probably not even that, though I've spent and will continue to spend many happy hours there. Want a bar downtown where you can actually meet Tom Waits characters? Try Burke's. Or skip the bar aspect and check out the little diner/cafe that ISN'T Werner's between Redwood and Lombard on Guilford.

As we raise this child called DBF, we need to be realistic about beer selection. Real dives are likely to top out at Yuengling at best, and probably even that's pushing the poseur envelope. Luckily, despite my geeking, I have an ongoing respect for good old Bud.

But again, and in closing, the dives we'll probably find the most interesting are the places no one can name who lives more than half a mile away from them. I'm intrigued personally by the deep SE -- I want to find the last bar on North Point Road, for instance. And maybe Essex, before it goes the way of Canton. . . .

 

Boy that grammatical belly flop in the last paragraph was ugly. My sincere apologies.

Apropos of nothing, imaginary riches to the first commenter who can convincingly rhyme "yeoman" and "Boh man" in a relevant couplet.

 

Last note, for now, on this thread.

My Wharf Rat quibble aside, I'll gladly grant that there are plenty of dives around Fells Point, by any definition. I wouldn't rate Leadbetter's as such, but I would nominate many of the Broadway establishments that I can't remember the name of. And then there's the Off Broadway "Bar."

And I'd like to put in a good word for a place that a) does have good beer and b) has all the marks from the outside of a fake dive but nonetheless manages to collect real characters like a honeydew collects flies: The Cat's Eye. Never have I entered and not had an amazing conversation with someone I'd never met.

 

EXCELLENT suggestion, Rach -- and precisely in the spirit, at least by my narrow description.

Isn't there also a place in that same general 'hood (maybe on Bel Air, but I think on Harford) called "The European Union," just up from Lake Montebello. Brussels-on-Herring-Run, as it were. That too has always seemed promising.