Bar reviewer Kristen Haney seeks to separate hipster wannabes from real-life dives in this weekly column.
Ha-ra ra, sis boom … nevermind. Don’t get too cute at this Tenderloin dive, or bartender Carl might get more surly than usual.
The term “dive bar” is difficult to define. The label tends to be subjective, used to conveniently describe myriads of diverse drinking establishments. According to the ever-so-accurate encyclopedic knowledge of Wikipedia, a dive bar is a “down market drinking establishment frequented by a poor or working class clientele.” A slightly more trustworthy source, the Oxford English Dictionary, simply considers a dive to be a “disreputable nightclub or bar.” And just in case I haven’t been keeping up with the jive street jargon of today’s young folk, I consulted Urban Dictionary, which says the term can be used to describe anything from a “comfortable-but-basic neighborhood pub” to the “nastiest swill-slinging hole.”
Pretty general, right? In the name of journalism, I’ve taken it upon myself to put on my drinking shoes and sling back beers with regulars at this city’s great (or not so great) dives. I’m willing to cause irrevocable damage to my liver in order to bring you a weekly review of places that fit my dive bar criteria, so you don’t have to waste your precious brain cells on places populated by neckerchiefs and skinny jeans. Here’s what I consider important for determining the “divey-ness” of the watering holes that pepper the city like cockroaches refusing to be squashed. You can take ‘em or leave ‘em, but I’m going to take a page from the typical dive bar patron and let you know I could care less what you think. Besides, that which we call a dive bar by any other name would smell just as…questionable.