What Makes a Great Dive Bar?

Courtesy: Unsplash

There are questions in life that surpass all others. The ones that seem to dangle above as you lie abed in pre-slumber reverie, thinking big thoughts, wondering big wonderings.

Are we alone in the universe? Who or what created existence? Where do we go when we die?

Then one question rises up and turbo-punches those paltry musings into cosmic shitdust. One question alone.

That question: What makes a great dive bar?

1. A Great Dive Bar Welcomes You Without Welcoming You

Entering a NYC dive bar represents a slight break from reality, as if you stepped into a kind of alternate mini-dimension that’s just off to the side of the one we know – the one with the job, and the family, and debts, and Red Sox fans, and the rest of the things that make life onerous.

It’s a different feeling than walking into other storefronts on the street. This isn’t Foot Locker or the flower shop. When you head into a dive bar and your vision adjusts to the dim lighting, you have to feel as if you’re in an underground refuge, a safe place that probably isn’t actually safe.

At its best, a dive bar is almost an anti-environment: the outside world is muffled; the bathroom door creaks open; the late afternoon bartender is surly but harmless; a senior citizen milks a Heineken and mutters regret to himself; a drunk, unemployed regular hijacks the Spotify. And is that a frog in the fish tank? Yes, it damn well is.

Basically, a great dive bar is both welcoming and off-putting. “Off-coming,” if you will. Which is a word that sounds either sexual or British.

2. First-timers Should Feel Just Slightly Uncomfortable About Walking In

Listen, even the most seasoned NYC dive bar regulars had to walk into their favorite establishment a first time. Unless some space continuum was broken, the old vet was once a rookie too, son.

So, when you do finally summon the fortitude to walk into the corner pub in your new neighborhood on a Wednesday – the joint with the busted Smithwick’s sign and the one-eyed alley cat out front – there should be a little rumbling of trepidation in your belly, a spirit of derring-do in your lowers. It’s natural. Otherwise, you’d just be going to Dave & Buster’s.

Courtesy: Unsplash

3. Must Feature a Cheap Beer-and-Shot Special

Some of my favorite NYC dive bars don’t offer an inexpensive beer-and-shot deal, so this may not be a cardinal rule exactly. Yet, a big part of me feels this should be a staple. Think about how many folks, on any given day, are low on funds and in need of a buzz. There is no metric for that because the sheer number would break all metrics, like a carnival mallet that smashes through the bell. These masses are the regular people of the world, and the regular people of the world rely on dive bars. Cheap beer-and-shots are practically a New York City public service, along the lines of $1 slices and AM New York.

If you are indeed a proper dive bar and still lack this offering (screw it, basic human right), I ask you to look within yourself. Then grab your best chalk-markers, climb up to that big board of yours, and scratch a ‘Genny + Any Well – $6’ into that sucker. You’d be doing God’s work.

4. While You’re At the Bar, There Has to Be One Guy From the Neighborhood Who Pops In With His Dog, Bullshits with the Bartender For Two Minutes About the Other Night, Has a Look to See If Dougie’s Been In, Then Leaves Without Having a Drink

Otherwise, you can barely even call the place a “bar.”

5. A Dive Bar Can Have a Patio Area But it Has To Be Pretty Neglected and Shitty

In the era of Covid, outdoor space has become a must, so there’s really no room to be cranky about a little alfresco drinking. Even if you’re an old-school drinker who likes her watering hole squarely within four peeling walls thank you very much, times have changed. Strange bedfellows must emerge. Dive bars and sunlight have to put their differences aside and join forces.

That said, a dive bar must have a commensurate dive patio. Meaning whatever bedraggled chairs have been tossed out there can’t match stylistically or even morally. Any accompanying tables must be either severely or comically off-balance, and the border between the bar’s yard area and the four-family residence next door should be ambiguous. How else are those kids supposed to get their soccer ball back?

***

These are not hard and fast rules, by the way – only one fan’s opinion. And even if I did proclaim them as rules nobody would listen to me. Enforcement would be a real bitch too, just the logistics of it all.

No matter. So much of what goes into a truly wonderful, second home, low-brow, no-frills, friendly neighborhood alcohol shack is intangible: a sense more than a standard, a mood more than a measurement. It’s a beer and a shot and the timeless zen that provides.

It’s one final question really: What makes a New York City dive bar great to you?

Courtesy: Unsplash