With Punk Rock Bowling in town this weekend, the venerable Double Down Saloon is sure to be crusted over with grog-swilling punks. (Heads up: Punk Vegas will be a topic on tomorrow’s City Cast Las Vegas podcast 🎧) So what dive bars might you divert to? Well, sure, the Huntridge Tavern — for many, the king of dives. But there are other options:
🍺 Dino’s Lounge: Any place regularly patronized by the great Las Vegas artist Jw Caldwell is authentic enough for me.
🍺 Champagne's: This Maryland Parkway bastion of Old Vegas swank has long been a favorite of local creative types, perhaps as an antidote to the overtouristed drinkeries of the megaresort era. The velvety wallpaper has a nice shabby-Versailles vibe, too.
🍺 Red Dwarf: A marginal case, perhaps, as it’s probably too recent to have that deeply ground-in authenticity so necessary to a great dive bar. But it’s on its way, with plenty of local music, distinct atmo, and Detroit-style pizza.
🍺 Stage Door: Okay, so technically it’s also a small gambling hall, as well as a convenience store — and, bad sign, it’s been acclaimed by the Best of Las Vegas crowd. “But woof, total dive,” a source tells us. Has good hot dogs we hear.
🍺 4 Mile Bar: Let’s let Andrew Kiraly, majordomo of TheList.Vegas, field this one: “In the grim, not-so-distant future, when it seems every last basic af watering hole in Las Vegas has been borged into the ‘dive bar’ template with craft beer and artisanal pizza and curated thrift-store decor and an edgy karaoke night and an Instagram account, the 4 Mile Bar on Boulder Highway will remain, defiant and untouched, the last real dive bar. It always feels strangely timeless, Lynchian, subaquatic, ahistoric. Its karaoke is not edgy. Its beer is not craft. Its pizza is not only not artisanal, it doesn't even exist. It is a dive bar.”
- Related: A spirited dive bar convo with the Double Down’s P Moss. [City Cast Las Vegas 🎧]
Now, your turn: What great dive bar did we miss?
