The Cork
4771 West Adams Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90016
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Life got you down? Don’t have any friends? Wish someone would show you a little affection?

Well then come join The World Dive Bar Tour at The Cork Bar & Grill where you can get a stiff drink and firm pat-down for less than $10! They even accept cash and credit to make your "experience" more manageable.

Yes, folks, drinks may be on the higher end of our dive bar scale, but they’ll knock you down. Orly, the bartender at this 65 year-old cultural landmark, is known for heavy-handed pours and restraint with the mixers. During a recent scouting trip one of our esteemed comrades (who will remain unnamed) remarked that if he had ordered a third “Tarr” he would have been properly drunk!

And if the thought of getting drunk off of three cocktails doesn’t motivate you to attend, then perhaps the thrill of venturing down Adams Boulevard west of Crenshaw – yes, past Crenshaw! – will get your blood flowing. Pull up to the bar and you’ll notice the iconic neon sign and plenty of street parking. (There’s even a free lot across the street.) When you arrive at the front entrance, be ready to smile and say hello to ‘C. Will’.

Who’s C. Will, you ask? Well, he’s the 250 lb. man that checks your ID and pats you down for weapons before you enjoy a $5 domestic with a platter of fried chicken. And he’s always there. In fact, C. Will is such a fixture at The Cork that the management throws him a birthday party every year with $8 Hennessy, $10 Patron, and loooong lines of well-wishers.

Who knows? After a few drinks, some delicious fried food, and some (un)welcomed human contact, you might be toasting C. Will on his birthday next year.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Neil, host

for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

El Texate
316 Pico Blvd.
Santa Monica, CA 90405
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This week we visit a Santa Monica hole-in-the-wall, El Texate. Frequented mostly by the locals from the surrounding beach community, this restaurant/bar serves respectable, slightly over-priced Oaxacan fare yet drinks cheap enough to warrant status as a dive. As one of our few dinner/dive spots, we highly recommend showing up early to eat and make friends with the waitresses who will be serving your drinks for the rest of the night.

Don’t come here expecting to play billiards or darts, as there is no room in the cozy dining and bar area. However, what El Texate lacks in entertainment it makes up for in character, teleporting you from a dull neighborhood street to an authentic Mexican oasis. The walls and ceilings are adorned with traditional mexican decor from sombreros to panchos, pictures of cacti and men on horseback. El Texate also features an outdoor dining patio, but you’ll still have to stand off the premises - 30 feet from the entrance, in the middle of the street - to legally smoke a cigarette.

Plenty of lot and street parking. Cash and Credit accepted.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Damien, host

for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Lotus Lounge
1135 N. Vermont Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90029
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There are times when this city can still surprise and delight. It’s the feeling one gets in a slightly grimy neighborhood, which you have passed through hundreds of times, when you wander in a slightly grimy doorway, which you have never before noticed, and find a dive bar that warmly welcomes you and serves up the most inexpensive pitcher of beer seen in years. It is harder and harder to uncover a new dive never before seen on the tour, but this week we will bring such a bar into the fold.

This week sets us down smack in the middle of town, on axis with the great dive bar heaven of San Pedro and somewhere between the neighborhoods we often call "east" and "west." The bar is just a block from a stop on our often neglected subway system between downtown and the valley. It is just a stones throw away from the 24 hour Mexican restaurant known affectionately as ‘The Gran’. A pitcher of beer will set you back just 12 dollars. There is a dart board, a pool table and over sized 80’s macro-brew posters all over the walls. If you do decide to drive (rarely has a dive bar destination been so accessible to public transportation) you will find copious amounts of street parking and a small lot in the back. Stay long enough and you might find yourself in a crackpot conversation about the economic future of the United States of America with a nice old-timer. With all these factors taken into account, I am beginning to think the Lotus Lounge could be a lynch-pin of the entire Los Angeles dive bar universe.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM an gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Brian, host
for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

“As a lotus flower is born in water, grows in water and rises out of water to stand above it unsoiled, so I, born in the world, raised in the world having overcome the world, live unsoiled by the world”
- Siddharta

Chimneysweep Lounge
4354 Woodman Ave.
Sherman Oaks, CA 91423
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When it comes to Los Angeles dive bars, the question is often asked - “What is the best dive in Los Angeles?” Like a parent with a large brood of children, the answer must be - “We love them all the same.” It is impossible to simplistically identify a single bar as the greatest, or even to compose a list of the top 5, 10, or 20. All dives are exemplary, and like “man’s other best friend” they all have certain characteristics and special qualities which set them apart in pedigree or link them together in loyalty. Yet, this week the WDBT will visit a bar that could eek out a ‘Best in Show’ in a dive bar competition on any given night in this fine city.

The Chimneysweep Lounge sits in the San Fernando Valley halfway between the Studio City and Encino in a grand LA strip mall a few blocks north of Ventura Blvd. It shares an ample parking lot with a ornate middle eastern restaurant, a surly dry cleaner, a specialty Tango dance studio, and a Chicago Style hot dog joint where you can have any sausage steamed, grilled, charred, or deep fried. The Chimneysweep, in the rear of the mini mall, is a lovely dark space. It contains a beautiful kidney bean shaped bar, topical art, free popcorn, an unfriendly bartender, an indoor fireplace (it is unknown if it can be lit), and the trophies from decades of softball team sponsorship. The small adjoining room contains a pool table, dart board, and golden tee arcade game…. and best of all, the door to the front patio. The only rule on the patio is “No Drinks After Midnight.”

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Travis, host
for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

“Chim chiminey, Chim chiminey, Chim chim cher-ee!, When you’re with a sweep, You’re in glad company” - Dick Van Dyke

]]> http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/04/02/april-4th-2012-chimneysweep-lounge/feed/ http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/03/20/march-21st-2012-irish-times/ http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/03/20/march-21st-2012-irish-times/#comments Tue, 20 Mar 2012 18:55:59 +0000 World Dive Bar Tour http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/03/20/march-21st-2012-irish-times/ WEDNESDAY, March 21st, 2012

Irish Times
3267 Motor Ave
Los Angeles, CA 90034
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“An té a luíonn le madaí, eiroidh sé le dearnaid.” - Gaelic
“He who lies down with dogs, gets up with fleas.” - English

It’s been said that you can learn a lot about a person by studying those they call “friends.” I say you will learn even more by studying where they go to honor St. Patrick. So-called "authentic" Irish pubs want you to believe that these places are decorated with glossy, varnished bars, shamrock bric-a-brac, and plasma screens. One trip to the land of Éire would quickly clear up this misconception…or you could just visit Irish Times with the World Dive Bar Tour this week.

While all the amateurs are nursing hangovers and oxycleaning the vomit out of their clothes, the Tour is hitting up the only dive-worthy, authentic Irish pub in town. Capturing the ambiance of a quiet, Dublin watering hole, Irish Times offers Guinness on tap served by an acid-tongued Irish bartender (she’s really from Ireland, folks) in a dark , cozy space, where the pint is truly mightier than the game on TV. But, should you need additional entertainment, Irish Times provides some dive bar essentials like Golden Tee golf, 75 cent pool tables, and a juke box full of the best rock n’ roll.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Curtis, host

for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Living Room
2636 Crenshaw Blvd
Los Angeles, CA 90016
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My mother used to scold me for not taking off my shoes when entering a home. “It’s disrespectful to wear them inside,” she would say.

This week at the Living Room we have to tread carefully and be mindful of the fact that we are visitors in someone else’s home. A home to blues hounds and karaoke singers, church-goers and old-timers, many of whom date their first drink at the West Adams establishment to the 1950’s when scores of African Americans left the south and headed west. Nowadays, if you spend a Sunday evening at the bar with Chu Chu and the Lovely Band, you’ll hear an undercurrent of accents – Texas, Louisiana, and Arkansas – beneath the steady flow of bourbon and blues. Legendary R&B singer, Miss Mickey Champion belts out her soulful sound on the bar’s postage stamp-sized stage – a sound that’s been described as “a cross between a smooth shot of Hennessy and an acetylene blowtorch.” And it’s precisely that mixture of refinement and raucousness that makes the Living Room so interesting, and why it demands respect from all who pay it a visit.

Located a short drive south of the Rosa Parks (10) freeway on Crenshaw, the Living Room is best accessed through the rear alley parking lot that it shares with Chef Marilyn’s Soul Food. Walk up to the back gate and ring the buzzer; “Big John” will come get you. As you walk through the smoking cage and enter the boxcar-width bar, you’ll be transported in time. The anachronistic décor harkens back to an era when alternating wood and mirror panels were considered “swanky”. Snag an open seat on one of the tweed couches and play a slow jam on the juke box; you may get an elderly couple to do the two-step. The Wednesday crowd is less lively than the weekend’s, but this jook joint is worth a visit any night of the week. So show some respect by tipping your caps (and Kim, the bartender) – and don’t forget to wipe your feet.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Neil, host

for the World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Monte Carlo
3514 West Third Street
Los Angeles, CA 90020
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It was a cold night in Los Angeles. The kind of night other places call Fall. The streets were still damp from the day’s rain but the clouds had cleared off for sunnier places, I guess. We pushed open the door and stepped inside. It was dark - a few sad lights, ESPN and Fox News gave the place a cold blue hue. The bartender looked nice but she was handling the drunk at the far end of the bar something fierce. She prodded him to wake up, get up and get out. Used logic that wasn’t fit for a man, let alone one with too many. He was draped in a coal black suit, covering a shiny red shirt and tie, and topped off by a dime store fedora. His clothes and nose gave the impression of a double for Pacino in the Devil’s Advocate, but last I check Al wasn’t Armenian.

I barked my order, “I’ll have a Tarr.” She was unaware of the cocktail. I clarified, “Jim Beam with a splash of Coke.” It was a generous pour for six clams; I knew I was in a bar. My crew got a couple of beers for three and half apiece. The place was stocked up. Cases of beer lined the walls. I could see Ness bustin’ in at anytime and ruining a dive like this, but this place might be too dirty to ever clean.

This week, we visit the Monte Carlo Bar. Park at the Ralph’s across Vermont. Bring cash.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Di Maggio, host

for The World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Big Fish Bar & Grill
5230 San Fernando Rd
Glendale, CA 91209
map

In years past we have warned about those dive bars which exist ‘off the map’ in areas populated by sea monsters, valley dwellers, and porn stars. This weeks dive bar doesn’t find any of those aforementioned monsters- just one Big Fish, a strong nautical theme, and locals up to their gills in cheap booze.

The bar is a fish out of water on its lonely stretch of San Fernando Road. Bordered by train tracks, surrounded on all sides by nameless light industrial warehouses, and accessible to the rest of the city only by a complicated negotiation of freeway off ramps and frontage roads. The bar itself, while it doesn’t seem to have a grill of any sort, does offer a weekly lineup of karaoke, live music, and open mic stand up comedy. Blessedly Wednesdays are reserved for hard drinking, but steel yourself for the drunks at the bar. Happy hour starts early in this part of town.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Travis, host

for The World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

“Truth is, I’ve always been thirsty.”
~Senior Ed Bloom, Big Fish (2003)

]]> http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/02/03/february-8th-2012-big-fish-bar-grill/feed/ http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/01/24/january-25th-2012-moms/ http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/01/24/january-25th-2012-moms/#comments Tue, 24 Jan 2012 19:40:52 +0000 World Dive Bar Tour http://www.worlddivebartour.com/v1/2012/01/24/january-25th-2012-moms/ WEDNESDAY, January 25th, 2012

Mom’s
12238 Santa Monica Blvd.
Los Angeles, CA 90025
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Let us say it before you do. We have our doubts about Mom’s being capable of meeting WDBT standards.

There is a lot of pain and acrimony behind the opening of this bar, from the hostile takeover of one of West LA’s finest dives, Del’s Saloon, to the fact that the owner’s other establishment, The Backstage in Culver City, formerly a WDBT favorite, is now on the Tour’s RIP list of repro-bars who have grown into douche-laden cesspools of obnoxious debauchery.

At first blush it would seem this bar has everything a great dive should have. Cheap drinks. A great bar menu. Billiards and TVs tuned to sports. Like the Backstage, Mom’s does a lot of things right. They even offer a smoking/drinking patio (rare these days). But we cock our heads and squint with misgivings over certain “draws” like a dance floor, jello shots, and a photo booth.

Mom’s inception cost many tears in many beers. This bar’s penance will be paid only by demonstrating to the Tour that they’ve merely picked up where the previous tenant left off. Please join us and let us know if you think they did.

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own and we’ll find you.

Carpe Drink’em,

Damien , Host

for The World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Smog Cutter
864 N. Virgil Ave.
Los Angeles, CA 90029
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Some dive bars have no need for a glowing introduction. They simply exist, and will continue to exist, whether you like it or not. As to charms, the Smog Cutter has too few to mention, it is the antithesis of Hollywood nightlife. We at the World Dive Bar Tour wouldn’t have it any other way.

The Smog Cutter is generally shabby. The neighborhood is dodgy. The customer is most definitely wrong in all disputes. It has decrepit bathrooms. There is a rumor of vermin. And finally, the bartenders exhibit an overbearing insistence on Karaoke participation with a two drink minimum policy - two drinks which are not as cheap as typically found in such establishments. In short, the bar is perfectly bad in the finest divey manner. The only way it could be better (i.e. worse) is if they flaunted basic health and safety laws on a more predictable basis…..

As usual, the casual debauchery starts around 9PM and gets really interesting by 10:00. Come for one drink, or stay for one too many. Bring anyone and everyone, and join us for a great time in the middle of the week. If you arrive early or late, look for the people having a damn good time (it’ll be us), or start having a damn good time on your own (we’ll find you).

Carpe Drink’em,

Travis, host

for The World Dive Bar Tour Executive Committee

Ray "Bones" Barboni: “I’m from Miami-fuckin’-Beach and you wanna show me the ocean, huh? And what about sun, does it ever shine around here, or is this smog around all the time?”
Limo Driver With Sign: “They say the smog is the reason we have such beautiful sunsets.”
Ray "Bones" Barboni: “That’s what they say, huh? What a bunch of fuckin’ bullshit.”
~Get Shorty(1995)