bars

belgian beer cafe bluestone - 557 st kilda rd melbourne 3004 03 9529 2899

and i thought australia was the only place that claimed beer and chips as a national dish. probably a couple of hundred years before some foreign monk made a wrong turn at new guinea and found himself in sydney. the belgians were getting on the piss complimented by that other great food group, deep fried chipped potatoes.

chez phat - level 1 waratah pl melbourne 3000 9663 0988

cicciolina - 130 acland street st kilda 3182 9525 3333

you may think you know the italian restaurant on acland street known as cicciolina (pronounced chi-chi-o-leena). and that reminds me. it's pronounced brusketta not brushetta. try to remember that when you order it next. anyway, cicciolina is not just a well known italian restaurant. duck down the alley beside it and you find a back door to a little bar called - cicciolinas. crazy. now, while you might pay $25 for a main in the restaurant, nibbles in the bar start at just $6.50. and that's fucking cheap.

commercial club hotel - 344 nicholson street fitzroy 9419 1522

is it dirty? you bet. grungy? uhuh. is everything on the menu served with chips? just about. we'd been to the commercial club a few times but always the red room was stuffed with people. incidentally the red room is painted red, with a low red sofa, red chairs and a low table. hence the name, idiot.

dogs bar - 54 acland street st kilda 3182 9525 3599

they have the biggest fucking business card i have ever seen! it's really not that necessary. who needs more bloody people at dogs bar? it's already packed to the fucking rafters on any given evening so what's with the ads and the big ass business cards? not needed. tell the other bastards to go away!

e:fiftyfive - basement, 55 elizabeth street melbourne 9620 3899

this place just fucking rocks. i hesitate to say it, but this place might be my favouritest bar, ever. there's a lot of history here for me- shagging the bar boy in the toilets, meeting my (now ex) boyfriend, getting kicked out for being too drunk... all my favourite memories.

it's the staple meeting place. the place that you ring your friends and say "meet you in the city?" and they say "yeah, ok" and you both know that you'll be at e55. or at least i always knew what i meant, and my friends had to call me at 10 past with a "why the fuck aren't you under the clock?!" hey, it's around the corner a bit- tch!

fizz on the beach - r3 holdfast promenade glenelg south australia 5045 08 8376 9777

fizz on the beach is a great name for a bar. sounds sexy, tasty, yum. this place didn't quite hit all the marks, but they did try pretty hard and the name is so damn good. we had champagne on the balcony overlooking the beach - ignoring the sub-zero westerly trying to pull our hair out by the roots - and then went inside to a sofa overlooking the marina for salt and pepper calamari and something else which was probably good but obviously unremarkable.

gpo - (bendigo somewhere, main street i think, some pale mall place, i don't know, i was quite drunk by then so blah blah)

they've never heard of an espresso martini. mind you, i'd never heard of one until recently but thought the idea of caffeine and alcohol in the same drink was a stroke of genius. even without that knowledge they had a pretty good crack at it and managed to knock up something closely resembling said martini.

gunn island brew bar - 102 canterbury road middle park 3206

so the middle park hotel isn't good enough for these lads; they had to give it some fancy name that no-one remembers. and brew bar, please.

hairy canary - 212 little collins street melbourne 3000 9654 2471

hairy canary is one of those places we've been to a number of times but never really thought about writing about. that's not fair. some places we've been to for 5 minutes have got a half-page absolute caning.

madam brussels - level 3 59 bourke street melbourne 9662 2775

you just know a place called madam something or other is going to be different from your average pick-up melbourne bar (for that, think pony or long room, yikes). and the history of madam brussels is interesting to say the least. but the first thing you notice is that it has grass indoors and many people seem to be reclining on garden furniture - again, indoors. if you do go to madam's place already pissed it's a bit disconcerting to walk along the indoor garden path and step onto the lawn. as if handling the drink is not fucking hard enough. if you do go in a sober state the difference can at least get the jaded bar-goer's attention.

polly - 401 brunswick street fitzroy 3065 9417 0880

polly, polly, polly. old faithful. there when we need a lounge sofa, not a bar stool. when it's quite obvious that the people we are with are going to sod off at midnight and we are just getting fired up, polly is the place to be. the bar staff actually attend to your desires as opposed to 'not more bloody customers?'. g&ts are pretty good (although we did once get a gin and bitters when going for the gin and bitter lemon so they lost some points there). they have a cigar menu and a big range of girly cocktails but they can mix a few of the more serious ones too. long island iced teas are pretty lethal but don't let us see you drinking something with frothy egg in it.

pony - 68 little collins street melbourne 3000 9662 1026

dark and grungy, pony will appeal to dreadlocked freaks as well as dodgy businessman-with-daughter. a perfect hiding place from the bobby mcgee crowd (see yak). on the pretentiousness scale, it's the nail that holds the bottom of the scale from falling over. what you see is what you get - wysiwyg (apple not microsoft). the sofas have that 'son/daughter screwed here for years without you knowing' feel about them. why has the sofa sagged so much, honey? the upper floor hangs on by the carpet and the toilets construction and materials used are probably on a u.n. hazardous material list somewhere. do you dare to drink here? bridies is always next door...

suede - 284 smith st collingwood 3066 9417 1860

it's friday night, we've put up with lots of crap from stupid sue and dopey neil this week, and we're just bloody hungry. this place had been recommended, but a street kiosk with a decent supply of choc wedges would have filled the hole. we couldn't find a kiosk, so we wandered into suede instead.

the city wine shop - 159 spring street melbourne 3000 9654 6657

why have i never been to the wine shop. or the european, for that matter. it's a question i'm still asking myself with no good answer. the wine shop is directly under the supper club and beside the european restaurant. the same guy owns all three (lucky fucker) and has basically cornered the market in cool. in the spring street area, anyway.

the croft institute - croft lane melbourne 3000

everyone who works here should be called igor. i'm sure the designers were going for a med school frat party sort of atmosphere but all the beakers, medical equipment and glassware makes you feel like you've stumbled on to some b-grade movie set: frankenstein's other monster: the return: with a vengeance. everyone's just a little spooked out but trying not to show that they're not sure if some stitched together freak isn't going to walk out of a cupboard any minute.

the gin palace - 190 little collins st melbourne 3000 9654 0533

what do you reckon they serve here? hint - their beer is really, really good. anyway, three types of people frequent this royal establishment. which one are you?

the lobby bar - level one and level two 133-135 fitzroy street st kilda 3182 9593 6369

this place is very dark and has very cool red touches and funky decor. it is actually way too cool for a cinema lobby bar. they are usually places with paisley carpet and cigarette burns in the wallpaper. picture some overweight smelly public servant propping up the bar and smoking constantly. but we are talking fitzroy street here, and an uncool bar in this street would probably be overrun with chicks in denim miniskirts and ugg boots within seconds as being the next happening thing. (ugly is the new beautiful or some such crap).

the long room 162-168 collins street melbourne

i'm not sure what i expected from long room. obviously i'm thinking it's a room and it's long. i speculated that they serve drinks of some sort and that there would be some sort of music. past that i was willing to go with the flow. the first thing that surprised me was the retail store front with door bitches to prevent people without collared shirts from getting in. i mean, we all know that when you wear a collar, you're a better class of person. in spite of the overwhelming evidence against my choice of clothing, i was permitted into the inner sanctum. i should have known better.

the melbourne supper club - 1st floor 161 spring st melbourne 3000 9654 6300

when you don't have the network contacts to get you membership to the melbourne club, you can still find overpriced drinks and mingle with poncy stuck up people hell-bent on spending someone else's money to impress or pick up at the melbourne supper club. on the other hand; comfy sofas, more hours open than closed and there when you're desperate to dull the pain on your wallet.

the red eagle hotel - 111 victoria avenue albert park 3206 9699 9744

i can really only talk about this place from a bloke's view point. maybe it's a smorgasbord of hot flesh for the babes. try as i might, i can't put myself in their shoes and see that. you could always email us a let us know. frankly, i really don't give a fuck. this is my review and i'll say whatever i bloody well want.

the saint - 54 fitzroy st st kilda 3182 9593 8333

this is a cool place. literally, they seem to be able to open so many doors and windows that it is an architectural feat that the roof doesn't cave in and flatten all the beautiful people. sorry, i meant to say it's a shame it doesn't flatten the assholes. collateral damage i'm willing to put up with.

tony starr's kitten club - level 2/267 little collins st melbourne 3000 9650 2448

this place is sexy in an old fashioned great gatsby sort of way. sitting at the window overlooking flinders lane you could almost be lauren becall or bogey thinking about the one you loved and lost. all the girls should be wearing georgette and strings of pearls and the guys should take off their hats when they duck through the door. kitten club lacks the frenetic imbibing that marks some of the other city bars. (yes, gin palace, that means you). it's usually dark at the kitten club, the lamps make everyone look sexier. anyway, that is my original impression of kitten club, in the two most recent visits kc has gone from understated glamour to trailer park trash. rude and unhelpful staff, bright lights, all atmosphere gone, the place has turned into a tarty call girl named candy.

troika - 106 little lonsdale st melbourne 3000 9663 0221

if you rocked up to troika bollock naked, no-one would give a shit. it's that kind of place. it's not big, it's not very comfortable. it's in a shitty lane in the centre of melbourne. not much going for it really on the outside, apart from the sign that looks like they stole it from an optometrist's. makes you want to hold your hand over one eye to read it. inside, it's a different story. good music and good drinks. we had our first long island iced tea together there. it was very special moment for me - it brought tears to my eyes. at 40 bucks for two drinks, it'd bring tears to anyone's eyes. i've never tried the food at troika. i'm usually well fed before i get there. i just need some watering.

trust bar - 405-411 flinders lane melbourne 3000 9629 9300

this sort of place should be jammed on excellent thursday or even mediocre wednesday. there was lots of empty space and there were places where people weren't standing either. imagine a mix of b(w)ankers, guidos, old people in cardigans, and rip-curl boys all in the one place. this place is having a serious identity crisis. and i haven't even got on to the drinks yet. let's face it, if someone sealed the doors and threw in a few grenades, would anyone miss these people? i'm not encouraging anybody to do that. my point is that there are about 200 bars in the city and about 198 places better to go. the other shit one is pony.

wine bank - 45 view street bendigo 3550 5444 4655

it was a bank and now it sells wine. wine bank. crazy, huh? and how many bloody bank/bars use the fucking vault as a cellar? so original. of course, if they didn't use it as a cellar i'd be moaning about why not. they can't win.

yak bar and food - russell st (cnr flinders lane) melbourne 3000 9654 6699

i like yak. i hate yak. i don't fucking know. sometimes we go and it's really good. bar staff actually serve you, you get your drinks within the hour, you can find places to sit. other times there are no seats, the 'bar staff' do another job entirely, drinks can be viewed behind the bar but not actually touched or tasted. 'can we sit here'? 'that table's for six and you only have five'. asshole.

zimmer - acland street st kilda 3182

want wiggly hips and uncoordinated, drunken dancing? you can see that anywhere on a friday night in melbourne. want all that plus loud south american music? zimmer has the answer. girls who think they can dance like the flamenco coupled with boyfriends/pickups with no sense of rhythm or space, personal or otherwise. the waiters are paid danger money lest they lose an eye or a limb. if michael flattley worries you this would scare the crap out of you. one bloke nearly did lose an eye, thankfully only permanent disfigurement.