I officially have a new favourite bar.
And if a lot of you Sydneysiders are wondering what a bar is, it's like a pub but much smaller, and without pokies or dozens of plasma screens.

The Shady Pines Saloon, tucked away in a back alley in Darlinghurst, is not only a revelation in authentic, wild west speakeasy aesthetics, it's also a revelation in showing Sydney can do hidden novelty bars as good as New York. It's also building a solid following (with line ups unfortunatelty), and not in the usual Sydney way which involves launch parties with big name DJs and celebrity nobodies posing for pictures by the pool. It's website even boasts of the fact it doesn't take private bookings or exclusive hires (except for Willie Nelson). It's building solid hype due solely to the blogosphere, bar reviews and word of mouth.

First up: the look. You do literally feel like you've walked into the Hill Valley Saloon in 1885 Hill Valley ala Back To The Future 3. Everything down to the fittings and the furniture look authentically anitiquey, and thank god. Cause the odd thing sticking out (like say Lady Gaga playing on the stereo) would turn this into a kitsch cheesy simulacra. Oh it's still kitsch alright, but it's authentic kitsch and not dumb, cash in kitsch.

Secondly: the drinks. These guys know their stuff. I asked about pale ales and got blown away by their range and knowledge of Aussie microbrews I'd never heard of. If you want a VB, go elsewhere. If you like to drink whiskey during the day, this is your new home. Start redirecting mail now.

Of course being the bunch of novelty seekers us Sydneysiders are, everyone will go once just so they can say they've been. But this place feels like it deserves more than that and hopefully will be around for ages. Long enough even for them to open up a noughties themed retro bar next door, which will undoubtedly have bloggers raving about their authentic plasma screens, VB and Lady Gaga music.

It's 2010 and I still can't believe how many people I talk to who have never heard of The Mac, let alone set foot in it.

Located at the back of Central Station and with upstairs accommodation, you get a few country bumpkins setting foot inside Sydney's home of funk - which is exactly what this is. Free funk and blues/roots music, most nights of the week barring the anti-social ones. In a country where it seems there's more and more cover charges for worse and worse cover bands (oh they played Mr Jones and Two Princes - what a surprise) - The Mac is a haven for original music from talented musicians. Some of my favourite acts like Ray Mann, The Bakery and Extended Family are usually playing here, and the only cover band I can stomach Johnny G & The E Types which plays Stax era Booker T covers with such gusto that Otis Redding would sit in if he was in town. And that's the other secret, thanks to some well connected bookers, The Mac often offers free secret shows from visiting internationals, like Jon Cleary or one of Harry Connick Jr's horn players.

The newly renovated and opened venue upstairs, The Raval probably deserves it's own entry - but it's such a secret, great spot I'm afraid to talk about it too much for fear more people will discover it. It's like the parlour room of an old rich French uncle from the 19th century - all antique couches, chandeliers and stained glass. This is the kind of venue The Basement wishes it was - all class. It's such a good venue you don't care who's playing - you just want to take interstate guests their to drink absinthe and impress them and pretend it's your own private club. Make any excuse to go check it out.

Oh and if you need another excuse to visit - they brew their own beer!

For a recent birthday I wanted to assemble a very small group of my closest friends for a proper sunday afternoon catchup. Somewhere with good character, good beer, in a quiet spot that wouldn't be crowded with pokies, footy screens or backpackers.

That is why I chose the Lord Nelson. A micro-brew pub before the term even existed, their finely crafted home made ales (you can see the brew tanks through a glass window in the back) are STILL winning awards after all these years. The first time I ever tasted a Three Sheets - it was like the three course meal gum out of Willy Wonka's Factory. An amazing mix of flavours that rippled down your tastebuds like a waterfall.

Of course the unpretentious, yet not slummy vibe is good too. It's one of Sydney's oldest pubs, an old sandstone building, tucked on an out of the way corner of The Rocks. Oh and they serve pints. This and Opera Bar are my two favourite places to take tourists when in town, and The New York Times even gave it a mention recently in a great travel article about the ultimate wekened in Sydney.

After the closing of the Hopetoun and countless other venues, yet another Sydney music institution is under threat from gentrification and developers: the Abercrombie Hotel.

Arguably the smelliest dance floor in the state, the Abercrombie was nothing but an ugly, under-utilised "old mans drinking" facility of the six o'clock swill age, attached to the site of a former inner city brewery and on a very busy street corner - Abercrombie and Broadway.

It was however in a great location for students, literally just across the street from the University of Technology and down the road from the Uni of Sydney. Being on a main intersection also meant it could trade late into the night. It wasn't long until promoters discovered this smelly, nostalgic dive bar and turned into a hipster dance hangout - and it started with niche electronic music parties.

The Foreign Dub DNBBQ crew were the first guys to seize this grungey smelly den for one of their all-day, all-night jungle-music-and-cooked-meat-athons (sometime around 2001 I'm guessing), bringing in crowds to dance the night away in the carpeted bar and the outside beer garden (and of course to try and navigate between the two via the incredible small single staircase). Uber Lingua's world music fiestas soon followed, as did the anti-establishment performance night Creative Dissent.

But the Abercrombie remains synonymous with one night: Purple Sneakers. Named after a You Am I song and with a lineup generally stretching around the block, the sneakers became Sydney's see-and-be-seen Friday night for the Strokes/Franz indie uni student generation, getting to the point where wanker celebrities like Andrew Stockdale from Wolfmother were turning up to hang out, non-professional DJs like Chris Taylor from The Chaser came to spin tunes, local bands did DJ sets, record companies launched albums and many, many drunken pick ups took place. It's not much of a stretch to say that for indie kids, there really is nowhere else to go out late on a Friday night in Sin City.

Being down the street from my work means I've hung out at The Abercrombie far more than I should have for someone with a full time job, and looking back it was more than a venue, but rather a microcosm of my whole sordid twenties. At the Abercrombie I've kissed girls, reunited with old friends, cried my heart out, performed slam poetry, thrown up in the bathroom, danced like a crazy man to The Who at dawn, been ushered into a VIP room during a police shut down and been called a "good lookin' man" at the bar by Aussie rock legend Tim Rogers. We even had a work Christmas party there once, complete with professional decorations (but still the same godawful stench mix of sweat, beer, piss and puke).

Hopefully the Abercrombie will be back - with a new, less smelly carpet. Until then, Sydney seems to have run out of dodgy old man pubs for hipsters to reclaim for dance parties. What are we to do?

In what could actually be the straw that broke the camel's back of me deciding to move to Melbourne, The Hopetoun Hotel has closed suddenly and appears to be on the market, with the likelihood of it re-opening as an intimate music venue looking pretty damn unlikely.

Current uni-aged indie hipsters might have trouble believing me, but around the turn of the millennium, when both DJ culture and pokies were at their peak, i distinctly remember there were only two or three decent music venues left in Sydney where you could go see local independent bands seven nights a week - the Basement, the Annandale and The Hoey. Having survived that onslaught, it makes the sudden closing this week all the more unbelievable.

All throughout my twenties, the Hoey was always worth going to no matter what band was playing - as it always guaranteed a decent vibe, a laid back local crowd, intelligent music, cheap entry and a decent range of beers (including three Coopers on tap). On a quiet night you could sit on the floor with a drink in your hand - on a busy night you could never get to the bar and the dance floor was packed and sweaty. For years it was home to the Sunday electronica night Frigid, itself also a Sydney institution.

My favourite memories of the Hoey (in no particular order)

• The Hive (aka Baggsmen) + Pivot, winter 2001. Also, the Baggsmen's cinema shows playing along improvised music to movie scenes from Peter Seller's The Party and Indiana Jones.
• Also in 2001, rocking up randomly to see some up and coming band called Faker, which my friend Chris just happened to be in at the time.
• Jason Molina solo - frustratedly couldn't get his guitar to work for like 10 minutes, but managed to win over the crowd anyway
• Spod + Bluejuice on Christmas Eve, 2004, which also featured some birthday cake-wielding gatecrashers.
• The fact it welcomed great Melbourne bands that probably couldn't get a gig anywhere else in Sydney, like post-rockers International Karate and Laura, etc
• Sarah Blasko covering Kermit the Frog's The Rainbow Connection at a friend's private 30th.
• Rocket Science, September 2008 - last gig I saw before I left Sydney was at the Hoey, and it rocked out.
• seeing Thirsty Merc back when they were simply called "thirsty".
• Waiting For Guinness' annual anti-Homebake night crunk-jazz fests
• The Hauntingly Beautiful Mousemoon passing out improvised scrap metal percussive instruments to the crowd while also cooking pikelets onstage.

R.I.P. The Hoey.



Above: Betchadupa featuring a very young Liam Finn - onstage at the Hoey - Feb 5th 2003.





Above: A very early incarnation of the international prog-tronic exports Pivot onstage at the Hoey - winter 2001?

Sorry so many of these things are in the inner-west, but hey, it is the COOLEST part of Sydney.

Every Thursday for as long as I can remember, omnipod piano maestro and Sydney identity Chuck Yates has held court at the unpretentious local the Bald Faced Stag, playing three sets of impro-heavy trad jazz, with a rotating array of horn players, including on at least one occasion - no less than three trombonists. For free. Til very late. Usually with a free supper at midnight. Needless to say, Sydney's starving students and jazz-starved music fans ate it up - literally. One of the best free nights out Sydney had on offer, last thursday was supposedly the last of Yates' nights at the Stag. But i get the feeling he'll back.

Rumour has it one Thursday after playing a set of their pop-heavy hits at the Annandale, the multi-talented Thirsty Merc then wondered up the road to the Stag and played a jazz set, which I reckon probably would have been more enjoyable than hearing them play Thirsty Merc songs.

The Bald Faced Stag is at 345 Paramatta Road, Leichhardt.

NOTE: I leave Sydney in a week to go live in Canada for a year, so don't expect any new entries for a while. I started this blog as a piss-takey way of remembering the things i love about Sydney, and hopefully despite increasing commercialisation and over-crowding, most of these things will stay so i have something to look forward to coming back to. Rock over Sydney!

Okay, so they used to be $5 but these days $7 is the going rate for a decent pub steak. And if you pay more than $10 you're obviously a tourist.

The Forresters in Surry Hills started the $5 Steak craze, seeing it as a way of getting people in during mid-week winter nights, and they put a giant model cow on the awning to let people know. And it worked a treat - the pub was regularly packed out with budget-minded carnivores. But alas it didn't last. Soon every pub was offering cheap steaks (or even FREE in the case of the Glebe Excelsior every Wednesday with the purchase of a $10 jug of Coopers). Forresters, packed out with uni students, lowered the quality of the steaks, then discontinued it all together.

But the tradition lives on, and here are my current two favourite steak-based haunts for when i'm feeling low on iron midweek.

1. The Shakespeare in Surry Hills. Okay so it's $10 and can be variable, but generally huge and hearty.
2. The Great Southern on George St in Chinatown. $7. For when you're sick of laksa and pho, go a Chinatown steak.

And where are your favourite steaks?

Look, it had to be in here sooner or later. The Townie was the source of many of my ex-girlfriends and a depository for most of my food money in my early 20's. Between the age of about 21 and 22, for me, the Townie quickly went from being the dirty place you went to at the end of the night, to the place where you knew everybody and everybody knew you. How lame were we! But it arguably still is the most friendly and unpretentious late-night dive bar in all of Sydney.

Look, I haven't gone back since Coopers broke the $5 mark and everyone managed to stay the same age but somehow got five years younger than me, but if i do ever go back here is my $2 juke box triple play that would always get the night going:
1. Sweet Child Of Mine: Guns N Roses
2. Warewolves of London: Warren Zevon
3. Hey Ya: Outkast

The only pub that has more propagandist billboards attached to it than downtown Baghdad during the Saddam Hussein regime (somehow branded by Coopers, Jagermeister and Cog!?!?), the Annandale was one of only about three music venues in Sydney to survive the pokies/DJ explosion of the late 90s. Just.

Since getting music back in 2000, it's slowly become Inner-Western Sydney's busiest music venue. Located just down the Great Western Highway, and right near Stanmore McDonalds and with plenty of street parking, it's hardly an inner city den of bohemia or progressive electronica.

But it does have live music most nights of the week, and as the profanity-labelled t-shirts remind us, it is a Sydney institution. Most Sydney gig-sluts will happily lie about the night they saw Elliott Smith, Jet or The Dandy Warhols here.

It's loud rock (and the odd hip-hop gig), and in a sign that it's both pure Sydney and pure angry, the beer is served in schmiddies made of plastic.

The sound might be average, it might be in the middle of a cultural desert and the crowd might vary from boring to mediocre, but we've all had a great night out at the Annandale at somepoint in our life.

Many pubs and bars claim to make you feel like you're in your own lounge room - but the Clare really DOES resemble my lounge room. It's full of mismatched op-shop furniture, strewn pizza boxes, fellow ABC co-workers and a solid collection of current streetpress. And with mix CDs with the likes of Rock Steady Crew and Cyndi Lauper chosen by the bartenders, it has a house party vibe as the night goes on.

Yeah look, it's the only pub near my work that has a cool crowd and a non-pretentious vibe, and it was one of the first pubs to react against the gentrification of Sydney bars and "de-renovate" back to its tiled walls and back alley furnishings. The Clare is a comfy (though at times loud and crowded) corduroy oasis in a city of chrome and stainless steel.

File Under: Dive Bar.

The Clare is at 20 Broadway, Broadway.