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Rest In Power Tobacco Road, You Were Too Raw For This World
By
David Colon
Published Jul 13, 2017
Modified Jul 13, 2017
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David Colon/Gothamist
By
David Colon
Published Jul 13, 2017
Modified Jul 13, 2017
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"Ah this thing I love is gone now and New York will never be the same" is probably one of the worst genres of New York City writing, since the city's constant churn is part of the deal when you move here. That said, I am going to indulge in this pointless act of whining because Midtown's best bar, Tobacco Road, has shuffled off this mortal coil and folks, I am mad.
According to our pals at DNAinfo, a bar that I deemed one of the best dives in New York last year has shuffled off this mortal coil, merely for the crime of not paying their landlord $183,000 in back rent. Which...admittedly is a lot of money, but I still don't think that's a good reason to shutter one of the last pieces of New York that bus riders saw as they pulled out of the Port Authority.
In last year's dive bar roundup, I noted that the best word to describe the place was "grim," and I stand by that judgement. Not that I meant it as a slight. In an increasingly squeaky clean Times Square and New York in general, it was nice that right down the block from the fancy modern New York Times headquarters and so close to the world's largest M & M's Store, you could find a bar that got you away from all the squeaky clean vibes, where the bored bartenders were in bikinis for some reason and dudes in union sticker-covered hardhats and office attire stared at sports and news on the silent TVs.
Owing to the fact that I never, ever wanted to spend more time in Midtown that I absolutely had to, I can't say that I was a Tobacco Road regular. But it was comforting to have the red-tinged interior with the oddly tropical-themed cable softcore vibe around, in the event that I had to get a drink with someone in the neighborhood. In a part of the city where people just open one million versions of P.J. O'Sullivan's Good Times Drinks Barn, it's admirable in a way to run a bar so utterly alienating and bleak.
And of course, you can still get that from a few places around the city, but there's a vanishing number of them, if only because the new crop of New York dive bars still need time to build up the requisite weird smells and dusty countertops and blood stains from knife fights.
At least the last time I was there though I was able to make a memory that was fitting for an epitaph. There was a weird, horrible smell coming from the back room, which no one could walk into. I was drunk from a nearby wrestling show, screaming "WOOP WOOP" because that was what everyone at the show had been doing and I kept feeding money into the jukebox. No one seemed to mind the screaming, and my friends that I met up with there had...well, they had a time. At least someone made a friend.
And so, incredibly, we face a world where the Port Authority is somehow even more depressing than it was just a week ago. Life just ain't fair.
Tagged
dive bars
midtown
port authority
tobacco road
original
David Colon
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