When the fake dive bars drive out the real
This is the story of two bars. Both from midtown Atlanta. One alive and well, another just a memory. What links them is that the one that’s alive and well wants to be a ‘dive bar’, a secret, a place that intimidates regular people.
Halo lounge is a fancy place. They brag of their deconstructionist architecture and their excessively fancy well bottles. This is a far cry from the Stein Club, which was one of the few true bars in Atlanta history. That’s right, no food. The Stein Club lived in Midtown until about 2000 when the very nature of having been there was no longer provocative.
In 1985, if you went to the Stein Club, you were taking a risk. That section of Midtown was seedy and perhaps a little dangerous. While the Stein Club was marked, it was also a place that had a reputation. You only went there if you were from the neighborhood or were desperate enough for cheap beer that you would risk the drunks to get it.
Then came the anouncement that the Olympics were coming. Then came the revitalization of midtown; its Disneyfication. Suddenly, the new lofts were there. Suddenly, the dump had been turned on the Mitchell House, and suddenly all the people in the neighborhood wanted cosmopolitans and not PBR.
Whither the Stein Club. Instead a new type of bar replaced it. Halo does have a small sign, but it would be tough to recognize if you were just walking by. It’s also hard to find the door.
One gets the feeling this is intentional. On the night I visited, a majority of the clients were women who had to be making in the upper 5 figures or more. The place seems designed to intimidate and keep out people whom these women would not want there…. and there is the rub of truth.
A real dive bar is one in which ‘you’ are not low enough to really be there. The moderne/urbane dive bar is one in which generally ‘you’ are not high enough.
I’m not sure the latter is better; after all, it’s hard to dive upwards.
July 26th, 2004 at 3:16 am
Robert,
I would like to reply as one of the owners of Halo. I can appreciate some of your comments, as I enjoyed many a drunken stupor at the stein club. However your feeling of intimidation is in your own head. We basically created the nicest place in Atlanta, and we catch hell for not being judgemental. I hear all the time” its too gay, too black, too white, too straight, too casual and now too intimidating. Keep in mind most bars of this caliber would probably give you attitude about coming in. In your blog you did not talk about service, comfort, quality of drink or the fact that our bathrooms are clean. By the way we have PBR so get over your ill feelings we will be glad to have you in if you choose us….Allen H A L O
July 1st, 2005 at 6:54 am
Halo blows. It’s WAY overpriced, and the people there - whatever their creed or personal persuasion — are full of themselves.
Compound is the place to be. Pay no attention to the previous posting. It’s probably that Katz person blowing his own horn.
July 10th, 2006 at 7:34 pm
stein club sucked….mix , compound, and american pie rule……im starting a east andrews chapter biker club