GILBERT, AZ – The Rabbit Hole is now open at Gilbert and not only will you need to find it to get in, but you will need to make a reservation to be a guest on the list; yes, that means it’s a speakeasy bar with limited capacity.

“We like to think of it as an immersive experience…the idea is that when you come here, we want you to feel like you’ve been transported back to the 1920s, like a forbidden cocktail bar,” Joey said. Quatmann, the general. administrator.

TAILOR-MADE COCKTAILS

According to Quatmann, it’s not common knowledge that during Prohibition “there was a thriving cocktail culture”, and that era inspired the venue’s theme.

“What makes our menu unique from other bars is [that] we kind of specialize in ‘bartender’s choice’ where… you specifically tell the bartender what you want and the bartender will craft something on the spot,” Quatmann said.

THREE BARS, ONE PLACE

The Rabbit Hole shares the building with two other bars: the White Rabbit Bar and the Parlor Room.

Besides the fact that The Rabbit Hole is a speakeasy, there’s another reason it shares the facility.

Nick Medina

“We have this fictional character, known as Dr O’Hare. And the idea is that he was a doctor in the 1920s and he had a mansion… each of these individual bars is a different part of his mansion,” Quatmann said. “So you have the main bar, which is The White Rabbit, which is you know the cocktail experience. You have The Parlor Room, which is a nightclub. And then you have The Rabbit Hole which is a more intimate kind of experience.

IF YOU ARE GOING TO

• Click here to make a reservation for The Rabbit Hole.
• Location: 207 N Gilbert Road in Gilbert, Arizona.
• Opening hours: Friday and Saturday from 5 p.m. to 12 a.m.

Three enterprising business partners are about to open a new Ashland nightclub in a once-famous location for all the wrong reasons. Given the history of the previous establishment on Will Dodge Way, it is understandable that members of city council and other members of the community have expressed concern over the approval of a liquor license for the new company, the Trap Door. What is not understandable is to hold the new owners responsible for what happened under the previous management.

In the end, council members voted to approve the application for an unrestricted liquor license. It was the right choice, and the Oregon Liquor and Cannabis Commission is expected to give final approval to the request.

The previous establishment, known as the Vinyl Club, was the site of years of disorderly conduct complaints involving drunkenness, public urination and violence, including a 2018 incident in which a bouncer at the Vinyl Club was charged with second-degree assault for beating a customer, inflicting grievous bodily harm. Shortly after, the OLCC told the owner of the Vinyl Club to give up his liquor license for 28 days or pay a fine. He chose to close the business and sell it instead.

The new owners waited out the pandemic before looking to open a new business, spending the time remodeling the space to accommodate an upscale lounge and cocktail bar. They plan to limit occupancy to 59 people to maintain an intimate atmosphere, and offer craft cocktails and high-quality cuisine.

Given the venue’s history, City Council considered approving the liquor license application with conditions, including limiting the amount of alcohol in cocktails, limiting the hours of live music, and prohibiting serve drinks after 1am. The advisers correctly decided not to recommend any restrictions.

It would have been unfair to the new owners, who deserve the opportunity to show that they can operate a brand new business responsibly. The OLCC would consider pursuing a report examining past issues with the location. If this is the case, the commission should not hold the new owners responsible for events that have occurred in the past in a place that has been closed for three years.

If problems arise in the future, the City and the OLCC can address them. Unless and until they do, new owners should benefit from the doubt.

At first glance, the month-old Bottled Blonde Pizzeria + Beer Garden could pass for another hot new import to hit Miami in the past year.

Located off 29th Street, just west of where Wynwood’s traffic begins to thicken and slow down, its open layout with a huge central bar – flanked by 49 HDTV monitors, walls of projectors 24 feet tall and a whimsical pin-up setup – looks like the Wynwood sports bar didn’t know it was necessary. It’s an ambience that invites anyone who passes by to stop and consider having a drink or perusing the menu.

Do that and you’ll find it’s the kind of place you can order chicken wings, a Caesar salad or a pizza for between $14 and $22, dishes that pair well with your choice of cold beer or cocktail for about $8 to $18. .

Get there later in the evening, though, and it’s also the kind of place you can spend a year’s worth of bottle service tuition with a show.

The Arizona-based venue is one of more than a dozen out-of-state imports to target Wynwood as its new frontier. Founded by husband-and-wife team Les and Diane Corieri, the concept — which has locations scattered across Texas and Arizona — epitomizes the couple’s version of a “high-energy” establishment that features a sports bar, Italian-themed lunch and dinner menus and a late-night venue all under one roof.

Originally from Iowa, the Corieris opened their first bar in a small college town in the late 1970s. After getting a taste of the hospitality industry, they opened their first nightclub-inspired venue after moving in the Phoenix suburb of Tempe in 1985.

Over the next decade, a string of two dozen nightlife and dining establishments followed – among them Jetz, Stixx and the Axis nightclub – venues that the couple say helped the once sleepy section of the Old Town Scottsdale to come alive.

The concepts flourished in the 90s and early 2000s, but a wave of change set in around 2010, slowing business as Las Vegas nightclubs began promoting big-name artists in their venues. just 30 minutes away, says Les. new times.

“We noticed that the bigger nightclubs were becoming DJ-centric, and it was too expensive to compete with that,” says Les. “So we decided to come up with a fun concept that was indoors/outdoors with a more laid back atmosphere but still had that late night energy.”

In 2014, the couple opened the first Bottled Blonde in Scottsdale. Les says it was his own vision of a casual sports bar that could turn into an upscale nightclub, a format he has since expanded to multiple locations, including Miami, with Nashville and Las Vegas following suit.

Over the years, Bottled Blonde has stayed true to its original vision, delivering subtle “breastaurant” vibes earlier in the evening before transforming into a high-energy nightclub. To wit: At 11 p.m., a 15-minute makeover transforms the 9,000-square-foot space from waiters in cropped tank tops and cut-off shorts overseeing picnic-style meals into VIP lounges where Miamians can drop up to at $9,500 on “Star Wars,” Pokémon and Ghostbusters-themed bottle service. If those prices seem tame, one of the many bottled liquor packages is $23,000.

In March, new times noted the arrival of a troupe of lingerie-clad young women—propped up on mini-motorbikes hoisted into the air by a team of male waiters—at Bottled Blonde. Partying and cheering their way through the restaurant, the neon lights strobe to the beat of the music, it seemed like that’s what Bottled Blonde is all about.

And maybe it’s okay. While the concept didn’t pan out too well in a quiet Chicago neighborhood, it seems perfectly suited to Miami, where bottle service of this type is usually relegated to the confines of high-end nightclubs like LIV and Story.

Now, since Bottled Blonde has arrived, anyone can enjoy the show, even with a slice of pizza and a beer in hand. And if the pricey bottle wrappers aren’t your thing, the experience continues with $100, 100-ounce mimosa towers for weekend brunch, served in a yard-long glass. If not, then definitely the $17 Adult Capri Sun, an adult-sized Bottled Blonde branded beverage pouch filled with Tito’s fortified strawberry and banana juice that manages to taste surprisingly true.

And what about food? By day, for lunch and dinner or late night, Bottled Blonde deviates from the trope of sports bar fare with its short and sweet selection of antipasti, pizzas, salads and sandwiches. Topping the list of favorites: the vodka pie, a marriage of red cream sauce topped with prosciutto, red pepper and Parmesan cheese ($16). While a simple sauce-only topping might sound good at first, it works, and the only real quirk is how a rich, basted layer manages to perch perfectly on each slice.

Signature dishes found at the brand’s restaurants include dishes like shrimp served in a sambuca-enriched garlic cream sauce. Or Diane’s favorite “bang bang” cauliflower appetizer in Calabrian chili sauce, hailed as a popular favorite at the original location.

But the Crispy Chicken Sliders ($19) are a must here. Rob Gronkowski is said to have eaten 72 of them in one sitting, and here’s why: They’re tender and moist under a crispy shell, compliments of a well-timed brine. and ranch-seasoned breadcrumbs. Sandwiched between two fluffy tufts of sweet Hawaiian roll, they need nothing more than a few slices of pickle and a dollop of the chef’s own “secret” sauce as sidekicks.

So, is Bottled Blonde a casual sports bar or a nightclub? The answer is both. It’s a laid-back place to grab a few beers and watch the game in the afternoon, or a lively place to celebrate a rowdy birthday after dark. And it’s time everyone had a place to splurge on a few thousand dollars on bottle service if the evening calls for it.

Blonde in a bottle. 2838 NW Second Avenue Miami; 786-673-6925; bottledblondepizzeria.com. Monday to Friday from 4 p.m. to 3 a.m.; Saturday and Sunday from noon to 3 a.m.

original name Hotel Kernan After its builder, theater magnate James Lawrence Kernan, the Hotel du Congrès was built in 1903 to cater to musical theater lovers. The six-story French Revival-style hotel had 150 sumptuously appointed rooms and an art gallery. Two underground tunnels housed a Turkish bath, hair salon and swimming pool, and connected hotel guests to the adjacent Auditorium (now the Mayfair Theatre) and the Maryland Theater (demolished in 1951), both owned in Kernan. A savvy developer on par with PT Barnum, Kernan billed his hotel and theater complex as a “triple million dollar business.”

Kernan’s million-dollar triple venture has turned Franklin and Howard streets into Baltimore’s nightlife nexus. The Maryland Theater featured top vaudeville talent of the day, including Buster Keaton and Charlie Chaplin, and later Will Rogers, Weber & Fields, Al Jolson and Eddie Cantor, while the Auditorium focused on traditional pieces.

Taking advantage of the steady influx of German immigrants to the United States, Kernan converted the basement of the hotel into a rathskeller, a traditional German beer hall. Nicknamed “the bear pit” after Berlin’s mascot depicted on the German capital’s coat of arms, it was the city’s first real nightclub. The Great Depression saw the decline of the grand downtown hotel era. In 1932, the Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company purchased Kernan’s Million-Dollar Triple Enterprise at a bankruptcy auction for a mere $225,000 and reopened it a year later on October 5, 1933. , as The Congress Hotel.

By the 1970s, Congress had slipped into flophouse status, its single-occupancy rooms renting for less than $5 a day. In 1977, brothers Angelo and Samuel (“Sam”) Palumbo, a draftsman with the city’s housing department, purchased the property. In 1979, the brothers racked up 174 housing code violations, including citations for lack of working smoke detectors. A contemporary article in The Baltimore News-American lamented that “Congress has grown increasingly crummy, like an old movie star out of luck.”

“Pretty much a flea hotel,” is how jazzman Scott Cunningham remembers Congress. In 1976, when Cunningham was looking for a venue for his eponymous jazz band, not only the hotel, but also its surroundings had become unstable. Sam Palumbo showed Cunningham the Galaxy ballroom on the lobby level, then the dust-encrusted bar in the basement. Peering through the patina of grime, Cunningham spotted potential in the subterranean space. He wasn’t wrong. Once they removed the vinyl panels covering the wall behind the bar, it revealed the space’s original rathskeller-era oak paneling and mirrors. But the biggest win turned out to be the bar itself. Scrubbing away decades of rust-colored soot, Cunningham and his aides unveiled the crowning glory: a spectacular 72-foot-long bar carved from white Italian marble. Cunningham had found his place and a name: the Marble Bar.

To create word-of-mouth buzz and a following, Cunningham distributed flyers to nearby University of Maryland Medical School and offered free admission to students. The Scott Cunningham Band played there several nights a week while Cunningham worked with a promoter to book an eclectic mix of acts, including Muddy Waters and Talking Heads.

The Marble’s loyal clientele would be cemented by Cunningham’s successors, Roger and LesLee Anderson. In 1974, Roger, a bluegrass and rock ‘n’ roll player from Kentucky who grew up in West Baltimore, was also looking for a venue for his band, Clear. Engineer by day, he had met Sam Palumbo on a project for the city. The two hit it off, and Palumbo offered her the Galaxy Ballroom. For three years, Roger’s band performed in the ballroom on the lobby level of the hotel.

Meanwhile, in the basement, the Marble was struggling. The Spartan space lacked heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer. The construction of Franklin Street cost the bar its precious parking lot. Cunningham closed it in 1978 and Sam Palumbo handed over the keys to the Andersons, asking them to manage and lease the space.

At the time, the Andersons were excited for a move to California that they had never made. Before sealing the deal, the couple met Palumbo, who LesLee said treated her like she was invisible. Furious, she returns home and lays down the law. “Before I go there and work, he will respect me. And that’s all there is to it,” she recalls saying. Thereafter, she led the two Palumbo brothers with a mix of modern feminism and old-school charm.

Soothing the brothers’ periodic outbursts proved the least of the Andersons’ challenges. Crowd-pleasing disco bands were expensive, with some having as many as nine musicians, a serious consideration given the pair had to pay for the talent out of pocket. In addition to the award, Roger despised disco. The alternative: bring in a fresh new sound that wouldn’t cost a lot. “And punks march,” LesLee recalls with a laugh.

Although Roger was initially against booking punk acts – he turned down the police – he was eventually won over. Da Moronics and Judies Fixation were the first reserved punk bands. Off the Wall and The Slickee Boys played Marble once a month, drawing crowds that LesLee said “kept us afloat.”

LesLee recalls Roger saying, “’These kids, they’re playing three-chord music. And they have the time of their life. I will book more of them…as long as they do the right thing.

To many people’s surprise, the children did well. Roger made sure of that.

“No one played with Roger,” says Wilcox, lead singer of Rock Hard Peter. “I remember him breaking up an entire group, whether they were moshing too madly or whatever, with a two-by-four. Things pretty much calmed down after that. He ruled with an iron fist and a heart of gold.

“ROGER AND LESLEE GAVE BIRTH TO A SCENE THAT EMPOWERED PEOPLE TO BE FREE AND TO EXPRESS THEMSELVES.”

Roger took a personal interest in the young artists who flocked to the bar, buying instruments for budding musicians who couldn’t afford to buy their own, and even allowed graffiti in the hotel’s former barbershop. , then used as the main entrance to the bar. According to LesLee, “Roger always said, you give kids art and music at a young age, and it will save their lives.”

Under the Andersons, the Marble Bar became the place to listen to punk music. Stiff footsteps led the club kids from the street into a blanket of darkness, the only light coming from the stage and behind the bar. The cavernous atmosphere fostered a sense of self-reliance. And freedom. Flooding the dance floor, patrons sported styles ranging from mohawks to dreadlocks, many of them dancing with themselves. It was a dungeon for some, a sanctuary for others.

LesLee has fond memories of how Roger used comedy to empty the bar at closing time. “He would say things like, ‘It’s not your mother’s womb, so don’t get too comfortable.’ Or what would really make them run out the door: “All virgins can stay.”

The last call at the Marble may have been at 2 a.m., but for the Andersons, running the club was a 24/7 labor of love that extended across the country. home to fashion shows, art exhibits, poetry readings and even rock ‘n’ roll flea markets. .

“We didn’t have kids,” LesLee explains. “We weren’t very extravagant people. We just put everything back in the bar – bigger shows, more music, national acts.

LesLee, a musician and songwriter herself, had barkeeping in her blood. His family owned Nelson’s, a local watering hole in southwest Baltimore. At The Marble, she wore many hats, including running and maintaining the bar, booking acts, and acting as surrogate parent for many young punks. “They used to call me mum, all the little punk girls out there with their little black lipstick and their black rouge. They would all call me mum, a whole pocket of them. They still call me mum.

Jon Taffer, the ‘Bar Rescue’ host who likes to fix bars by shouting ‘shut it up’ and adding ‘not one, but two two-touch POS systems’, apparently did just that at a restaurant of Ybor City, which is set to become the latest Florida property featured on the show.

The Loft Elevated Bar + Food reopened earlier this month after first opening as a nostalgic, milk-guzzling Cerealholic Cafe and Bar in December 2020.

Axios says The Loft — still at 1909 N 15th St., former home of Ybor’s LGBTQ+ bar The Social — has been the subject of an upcoming episode of “Bar Rescue,” though the airdate of the issue is unknown.

Gone is Cerealholic’s cereal bar, signature burgers with apple jack infused meat, replaced instead by a Loft weekend brunch menu that aims to “elevate” your breakfast with dishes like a pancake platter, steak and eggs, biscuits and gravy – all served Saturday- Sunday 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Its non-breakfast menu includes hot chicken and waffles, an anytime breakfast sandwich, barbecue pork nachos, cheese dips, and a Cuban panini.

This Jon Taffer sure has the best ideas — and don’t worry, it looks like the drag shows are still going.

Hours of operation for the Loft Elevated Bar + Food in Ybor City are Thursday 4:30pm-10:30pm, Friday 4:30pm-1:00am, Saturday 10:00am-1:00am and Sunday 10:00am-7:00pm.