original sinners and boston dive bars

I've heard the Exene record and I'm not really a fan, but if you're in the Central Sq area of Cambridge (where the show is), check out the Middle East, the best venue in town, but also a great bar even if you're not going to a show. In Allston (a neighborhood of Boston), there are two pretty cool dive bars: the Model and the Silhouette.

I think the Original Sinner's debut album is fantastic, my favorite X side project, and probably my favorite non-Zoom X thing. I may be alone in this assessment though, so YMMV. I think this incarnation is a completely different band, so I've got no idea how they'd be live. But the material is great psychobilly.

The People's Republik is at 876 Mass Ave, just down the road from the ME.

Our local arbiter of .. um ... whatever, the Phoenix, gave this year's best-of laurels to the Sam Adams Brewery in Jamaica Plain, but that's a bit of a hike.

In Somerville (next door to Cambridge), the PHX calls the Abbey Lounge "a once, current, and future crummy dive with cheap beer, cool bands (every Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night), and a truly cruddy ambience that borders on the poetic."

Out on the Green Line amongst the BU kids and other low-rent loft rats, the Model Café (7 North Beacon Street, Allston) has (in the past) drawn the legions of Allston/Brighton hipster-types with its legendary jukebox and (more) cheap-ass drafts. "The best place in town to glimpse rock stars hanging out among the common folk of Allston."

(Regarding all of this advice, keep in mind, of course, that I don't drink.)

i wouldn't discourage anyone from seeing an original sinners show -- the record falls flat, but they're great live.

Not a dive bar but a show that you should check out in Boston (if it's not the same night as The Original Sinners.)

http://myspace-917.vo.llnwd.net/00565/71/90/565220917_l.jpg

Won't be there on Saturday but, thanks to all for comments/suggestions. Keep 'em coming.

I live 300 feet away from the shabby Abbey Lounge, and can highly recommend it...also, check out All-Asia, on Mass. Ave. in Cambridge (Central Square)...

Ah yes, the All Asia is quite a popular place nowadays too.

All Asia's popular, but not divey. For a dive I'd suggest Sligo in Davis Square. My place of preference, though, is the Red Hat in Beacon Hill, which is where I'll be spending about 12 of the next 30 hours.

Brendan Behan bar in Jamaica Plain has the reputation of being "the most dimly lit bar in Boston."

The Silhouette, right near The Model, is a great dive bar. Darts, free popcorn, pitchers of beer, booths, tv's pool tables, weird people, both old young, hip, and painfully uncool hang out there. Oh yeah and they have Keno!

I would hardly call this place a dive, but you must check the Littlest Bar, in Boston (Downtown Crossing, Province Street), especially as it may not be long for this earth...

I believe the Littlest Bar has already closed.

I live right around the corner from Behan's...definitely a favorite.

That Ho-Ag show should be a good time...

All Asia blows. There's a slew of other better bars in that area.

ok so i lurk here a lot and i'm drunk because today is EVACUATION DAY, in suffolk county. allston is cool but mission hill is cooler. so go to flann o'brien's or penguin for lots of goofy people being goofy.

but for rockin' go to great scott in allston, hi ben sisto, i checked you out at the library once!

There is a real fuckin' dump in South Boston near the corner of D and West 1st. (In fact, there are tons.) It's full of real assholes, but the walls are a checkerboard of the glass backs from old pinball machines -- y'know, those sheets of glass that you look at for the scrore and stuff and they have wild illustrations. I used to live around the corner from that place. But be warned -- if you are even adventurous/crazy rnough to go there -- it is filled with pricks, pricks who stare at outsiders. But those walls are so wild. It's a photo-op. I always thought the place would have made a great article for that old zine about pinball and music.

Then again, maybe the place has been razed for trendy condos, but I doubt it.