StL Adventure #56
StL Adventure #56: Catch the Soulard Blues Band performing at the Broadway Oyster Bar.
So here’s the deal with this challenge – I had to split it in two. It seems the Soulard Blues Band regularly performs at the Oyster Bar on Monday nights. And I’m too boring to go out on a Monday night : ) So, seeing the Soulard Blues Band has become challenge #74 on the list and #56 has been edited to Catching live music at the Broadway Oyster Bar.
Last Friday, after completing #57, Zac and I and our partners in list-completing crime set out to find a suitable place for some more beverages and live music. We scanned our options around the downtown area and decided to check out the Broadway Oyster Bar.
This is a place I’ve wanted to go since we first moved to the area. It just looks cool and it looks like our kind of place.
I need to stop here and define ‘our kind of place’ because I have a feeling it will be an oft used phrase in this series. Our kind of place includes a few things:
local and smallish – I don’t like chains, I don’t like huge. I prefer locally owned or family owned and always lean toward something more intimate or personal in size. If its obvious the place is packed with people who live within walking distance, extra points for that.
style – I like a place that looks old. Old wood floors, old brick walls, old farmhouse tables, vintage anything. I’m also a sucker for dim lighting especially if that lighting falls under the categories of strung-up or rustic. If you decorate your walls with old photographs, I’m hooked. I also like places whose style makes you wonder if the floors are dirty.
friendly – I like a place where the staff talks to you, kindly. I do not, under any circumstances, do pretentious. If you feel the need to act fancy, talk fancy or appear aloof its not because you’re refined it’s because you’re trying to fool either yourself or everyone around you and I want nothing to do with that. That’s not to say I don’t like like nice places and fine dining. I do. I just prefer establishments that have determined ‘fine dining’ and ‘friendly’ are not mutually exclusive.
music – I prefer it to be live. I am a lover of dudes with beards and acustic guitars. Blues, jazz, Irish or rock bands are also favorites. I’ll settle for pumped-in music if I must, but if its top 40, I’m going to need another round of drinks.
talkative patrons – I don’t like to be in places where everyone is acting like they don’t notice the other people around them. You’ve been to places like that, right? It’s strange! I’m all for conversations with people in the booth next to you and chatty drunks.
Alright so now you know what I’m saying when I say ‘our kind of place.’
So Broadway Oyster Bar looked like our kind of place but I don’t like oysters, or seafood in general save for a few select dishes, so we’d never ventured in.
But Friday we marched our happily fed selves right thru the door, encouraged by no shortage of avocado mango margaritas. I was instantly in love. Deep love. The music was perfect. It sounded like a hot, humid summer Saturday night. It was a freezing cold Friday night, but still. We snagged a few drinks at the patio bar, where the band was set up and grabbed a table to enjoy the music, the crazy decor and the lights strung from the ceiling.
In the phones please observe: live music, dim lighting, strung-up lighting, friendly looking patrons and a bearded dude with a guitar. I swear I didn’t know I had a picture of a bearded guy with a guitar when I mentioned it in the “my kind of place” ramblings.
We hung out for quite a while enjoying the music and atmosphere. Broadway Oyster Bar will be an absolute repeat AND next time we’ll be dining there also. We got a peak at the menu and happy for me, there were lots of amazing sounding things that I’d like to eat. The Hubs is looking forward to trying the oysters which are apparently served 800 different ways.
Big bonus – we nabbed a Groupon for the Oyster Bar so now we can dine and enjoy the music on the cheap. Which means our return visit will be sooner rather than later! I’ll post an update about the food after that happens.
As for the Soulard Blues Band…I’ve got an eye on their schedule and hope to catch them in the next few months. They are playing a few different spots that I’ve never been too, so maybe the list will again broaden my horizons. But, there also playing at one of my favorite local wineries. Is there a better Saturday than one spent with wine and blues music? There is not.