Good Bar grand opens tonight right at the start of Bedford Avenue on the Greenpoint/Williamsburg border. The self-described “record listening bar” hopes to add to the local DJ scene that its sister nightclub, Good Room, has been cultivating for the past seven years.
Co-owner and vinyl lover Greg Briar personally oversaw the concept. “I wanted a place where you could listen to the whole record,” he told Bedford + Bowery when we sat down with him earlier this week. “A lot of these are my albums too, plus we he had folks like Paul Raffaele from (DJ duo) Love Injection help curate what we’ve got here.”
When a record ran out during our conversation, Briar went to flip it over and described the bar’s audiophilic engine. “This turntable is a Thorens TD 160 that dates back to the ’70s and was made in Switzerland. These speakers above us are Klipsch Heresy III’s that they’ve been continuously making since 1964 and they sound absolutely beautiful.”Â
After soft opening three weeks ago, Briar has his drinks menu ready for the public. Naturally, they’re named after his favorite records: “Like a Virgin, Purple Rain, Nuyorican Soul,” he listed to us. “And then there’s my favorite, Grace Jones. We also have food, by the way. There’s a cheeseburger, chicken burger, and we added pierogis as a nod to the neighborhood.”
Good Bar was formerly occupied by Nights and Weekends and Briar kept the English phone booth that was outside. Above it, now, is a neon sign with his bar’s logo by artist Braulio Amado. Inside, there’s a new mural painted by Michelle Kesselman. Briar told us that he’d been interested in the space ever since he opened up Good Room further down Manhattan Avenue. “I was walking by this place forever and thought it was a cool little spot. When I saw that the lease was up, I jumped at it.”
Good Bar is located at 1 Bedford Ave. in Greenpoint/Williamsburg, open every day 5pm-late.