CLANCY OVERELL | Editor | CONTACT
A cool new dive bar that has just opened in one of those nameless suburbs that surrounds the Sydney Cricket Ground has been praised for it’s authentic New York-vibe, in a city that struggles with hosting any form of nightlife.
The trendy early to mid-evening venue known as ‘Boy Named Sue’ is so compact that they barely even have a kitchen, forcing them to rely on popcorn and toasted cheese sandwiches to fulfil their liquor licensing obligation to serve food.
“What I wanted was to create a place for people to come and drink and laugh in an environment where they didn’t feel like there was a policeman staring at their back of their heads the entire time” said the owner Luccio Appolo.
“We’ve got Wu-Tang clan playing during the day and Johnny Cash playing at night. It’s just like New York, where I used to live, before Brooklyn became cool”
However, unluckily for Luccio, while his old home in Williamsburg was becoming slightly lame with gentrification -his hometown of Sydney was becoming much, much lamer with their lock-out laws against nightlife noise and venue opening hours.
“It’s weird” he said.
“Like, most of my customers are off-the-rails real estate agents and stockbrokers who are having affairs with their assistants. Where are all the kids?”
“My barista changes every 88 days because the only young people trying their luck with this city are trustfunded Brazilians and English backpackers”
However, according to countless food blogs, Luccio’s venue is just like NEW YORK CITY.
Apart from the fact that he can be fined up to $30k dollars if he makes noise after 10pm and is found to be serving anyone who police deem to be intoxicated.
“We’ve had a few cops come in here with breathalysers” he said.
“Luckily the only person he got was one of our staffmembers who’d just knocked off. Apparently staff can be as fucked as they want”
However, Luccio remains optimistic that something might change when politicians realise that the city is turning into a lamer version of Adelaide.
“The cops have pulled back a little bit. They used to walk through every hour. Now it’s only a couple times a night – except on Sundays when the neighbours are watching Midsummer Murders”
“Aside from the Harbour, I didn’t think Sydney had enough going for it to shut down nightclubs in an attempt to keep the inner-city boomers happy”
