Happy marriage between robust brown ale and hop-centric India Pale Ale works dark chocolate nuttiness into citric-oiled hop resin and latent wood char. Burnt caramel malting picks up hazelnut molasses sweetness as recessive grapefruit, pineapple and tangerine fruiting dwells beneath.

Instead of trying to reinvent what has become an institution for the affluent Ridgewood community, the new owners of THE OFFICE BEER BAR & GRILL simply refined an outmoded menu while continuing to bring fantastic craft beers to local minions. A veritable sportsbar (previously home to the long-gone Brass Lamp), The Office quickly earned its stripes as a reliable downtown hotspot since opening in 1995.

 Located one block away from the train station, a black and red awning…

Boldly rounded full body with exemplary sweet-sour-bitter balance allows hemp-like hop oils to positively affect milky brown chocolate entry, chewy maple molasses-sapped anise goo and sugary oatmeal-toasted backdrop. Advertised espresso adjunct pervades ancillary chocolate cake, chocolate pudding, soy, dried cherry and pipe tobacco illusions. Vinous red-wined sherry boozing settles beside rum-spiced tingle above earthen peat bottom and ashen pine soot. Lusty 10% alcohol thrust well hidden by luxurious chocolate creaminess and hop-charred pine char. 

Widely acclaimed traditional English-styled bitter plies delicate mineral water to lightly creamed caramel malting and gentle Fuggle hop bittering. Smoothly robust considering moderate 4.3% alcohol flow, allowing phenol-spiced marzipan, raisin bread, black cherry, dried fig, and pecan illusions to sway resinous peat backdrop. The nebulous Copper Ale style owes a debt of gratitude to this proudly British Extra Special Bitter. Holds up to scrutiny.

HOBOKEN’S PILSENER HAUS & BIERGARTEN TAKES OFF

Sometimes the waiting is the hardest part. Cutting through red tape and getting local politicians onboard for a new venture could cost many young entrepreneurs the chance of a lifetime.

It may’ve taken three motivated European immigrants two-and-a-half years to finally get clearance for Hoboken’s first ever biergarten, but it has proved to be a resounding success. Fashioned after authentic pre-World War One Austro-Hungarian bistros, yet easily mistaken for a bustling German beer…

One of America’s newest musical sensations has been a humble East Coast quintet that grew out of an absurdist art project at a snootily unappreciative upscale college. It may’ve taken them a few months to catch on with the masses, but MGMT incredibly made the jump from interesting indie pop apprentices (with an addictive techno edge) to universal dance-pop champions (raised on a diet of Rhythm & Blues, prog-rock, new wave, disco, and, for good measure, ‘60s psychedelia). Theirs is…

1962-1964

…

This article originally appeared in Aquarian Weekly March ’10.

…

 Branching out beyond reflective folk-based singer-songwriter to artful Jazz-affected rhapsodist, multi-talented acoustic guitarist-pianist Joe Henry’s a roving chameleon who has become entrusted producer for several veteran singers. Fact is, the unrivaled Los Angeles transplant refined and redefined his widening artistic profile over the course of a dozen evolving albums while commendably reintroducing respectful aged-in-the-wool vocalists who’d been unfairly neglected in recent years.

…

TOLEDO, OHIO

In an old red brick building off Route 79 near industrial port of Toledo lies high-ceilinged multi-purpose venue MAUMEE BAY BREWING, visited August ‘06. Its large spread includes banquet facilities, several dining areas, and a commodious bar with immense liquor-stored antique-mirrored mantle. Wood cabinets with beer bottles and cans take up open spaces along stairwells and backrooms while kitchen serves sandwiches, pizza, burgers, and chicken.

On tap, sucked up light dry-bodied maize-soured wheat-chaffed malt-sweetened Buckeye Beer (bottled versions…

Au Revoir Simone are three long-legged long-haired lasses living in Brooklyn who weave gossamer pillow-talked seductions through minimalist melodic symphonies, futurist lounge pop, celestial ambient abstractions, and buoyant cybernetic Kraut-rock. Customarily using vintage manual input devices, their most accomplished set yet, ‘09s Still Night, Still Light, refines the ethereal Casio-glazed gauzy linearity, buzz-y electro whirs, and pulsating crystalline balladry previously put forth.

Heather, who’d been watching Pee Wee’s Playhouse religiously, took their French moniker from a line in the movie

…

Radical anti-commercial Dadaist pranksters, Pissed Jeans, prove boisterous vertigo-inducing art-damaged delirium and grimy rough-hewn gruffness could still rule the subterranean jungle. Sordid passive-aggressive business professionals by day, they’d rather be stuck in the scummy muck of stinky broken-down clubs than relish the cushy comfort their restrictive money-making traditional jobs proffer.

Though Pissed Jeans call God’s Country home, these misanthropic non-conformists make a turbulent hell-bent racket the devil would dig way more than any heavenly divinity. Formed from the ashes…