NIGHTLIFE
BEST-LOOKING CLIENTELE #2, BEST LOUNGE #9: W Hotel
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Best Bartender
1. Gern F. at Grumpy’s
2. Sarah Ouellet at Brutopia
3. Dylan Kennett at Benelux
4. Sonia at GoGo Lounge
5. Bruce Mattieu at Pub Claddagh
6. Maia Davies at Grumpy’s Bar
7. Shayne Patenaude at Sir Winston
Churchill’s Pub
8. Stacey at Tokyo
9. Ram at Grumpy’s Bar
10. Kim at Barfly
Honourable mentions: Bill at Saphir, Foufs• Melodie at Saphir• Prasie at Orchid• Jen at Cock ’n’ Bull
Look, good bartending isn’t a matter of corny bottle juggling and flashy stunts, Tom Cruise be damned. The best at this demanding trade are those who combine the skills of the amiable raconteur, the amateur psychiatrist and the hyperactive social coordinator with all manner of alcoholic alchemy, the specifics of which they’ve completely committed to memory. After hovering near the top for a couple of years, Gern F. (like Best Waitress Felicity Hamer, below, the F-meister is also part of United Steel Workers of Montreal, who’ve rated aces in the music categories this year). Two of his Grumpy’s colleagues also chart here, suggesting that the grumpiness stops at the sign above the door.
Best Waiter/Waitress
1. Felicity Hamer at Brutopia
2. Jane at Brutopia
3. Susan at Bifteck
4. Lauren at GoGo Lounge
5. Kristy at Foufounes Électriques
6. Melo at Saphir
7. Marie-Claude at Copacabana
8. Gwelf at Saphir
9. Stacy Kennedy at Tokyo
10. Myriam Rousseau at Benelux
Honourable mentions: Eric at Santa Lucia• Amy at Cock ’n’ Bull• Bruce Matthew at Pub Claddagh
Best Watering Hole
1. Bifteck
2. Brutopia
3. Cock ’n’ Bull
4. Grumpy’s
5. Barfly
6. Copacabana
7. Hurley’s Irish Pub
8. Madhatter’s
9. Foufounes Électriques
10. Peel Pub
Best Sleazy Dive
1. Bifteck
2. Cock ’n’ Bull
3. Barfly
4. Miami
5. Reggie’s
6. Diana Pub
7. Thursday’s
8. Madhatters
9. Copacabana
10. Winnie’s
It tells you something about Montrealers that “nasty, déclassé hole in the wall” and “beloved locale were I enjoy the company of my dearest friends” mean pretty much the same thing to us. The ol’ Biffer takes the top slot in both the Watering Hole and Sleazy Dive categories (Miami ruled the latter for years… how the mighty have fallen!). Brutopia and Grumpy’s manage to avoid the sleaze tag, but Cock ’n’ Bull, Barfly, Copa and Madhatters all make both lists, suggesting that we don’t mind following our tequila shots with tetanus shots.
BEST PICK-UP SPOT, BEST HAPPY HOUR #6, BEST SLEAZY DIVE #7: Thursday’s
1. Brutopia
2. Pub Claddagh
3. Carlos & Pepes
4. Vol de Nuit
5. Foufounes Électriques
6. Thursday’s
7. Peel Pub
8. Cheers
9. Winnie’s
10. McKibbin’s Irish Pub
Best Pick-up Spot
1. Thursday’s
2. GoGo Lounge
3. Reggies
4. Brutopia
5. Cheers
6. Tokyo
7. Foufounes Électriques
8. corner of Ste-Catherine & St-Laurent
9. Saphir
10. Fringe Festival
Thursday’s maintains its grip on meat-market supremacy! As in 2005 and 2006, the Crescent Street joint is acknowledged as the best place to get your mack on (and presumably, following that, your pants off). Other perennials in this category pop up—Cheers, Tokyo, Foufs. As for the wiseacres who suggested the corner of the Main and Ste-Catherine, enjoy it while it lasts, chumps. Before long, that area will be cleaned up and converted into a family-friendly tourist/arts zone. Finally, we have a new contender this year, the Fringe Fest… the perfect place for cruising if you have a fetish for avant-garde mimes, self-loathing collegiate poetesses and chunky, balding, morally decrepit festival directors.
Best-looking Clientele
1. Time Supperclub
2. W Hotel
3. GoGo Lounge
4. Brutopia
5. Buona Notte
6. Club Opera
7. Foufounes Électriques
8. Tokyo
9. 1234
10. Saphir The upscale joints take it this year, with Time at the top. Keep in mind though that they and Buona Notte, Opera and others have the benefit of the velvet rope, the pricey drinks and the exacting dress code, which adds up to effective social Darwinism in the looks department. Nice to see Foufs and Saphir in there, suggesting that for some, looking freaky, spiky, glammed up and gothy will get you points too.
Best Terrasse
1. St-Sulpice
2. Unity
3. St-Elizabeth
4. The Main
5. Madhatters
6. Tokyo
7. 737
8. Vol de Nuit
9. Sir Winston Churchill Pub
10. Santropol
Best Live Venue
1. La Sala Rossa
2. Metropolis
3. Spectrum
4. Club Soda
5. Foufounes Électriques
6. Main Hall
7. Le National
8. Barfly
9. Casa del Popolo
10. The Green Room
Woulda been nice to see le Spectrum ace this category, if only because by next year, the hallowed standby of mid-sized shows in Montreal will be condos and a Best Buy, apparently. On the other hand, la Sala is a great room—looks good, sounds good, and the beer’s priced right.
Best Lounge
1. GoGo Lounge
2. Jello Bar
3. Vinyl
4. Kafein
5. Typhoon
6. Sofa
7. Blizzarts
8. Laïka
9. W Hotel
10. Newtown
Best Jazz Bar
1. Upstairs
2. House of Jazz
3. Grumpy’s
4. Jello Bar
5. Kemia
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6. Pub Quartier Latin
7. Kafein
8. Bistro à Jojo
9. Bily Kun
10. Griffintown Café
Best Dance Club
1. Club Opera
2. Tokyo
3. Parking
4. Rouge
5. Saphir
6. Stereo
7. Orchid
8. Mile End
9. Unity
10. Tribe Hyperclub
Best Club Night
1. Saphir on Friday (Panic/Darkwave)
2. Parking on Thursday (Overdose/
Faggy Baggy)
3. Saphir’s Mix Thursdays
4. Tokyo on Sunday
(Goontribe)
5. Peer Pressure
6. Black and Blue
7. Tokyo on Thursday
8. Tribe Hyperclub on Thursday
9. Mile End Bar on Thursday
10. I Love Neon
BEST LOUNGE, BEST-LOOKING CLIENTELE #3, BEST
BARTENDER #4: GoGo
1. Redlite
2. Stereo
3. Circus
4. Aria (RIP)
5. Peer Pressure afterparties
6. Sona (RIP)
7. Gravity
8. Parking
9. Centre Fractal
10. Somebody’s apartment/loft
Best Rave/Party
1. Bal en Blanc
2. Black and Blue
3. Peer Pressure
4. I Love Neon
5. Nostalgia
6. Piknic Électronik
7. Stereo
8. Rewire
9. Redlite
10. Celebration
Best Promoter
1. Blue Skies Turn Black
2. Hello Darlin’
3. UrbanHanded Works
4. Peer Pressure
5. Greenland
6. Blended
7. ICM
8. A Fly Is on the Wall
9. Bitch Promotions
10. Donald K. Donald
The skies stay blue for indie-rock-and-beyond promoters BSTB, again the best-loved organizers of events after dark. Matt Large’s Hello Darlin’ outfit, who keep the roots music happening on the steady, creep up to second place following a number of strong shows this year, followed closely by the USWM-related UrbanHanded Works. Peer Pressure, they of the banging, bounce-oriented parties, slide down a slot from last year, while Greenland and Blended hold the same positions. Nice to see zesty newcomers A Fly Is on the Wall stepping in at number 8.
Best Strip Club
1. Kamasutra
2. Wanda’s
3. Club Downtown
4. Supersexe
5. 281
6. Solid Gold
7. Chez Parée
8. Les Amazones
9. Café Cleopatra
10. Bar Stock
Knocking the upscale Wanda’s out of the top slot they’ve held in recent years, Kamasutra (the Plateau’s peeler joint of preference) climbs up from last year’s second place to take top honours in this category. Club Downtown’s leap is even more impressive, from last year’s eighth to this year’s third place. Other standbys—the venerable Supersexe and Chez Parée, Solid Gold and Amazones, and for the ladies, Club 281—stay in the spotlight, no small feat in a town where strip clubs abound.
Best Gay Bar
1. Unity
2. Parking
3. Sky
4. Drugstore
5. Chez Mado
6. Stereo
7. Studs
8. Club Date
9. Café European
10. L’Aigle Noir
Best Lesbian Bar
1. Unity
2. Drugstore
3. Parking
4. There are none!
5. Sky
6. I don’t know
7. Metro Lounge
8. Sisters
9. Meow Mix
10. La Cagibi
Best Drag Queen
1. Mado
2. Anthony Garufi
3. Miss Gina
4. Plastik Patrik
5. Kiki
6. Sister Margaret
7. Sheena Hershey
8. Michel Dorion
9. Tracy Trash
10. Popeline
Best Pool Hall
1. Sharx
2. Scratch
3. Boule Noir
4. Fats
5. Trix
6. Drugstore
7. El Jumanji
8. Bifteck
9. Montreal Pool Hall
10. Shooters
Best Comedy Bar
1. Comedy Nest
2. Comedy Works
3. Comedy Off the Main
4. Oliveira’s
5. Théâtre Ste-Catherine
6. Juste Pour Rire
7. MainLine Theatre
8. Jimbo’s
9. Bourbon Street West
10. Grumpy’s on Tuesdays
Best Stand-up Comedian
1. Peter Radomski
2. Sugar Sammy
3. Joey Elias
4. Deanne Smith
5. Mike Paterson
6. Kevin Gasior
7. Andrew Searles
8. Lydia Lockett
9. Louis José Houde
10. Russell Peters
Best Drug
1. Marijuana
2. Ecstasy
3. Alcohol
4. Cocaine
5. Mushrooms
6. Caffeine
7. Speed
8. Hash
9. LSD
10. GHB
Hey, we just noticed something—the top four winners in this field, recited in order, is exactly the same wording as the second half of the chorus of the Queens of the Stone Age song “Feelgood Hit of the Summer,” dude! Serendipity… or complex conspiracy?
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BEST GAY BAR, BEST LESBIAN BAR, BEST TERRASSE #2,
BEST DANCE CLUB #9: Unity
A sassy lass with
the sauce
>> Felicity Hamer of Brutopia and USWM
is more than just your favourite waitress
by JOHNSON CUMMINS
When the Mirror reached Brutopia’s Felicity Hamer to give her the good news that she’d been elected by our fine readership as the city’s Best Waitress, she proved to be as effervescent as the frothy suds she serves every night.
Having served drinks at the Crescent Street pub for the past four years, Hamer first got her start as a waitress at the kind of watering hole that smelled like old people in a  blender, delivered the obligatory shaker of salt with every tavern glass and displayed pigs’ knuckles floating like a forgotten science project in a cloudy container on the bar—but was also where Hamer learned the lost art of paying personal attention to regulars that made her a shoo-in this year.
“It was kind of a strange place because it was more of an old man kind of bar,” says Hamer. “One night, one of the regulars didn’t show up, which was kind of odd, but after he didn’t show up for a whole week, we got kind of worried, so we called his girlfriend. She told us that he had died and we were all pretty taken aback, and had kind of a wake for him. After about a week, he came back in and just sat right down in his regular spot like nothing happened and just said, ‘I’ll have a Blue.’ It ended up he was just sick and his girlfriend was just trying to get him not to go to the bar anymore, but we thought he was dead until he drank that Blue. It was definitely a weird place.”
Hamer not only triumphed as a waitress this year, but also came out on top of the Best Country/Folk Act category with her band the United Steel Workers of Montreal. When the Mirror tracked her down on the phone in Halifax, the band were right in the middle of an East Coast tour. Hamer’s throaty croon and sweeping accordion perfectly offset co-singer Gern F.’s gruff growl and choppy strum, providing the perfect soundtrack for copious intake of amber nectar.
Gern F.’s no slouch himself, taking top place in the Best Bartender category for his service manning the taps at the Bishop Street pub Grumpy’s. Hamer admits it’s no wonder so many musicians choose to serve up the booze when not serving up the tunes.
“We’ve been really lucky in that when you are a bar worker, you can trade shifts if you have a gig, and both Gern and I have been really lucky that they let us off if we have a tour to do. The band really started from hanging around in the bar, and through open-mic nights, and you really get to meet a lot of great musicians hanging around here. Usually, as soon as I get off work, I just go across the parking lot to Grumpy’s, hang out with Gern and watch him pour pints.”
SEXIEST FRENCH
PICK-UP LINES
1. Voulez-vous coucher avec moi?
2. Ça va?
3. Bon soir/Bonjour
4. Salut bébé/coco/labelle/beauté/ma belle
5. Suce-moi/suces tu?/suce mon
6. Baise-moi/alors on baise/ce soir on baise/
ça tente tu de baiser
7. Aimes-tu des patates/bagels/moustaches?
8. T’as des beaux yeux
9. As-tu du feu?
10. Je t’aime
T’as tu d’la poudre? • À cause de toi, tout a coup! mes pantalons sont de trop • A tu eux ton chèque • As-tu vu mes gosses? • Avez vous un pop-tart? • Bonjour mon petit poulet • Chin chin les filles • Combien pour la danse Madame? • Eh làlà, tu prends tes oeufs avec la mayonaise? • J’en ai un beau crayon dans mes pantalons • J’peux-tu cracher à terre? • Je déteste les anglais
Je m’appelle Corey Hart • Je pense que tes seins sentent le renfermé, enlève • Je peux faire goo-explosion dans votre vagin? • Je sais comment faire des crêpes-suzettes • Je suis dans une bande indie • Je suis un immigrant • Je vais jouer ta chanson • J’te mangerais ben la noune • On peut tourner à droite à la prochaine lumière • Showez me your cockez • Tabernac you look ’ot in zem shoes • Toi là, tu viens tu du Lac St-Jean? • Tu as des beaux tattoos • Tu resembles à un de mes amis chez MySpace • Tu es trop belle pour cette bande d’idiots
BEST STAND-UP COMEDIAN: Peter Radomski
Little man
makes big funny
>> Comedy newcomer Peter Radomski baffled
he beat out the big-name comics for Best Stand-Up
by CHRIS BARRY
It takes a big man indeed to be bashful about acquiring as mighty a distinction as winner of 2007’s BOM’s Best Stand-up Comedian category. But Peter Radomski is such a man. ”I think it’s bizarre I’m on the list at all,” he says. “I didn’t even make Honourable mention last year. It’s pretty overwhelming when you consider you’ve got all these great comic voices around Montreal like Sugar Sammy, David Pryde and Joey Elias.”
One of two regular hosts of Drop the Gloves Tuesdays, a weekly open-mic that takes place at Grumpy’s Bar, and the co-founder of the popular Comedy Off the Main nights that go down at Oliveira on Rachel every Wednesday night, Radomski says his comedy style has been described as “different.”
“Ideally, what I’d like to hear is that it’s funny,” quips the 4-foot-11-inch comic, who insists he might well be small but is definitely not a midget. “But my style is more conversational. I don’t go with a script, I don’t memorize my shtick. I’m basically having a conversation with 30 people the same way I might sit down with you at a bar and talk bullshit for 12 hours.”
Radomski says he only “really started getting into comedy” in the spring of 2004 after “dabbling on the open-mics for about six months” and deciding it was time to leave his day job as a human resources director to better commit his energies towards his comedy career.
“That’s when I started trying to hit as many stages as possible. Now I try and do four to five nights a week, sometimes two gigs a night whenever possible. I’ll go to Ottawa to perform if I can, I’m going to Toronto in the late summer, New York City as well. Basically, since then, the focus of my life has been about making people laugh, trying to improve my ability to make people laugh, and really looking into the possibility of doing comedy as a full-time thing, it’s my number one priority now.”
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