Wednesday, August 11, 2010
BY STEVE JANOSKI
He was a big man with graying hair and a gravelly voice that carried the weight of years in every word.
"This place is nothin' man," he told me. "I bounced in a bar once years back…that place was rough. I been shot, stabbed, beat up…"
He went on to tell me about the time that two rival outlaw gangs got into a rumble at that bar—by the end of the night, a cop was shot and members of both clubs were mangled.
He had the battle scars in the form of a cluster of missing teeth to back up his stories, but I could tell he wasn't the lying type anyway.
He stood next to me at the bar and listened to the blues band for a couple songs before excusing himself outside to have a smoke.
It's hard to find bars around here where things like that happen anymore.
Moreover, it was in what we were doing: standing at the bar, drinking a beer, listening to a blues band, and telling some stories.
That's the reality of biker bars, right there. It's not fancy, and nothing that's anywhere near as brutal as the movies would like you to think.
In researching local biker bars for a recent article, I've found that the idea that there's blood on the floor every night is the stereotype that the bar owners seem to be trying to combat, and I don't blame them.
The amount of comments I get when I wear a "Great Notch Inn" t-shirt is mind-boggling, with most of them being along the lines of "I can't believe you go there!"
"Do you believe it?" I tell them. "And I haven't been shot once!"
Honestly, I've found these places to be safer than the college bars in the area, probably because of the intimidation factor that the clientele brings with them; the odds of a 21-year-old kid starting a problem shrink exponentially when a massive, bald-headed biker with "SS" tattooed on his neck is sitting right next to him.
But biker bars are full of guys who go to the bar for the same reason that the doctor or accountant do: to have a beer and relax. The fact that they ride in on a bike doesn't make any difference once they're in the door.
I have been in the worst places that North Jersey has to offer, from the seediest Paterson strip club to the hardest biker bar in the boonies, and yet the only problems I've ever had came about because I was looking for trouble myself.
When people say they're scared to go into a place like West Milford's Mountain Rest or the Great Notch, I tell them that, as clichéd as it sounds, follow the rule that Patrick Swayze gave his bouncers in the legendary film "Roadhouse" — be nice.
That one piece of advice will let you sit at nearly any bar in the country and have nary a worry, because bikers, like all other people, like to be treated with respect.
Common courtesies like holding the door open for someone, saying "please" or "thank you," and apologizing if you bump into a guy or spill a drink will get you a long way in these places, just like they do anywhere else.
Of course, don't get me wrong. If you walk into one of these places looking for trouble, you could quickly be in a world of hurt, but that rule tends to be the same in any bar.
The cold reality is that for all of the attention they receive in movies, television, and magazines, the "Double Deuces" of the world tend to get shut down because the real world has things like zoning boards, liquor licenses, and laws.
Are there motorcycle gangs that break the law? Sure. Are they going to do it in public, or risk getting locked up because of some dumb kid starting trouble at the bar? Not likely.
So give these places a shot next time you want to get out on Friday night. They've got character that is nowhere to be found in the soulless service bars of the chain restaurants of the world, and you might just meet some interesting folks that you didn't think you'd befriend otherwise.
Although if Sam Elliott walks in…you should probably leave.
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