I want very badly to love this bar.  I really do.  It has all the promising combinations of qualities I look for in a local locale.  

Great beer.  I have no qualms about ordering the French Canadian Hefeweizen (that I can't even pronounce, spell or at this moment recall) with one glass all to myself and lick my lips at many other brews on the menu.  Add a wine list beyond belief and liquor if its your poison too.

The proximity to my own compound and the blossoming bud that is the central Phoenix renaissance  is always worth a gold star; why commute when staying local is a better option?

The staff and owners of the Sidebar are fantastic.  From my induction many months ago they sling the drinks with pride and the effort in the setup and delivery of the place doesn't go unnoticed. 

The decor is where things start to slide.  Not because the place is hovel, far from it.  Everything is crisp and new.  From the hydraulic bar stools, to the multicolored ambient lighting to the comfy lounge couches, to the super clean bathrooms; this place is a slice of upper crust for those of us who don't normally even thing to nibble from such a decadent pie.  Herein lies the problem or as my former boozing partner visiting from his new digs in Portland put it, "I'd like to see this place with about 10 years worth of dust on it."  Not my style, but I dig it and Phoenix sure as hell needs a place like it.

In the end I will go back and don't mind in the slightest having a place like Sidebar to show off to East Valley dwellers and Scottsdale brats, but every time I reach for the front door I pause and am sad.

A mere few feet away lies the corpse of the beloved Emerald Lounge.  A dark, seedy, dirty, smoke filled haven of locals, live music, art and personality that is now nothing but a painted over ghost.  So please, support your local bar, bring your friends and keep the sidebar real.  But remember to pause for a moment of silence and drink one to the ghost below your feet; us locals will thank you.