Speaking of which, Browns won as both best new bar and bar of the year, and deservedly so, since no other place has had more impact on the city’s scene in 2006. It offers good pub grub, an excellent beer selection, and a fun atmosphere; it attracts competing owners and employees as patrons; and it seems to polarize people into love-it or hate-it camps, thus making it hard to ignore. The place is a winner. So naturally, on the Saturday night following the awards, Browns held a singing contest. Yes, business as usual — that is, the things that got it the awards — came to a screeching stop while patrons watched the musically challenged climb atop the bar and massacre Every Breath You Take, Faith, Buttercup, and other songs. Admittedly, I complained a bit too vociferously about this situation (apologies all around), especially as the contest had been advertised for weeks (my bad for not reading the posters in the toilet), but it did seem like bad timing.

In any case, initiative is good and so is realizing when to cut one’s losses, and things were back to normal the next Saturday, which is to say that the music was so-so. I have largely praised Browns since it opened, and have received some grief from other bar owners who claim I favor the place, but one thing I have not applauded is the music, although it has improved a bit in recent months. It doesn’t seem like rocket science to observe that: 1) Browns draws arguably the most diverse crowd in town, ranging in age from 20 to 60 and including nearly every profession and nationality, and this group is most likely to respond to hit songs; 2) fewer people dance when the DJ plays an esoteric tune (which demonstrates his or her breadth of musical knowledge, though unfortunately to a crowd that largely doesn’t care) than when he or she dumbs things down and plays hit songs; 3) this place is a copy of the popular bar Carnegie’s in Taipei which, for better or worse, plays hit songs. I guess what I’m saying is: play more hit songs!

Perhaps I’m being oversensitive. After all, someone could say that a) Browns is full and thus b) people must love the music. But I think Browns is a success because it offers a package of food, drinks, fun and location, and that competitors looking for a piece of that success will try to exploit the weakest parts of that package. One of these, in my humble opinion, is the music. Another is the drinks, which are literally weak. (Last Saturday, for example, after having a few anemic cocktails, I went and watched one of the bartenders, and he was using far too little alcohol for the mixed drinks. Not a minute later, a patron three meters away had the same complaint, as did some others during the evening.) My point: weaknesses can catch up with a bar, thus having a packed place today is very different from having a packed place three months from now, and the latter requires listening to customers, constantly improving the package, and holding off current and potential competitors, whether by improving the music, reminding bartenders what constitutes a standard drink, or other measures. Fortunately for Browns, it is strongly positioned and thus has great influence over its destiny, but in the dog-eat-dog world of bars, eternal vigilance is not only a virtue, but a necessity. These comments aside, it has been an excellent 2006 for Browns and it very much deserved the award for bar of the year.

(From Beijing Boyce XXI, first emailed on July 27, 2006)