The ’70s are alive and well at DayTrip.
• Little Jumbo hosts some of Asheville’s best live jazz every Monday and Tuesday night, with no cover charge. The website lists each week’s lineup.
• Specialized menus, including a list of G&T options and specialty absinthe and pastis offerings, are available upon request.
• For date night (or any night), the bar offers special drinks service for two. Choose between Manhattans, Martinis, Japanese highballs, absinthe or hot cocoa and rum, and your selection will be delivered on ornate trays with various fun accoutrements.
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A five-minute walk away, Edgar Allen Poe-themed bar the Crow & Quill boasts excellent cocktails and the city’s largest whiskey collection. Another block south, DSSOLVR brewery and its adjoining cocktail bar, VOWL, serve an edgy, rock-and-roll vibe along with unique beers, like a Cold Caprese Pizza Italian pilsner. For actual
pizza—of the memorable, artisanal brick-oven variety—it’s worth the quick drive up the hill to visit snazzy rooftop cocktail bar and restaurant Soprana.
NOTABLE AND NEARBY
DayTrip is the passion project of Brandon Davis and Davie Roberts, a married couple who are Asheville bar and restaurant industry veterans. This 1970s-themed bar is one of Asheville’s most celebrated post-Hurricane Helene resilience stories. Though DayTrip originally launched along the banks of the French Broad River in 2024, flooding from Helene brought the bar to a halt. In early 2025, Davis and Roberts intrepidly started from scratch, reviving the concept in a cavernous building just north of downtown that formerly housed the production facility for Moog Music synthesizers. The colorful, kitschy, art-filled space—designed by the couple to look “like your grandma’s basement,” according to Davis—is a celebration of Asheville’s LGBTQ+ community. Roberts’ cocktail menu swerves playfully from selections like the Dumpster Date (a boilermaker comprising PBR and a shot of Malört) to an elegant take on the Pink Squirrel.
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Around the corner on Grand Street, Fresh Kills (from Richie Boccato) has been quietly serving some of the best cocktails in Brooklyn for nearly a decade.
NOTABLE AND NEARBY
• When outdoor seating is available, the wisteria-draped garden (book ahead on Resy) might fool you into thinking you’re somewhere between Louisiana and Provence.
• While Maison excels at the A-list classics, look closely and you’ll find lovingly executed takes on B-side hits, like the Yellow Parrot and the Obituary, that make the case for revival.
NICE TO KNOW
Staff Favorite Dive Bars
Pete's Candy Store
I moved around the corner from Pete’s in 2008, and have found myself wedged into the bar’s tiny back music venue on countless nights since. The crowds may have changed, but Pete’s still maintains a bygone Williamsburg combo of grit, disaffection and surprise and delight. —Talia Baiocchi, editor-in-chief
Happyfun Hideaway
If you’re looking to make out on a dance floor, this no-frills, tropical-themed queer bar is the spot for you. —Irina Groushevaia, senior social media manager
7B Horseshoe Bar
7B stands out from the hoards of East Village icons not only because it opens at noon (ideal for killing time before, well, anything) but because it has one of the friendliest staffs of any bar, let alone dive, in the city. —Chloe Frechette, deputy editor
Sunny’s
This outer fringe of Brooklyn’s Red Hook neighborhood is not easily accessible, but it’s worth a trip to experience a bar that’s been resurrected from the brink of closure several times. Live music starts most nights at 8 p.m., and there’s plenty of outdoor space for loitering. Don’t forget to bring cash. —Allison Hamlin, director of network development
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DayTrip’s menu, like its space, offers playful throwbacks like a take on the Pink Squirrel.
The signature cocktail of the original Rogue Cocktails, the Gunshop Fizz uses a full 2 ounces of Peychaud’s bitters.
The Howitzer, the first original cocktail to be featured on a Cure menu, is a bourbon-based riff on the French 75.
• From oil rain lamps to crushed velvet couches, the vintage 1970s-era furnishings and artwork have been painstakingly collected by the owners. Look for a few special items salvaged from the original riverside bar.
• Eighties dance parties, themed drag shows, trivia competitions, horror movie nights—about any activity you can imagine—are on constant rotation in DayTrip’s large event room.
NICE TO KNOW
A five-minute walk away, Edgar Allen Poe-themed bar the Crow & Quill boasts excellent cocktails and the city’s largest whiskey collection. Another block south, DSSOLVR brewery and its adjoining cocktail bar, VOWL, serve an edgy, rock-and-roll vibe along with unique beers, like a Cold Caprese Pizza Italian pilsner. For actual pizza—of the memorable, artisanal brick-oven variety—it’s worth the quick drive up the hill to visit snazzy rooftop cocktail bar and restaurant Soprana.