The Bitter End

ZERO STARS!!! What the hell is wrong with this place?! The staff look like a bunch of burn outs. Extremely rude, they claim that the bar and seating areas are different? Then how about make the bar at the end of the room. Not the fucking front where people walk in. Oh and they serve underage people. This place needs to shut down ASAP.

Once a great club to showcase and see great new artists, now only seems to use that reputation acquired many many years ago under different ownership and management to take advantage of youg artists as well as patrons by treating artists very poorly and by booking many artists who are not very good at all just so long as they can bring a certain number of there friends to the club, and of course the show & drinks are not worth the price they ask, plus i have heard and witnessed myself the rude way they treat artists and patrons alike. Very sad how such a great legendary club with a reputation of being artist friendly as well as a great spot to see new undiscovered great talent has fallen so low to be barely recognizable, except of course for the club décor and sound system which seems to have not been updated in many many many years or for that matter has not been even cleaned in many years if you happen to need to use the bathroom facility or use a light in this very dimly lit room to actually look at the table or chair you are sitting on or the floor underneath you.

Beware– they add tip on to the bill without notifying you, hoping. You will double — tip on top. When I called them out they offered to change it but I would be careful with such shady business practices. Too bad, the music was good

I actually had a better time than I expected. I’m not really into live performances but I really enjoyed the performance. The drink prices are okay. It’s a cozy small venue to watch upcoming arising artists who are trying to make in the music industry. This places charges a cover which is a bit ehhhh and it was a Monday too.

This place is actually worse than Fat Baby. I have toured, I have traveled across the country extensively, I have visited many a bar in many a state and this is the absolute worst one that I’ve ever had the misfortune of patronizing. I’m going to give a little tip to all of the 14-​year-​olds with fake IDs that come here: A bar that has a cover and a drink minimum is a bar that’s keenly self-​aware of the fact that most people would otherwise not spend a dime in that place. A half-​decent bar doesn’t need to have drink minimums, in much that same way that a decent sushi place wouldn’t need a sign saying «All vomiting must be restricted to the bathrooms». A bar that imposes a four person minimum per table in addition to a drink minimum is subtly telling you «Oh, god! We’re hemorrhaging money from all the upkeep that we’re not doing on the bathrooms! Bilk these little hipster shits for all of their pennies!» On the topic of bathrooms, the layout encourages blocking the fire escape, so a nod to the staff for deciding to run the bar with the same incompetence and lack of respect for the craft that physically brought this venue into being.
So, who comes here? Dads who weren’t cool enough to make friends with the other dads at Little League, NYU hipsters who don’t know how to drink without explicit instructions, and the grizzled mountain men of central Long Island and Westchester who had descended from their lofts (altitude: 500 ft) to share their country wisdom with us here city slickers. In other words: aggressively lame yuppies, tourists, and newbies whose involvement here can best be summed up with «#becauseit’sNewYork!» Example: Why are you ok with a miller lite being 7 bucks? «Because it’s New York!» :D
Fuck you if you want to take a breath between drinks, by the way. If you’re not constantly imbibing, you might notice that there’s only one good beer available and that the bands sound like easy listening sans the balls. Upon finding out that I wasn’t going to buy another drink right that second, the server announced «I’m going to have to charge you for two drinks anyway.» Let that sink in. Literally, «I will charge you money for something that you have not ordered.» Also, you do not open a tab, they lump the entire table’s tabs together and don’t tell you how much anything costs, in a pathetically transparent gambit to trick people into overindulging. Because a good bar needs to trick people into boozing hard, right? Also, the server got in my shit because I made some grumpy comment to my friend and apparently she feels that I answer to her, so she asked me to repeat myself several times. I did. Apparently, she was expecting me to be intimidated into enjoying myself because she had NOT survived the Great Depression to be around my lip! Sorry, uppity bottle jockeys don’t intimidate me. Better luck next time. Oh, but at least you don’t have to worry about figuring out how much to tip! It doesn’t matter how horrible, rude, confrontational, and nonexistent the service is, 15% gratuity is added automatically! At absolutely no point prior to getting your check are you informed of this.
So, now, I am going to bring up the most obnoxious idiocy of the entire night, which is a bit like pointing out the largest elephant shit in a pile of elephant shits that are all at least 3 standard deviations above average size. The stated minimum is 2 drinks per person per show. The server, who had been ignoring me for at least the past hour (because how dare I have the gall to say something when asked to say something!), informed me that I’d ONLY bought two drinks and she COULD have thrown me out for not having enough smiles for her earlier but she jolly well didn’t because she’s just so awesome and now I need to meet the drink minimum. I told her I did. Her response was that it was 2 drinks PER SET. I pointed out the sign. It says «PER SHOW». She smugly insisted that per show meant per set and how rude of me to not immediately comply! I suppose I should be grateful that she didn’t also decide that that per person actually meant per kidney and that kidney actually meant fingernail. I’m guessing she just moved here from the farm or something because she started giving me a speech about what a golly gosh darn meany head I was for knowing what words mean, at which point I just walked away. Oh, btw, the table and drink minimums? Selectively enforced, in addition to being utter bullshit.
If the people who drink here are stupid enough to swallow that, then exploit away. I, however, am not. If given a choice between coming here again or filing my taxes, I would pick the latter in a second. At least I wouldn’t be surrounded by the kind of people who can’t masturbate unless either Belle and Sebastian are playing or they can cook up a good fantasy about responding to «I’m hungry» with «Hi, Hungry! You can call me dad!»

Since I can’t give zero stars, or even half a star, I’ll start this out with the only nice thing I can say. The bracelet that signifies I paid the $ 10 cover was put on my hand very well. No overlap on the sticky bit at all.
Now onto the meat of it. Never have I felt so unwelcome, harassed, and hated at a bar. I went in to see one band in a seven act show and what should have been a fun time getting drunk with my friends was just a constant harassment by the wait staff. The selection is terrible but God forbid you take more than a second to decide what you want, that’s strike one. If you don’t down your drink and immediately order the next one, that’s strike two. If you take a seat in the back braise you have a giant bag and don’t want to block the aisle but the rest of your party isn’t there yet that’s strike three. Get ready for some god awful treatment.
The real glory of the waitstaff though is insisting not that the two drink minimum per person per show is a per act minimum. I’m a small person. Two drinks every half hour is more than I can physically hold. There’s only two bathrooms and a long line down a narrow hallway.
Now, my groups stubborn refusal to drink ourselves to death at the table had the waitstaff angrier than normal. In addition o haranguing and harassing us, one of them seemed to be trying to fight me. Physically. Pushing drinks I didn’t order into my hand and telling me I’m going to pay after I closed out my tab.
There was an automatic 15% gratuity. So while the waitresses were very doting in breathing down our necks, I did not feel gratitude. I told the waitress as much because at that point, she’d already threatened to kick us out for not drinking enough. But I paid it because my friends band still had not gone on stage.
4 drinks, $ 30. I don’t care about NYC prices, I live in NYC. Fuck your dumb shit prices. The waitresses wouldn’t let me sit down without ordering more drinks, yelled at me to get up. Tried to force a drink into my hand. We waited outside with the high school kids from Long Island (my literal nightmare) and then went back into to see my friends band. She put on a lovely show.

I would advise musicians not to perform at the venue. I was not paid for my services. After we packed up our equipment & started loading out, the music booker Pete kicked the keyboard.

The Bitter End is a grungy college bar that showcases some pretty good bands. We were there to see a friend’s band play, and the group before their’s was pretty darn good as well. The group after their’s wasn’t too shabby, so with a sample size of 3 groups, I would say the Bitter End books some pretty good talent. The drink selection is unimpressive and the prices are on the high side. There is a 2 drinks minimum per person per show (in addition to the cover charge) if you sit at the tables, but if you stand or are at the bar, there is no minimum for drinks. I would never come to the Bitter End if the sole purpose was to drink at a bar, but if you want to check out some local talent, I would say the Bitter End won’t disappoint.

This place is pretty okay. The seating can get a little tight if you don’t get there far enough in advance for the show you’re seeing and sometimes the cover charges are a bit high (probably not the fault of The Bitter End), but overall this is a cool place to hang out and see some good music.

Came here to see a friend’s show. Awesome sound effect and live acts.
BUT
2 drinks minimum PER PERSON PER SHOW. Are you kidding me? Mediocre drinks at best. It is so annoying that the waitress kept coming back until everyone ordered. I know it’s not her fault, but seriously, I hate places that force you to pay a minimum, especially there is already a 10-​dollar cover.
You can be a d*ck about your drink policies, the Bitter End. And I, as well as my friends, can take our business elsewhere. There are better places to spend my money at.
Right I’m bitter. And this is the end.

Week sauce beer selection does not detract from this storied spot’s continued commitment to the performing arts. Hosting up and coming music acts as well as cool local storytelling events (MOTH, Bad Date Great Story, etc.), The Bitter End has plenty more to give while the neighborhood around it morphs into an unrecognizable grid of fro-​yo and artisanal dessert shops.

This place was nothing short of FANTASTIC. When I went in I was greeted by the manager himself– and what a guy. He’s funny and I just felt so welcomed. It’s a great music scene and a MUST SEE if you’re anywhere on or near Bleeker street. The service was great and it was just an all together WONDERFUL experience. I can’t wait to go back!

This is a pretty good venue for music, no doubt, but my experience there was not very pleasant, and I probably will never go back again.
When I got there, my friends and I tried to sit down at a table together. There were five of us, but four seats. Thankfully, there were plenty of open tables, so no problem, I can just grab another chair from another table and sit down. Right? Wrong. As I did that, a woman working there told me that I couldn’t put the chair in the aisle, as it was a fire hazard, and I had to sit at a different table than my friends. There were no other people around, so I asked her to make an exception. She responded, dripping with sarcasm, «I’m sorry, do you work here?». When I said no, she said, «That’s right, now sit at another table; you’re too fat to sit in the aisles».
After that, I think I’m gonna stick with Arlene’s Grocery for my music.

Had a great experience here! Only $ 5 to get in and listen to a bunch of fun bands! The set up is so great, and if you’re lucky enough to get a table (which we did after the first band) then you’re sure to enjoy yourself. My husband and I really had fun and will definitely be back!

I hadn’t been here in years and was kind of excited to go back. I don’t remember a two drink minimum (on top of a cover), but like I said, I haven’t been here in years.
The set up is sort of annoying, the tables are super crowded in — I think it would be smarter to have little booths, because it’s essentially the same thing, except you don’t have the girl behind you shoving her chair into you trying to get out, and she clearly can not shove the chair anywhere. Because you are practically sitting on top of the stage, it’s super loud at the tables. Forgot hearing if you are sitting in the front row.
We ordered our mandatory drinks… our entire table got their drinks, the table next to ours got theirs… and my drink is MIA… she forgot to put my drink order in? Our waitress was quite pushy on making sure we ordered our second mandatory round. Now we are ready for round three, which was not mandatory, and the waitress is MIA. Finally flag her down, get our orders in and ask to cash out. As we didn’t need to order the drinks, our drinks took a long time to get to us, and our checks even longer. Wouldn’t it have been smart to bring it all at once? Less trips?
We were all a couple of drinks in, luckily our DD managed to point out to us that the tip was already calculated in, because I didn’t notice it at first, and it was on the written bill, but wasn’t broke down on the receipt. Unless you are paying in cash, I’d keep a eye on the tip.

I went to The Bitter End on a Saturday night to see my friends’ a cappella group perform, along with a few comedians. There is a two drink minimum for these types of shows in order to secure a table, which I think is fair. It was very crowded, thanks to my friends’ group’s popularity, along with the popularity of the comedians. I found the service fine, and heard that it is a pretty respected venue where a lot of now famous and popular singers and songwriters got there start.
I would come back to see other performances, even if the acts don’t include any of my friends; however I was pretty annoyed with the over-​eager service charge that was automatically added to our bill. This 15 percent service charge (automatically assuming we want to tip that much) always irks me. I really don’t like establishments like this, so if I go back, I would avoid the table service and just stand at the bar. I think The Bitter End should reconsider this assumed 15 percent tip…
If you are a group that is looking to book a show here, I know my friends had a good experience — so there’s always that.

Don’t go there for the jam session if you’re a harp player. They made it clear we aren’t welcome.
Also, the beer selection sucks.

Came here for a show of a friend of a friend. Small venue, good views from everywhere. We mostly stood by the bar. Nothing stuck out as good or bad really. I wouldn’t come here unless I wanted to see someone perform, but then again same goes for most concert venues.

I’m not one to harp on bad experiences and try really hard to take it with a grain of salt and let it go, but this staff definitely deserves a review so other people are prepared to deal with the horrible customer service. I went here last night to see my cousin play in his band and of course they were great and I’m very happy I went for that reason, but I will never give them a penny of my money IF I ever come here again (unlikely).
When I first tried to order a drink I finally got the attention of a tall masculine girl with a dark brown ponytail. She looked at me, said, and I quote.“What?” That was the first turn off.
During the show we sat down and ordered a drink from a nice waitress. She asked if I had a tab opened up at the bar and I said no, and she asked if I would like too so I said sure. She came back once during the show asking if we needed anything else, and we said no. I should have asked for the check but I presumed we might drink more after a cigarette and I could close it out at the bar.
Once we were about to leave I went up to the only space I could find at the bar to close it out and rudely was told I couldn’t stand there, «this is the waitress serving area.» I said I’m sorry and that I wasn’t trying to hang out there just wanted the bartenders attention so I could close out my tab. I got an impolite response that I needed to «move.»
Finally got an older woman’s attention who was working behind the bar. I told her I wanted to close out my tab and I gave her my name. She said bluntly that she didn’t have my card. I said I ordered with a waitress and she told me I was opening a BAR tab. She said «well then you’re gonna have to go find your waitress.» I said I thought I could easily close it at the bar seeming how it was a bar tab. She had such an attitude for no reason. I finally said «what’s your problem?» And clearly menopause hit her at that very moment and she started yelling at me telling me she «ain’t doing this with me.» I said I simply want my credit card back and that I wasn’t aware of the fact that I as the customer had to go on a goose hunt trying to find a waitress that I wasn’t positively sure looked like.
I told her that her customer service was horrendous and I was going to call tomorrow to complain about it and she responded with «go ahead, i ain’t going anywhere.» I just don’t understand why some people just naturally want to be nasty out of the blue and almost pick a fight. Life is too short why can’t we all just get along and respect each other?
After waiting a good 15 minutes a medium length blonde haired girl who wasn’t the waitress came up to me and gave me my check and apologized. I managed to get the old bartenders name ((((KAREN))))). Of course that could be a fake name, but whatever.
Go here for good bands, go here for friends, don’t go here expecting any form of friendly service. I guess it’s called the BITTER end for a reason. Bitter menopausal ladies, represent.

Not the best dive I’ve been to.
Came here for Moth Slam story telling which was pretty cool. Different.
The venue is small, crowded and doesn’t have much space to walk through. Also 2 drink minimum for a table is a bit annoying. Staff wasn’t super attentive either.
The place is famous as a music venue so check it out for yourself. It just didn’t speak to me and I don’t have much of a desire to return.