The Alibi is a Neon Temple to Sweet Liquor and Out-of-Tune Songs

You go for the atmosphere, established by decor from the late ’40s that's barely been touched since the ’80s.

(Jarod Opperman)

4024 N Interstate Ave., 503-287-5335, alibiportland.com, 11 am-2:30 am, Happy hour 3-7 pm Monday-Saturday and all day Sunday.

Established: 1947

For its 70th birthday, the Alibi is under new ownership, as Warren Boothby and Marcus Archambeault recently added it to their impressive portfolio of hipster dives, which also includes Sandy Hut and Gold Dust Meridian. Don't expect much to change. The lights are dim, the air heavy, and the drinks very sweet and relatively weak. Day drinking is still the way to go—it's simultaneously festive but quiet, like daybreak on a snowy New Year's Day. On a recent Friday night visit, the Alibi was pufferfished out by 9 pm for the uber-popular karaoke in the back room. You don't go to this spot for nice things, though. You go for the atmosphere, established by decor from the late '40s that's barely been touched since the '80s. "We really want to be stewards of this place," Boothby told The Mercury after buying it. "We want it to be there forever." So do we.

Bar story: According to a tiki bar blogger (yes, there's such a thing), the Alibi was a tavern in the late 1800s called the Chat-n-Nibble, originally a stop for horse-drawn buggies.

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