Poor Music .. and getting wrose . Review on STYX Pub, MG Road, Bangalore

With every visit, my opinion of this place has been going down progressively. When I had first been there though, I found it a really cool hangout for guys into Metal music who want to get together somewhere and enjoy a mug of beer while headbanging to pure, aggressive, all-out Heavy Metal. However, contrary to that there is almost never any all-out metal and what’s worse when it isn’t Metal, it’s the low-grade alternative/Nu-Metal that dominates Music Channels and Radios. But before I get to that let me first describe the place which is pretty decent.

The interior is well-designed with a charming fish tank just opposite the entrance, small and elegant glass tables placed in the middle of comfortable couches seating about 8, not-so-comfortable seats which is little too small in every portion for a reasonably tall person to sit in a relaxed manner for more than half-an hour –the support for the back is about half in height and a fourth in width of what it should be. A sparkling and attractive chandelier is placed in the middle and the floor glows with the disco lights from within.

The bar is quite small and is located in a corner next to the DJ box. There is enough open space for people to stand around when the seats are all occupied. The stand-out feature of this place is the rather big screen that is fixed to the wall right next to the entrance door accompanied by what I gather is the Bose stereo system consisting of those small but ultra-powerful speakers hung uniformly around the place. The screen definitely adds to the overall effect of the place and no doubt this pub scores over many others solely for that reason, not to mention that it is a great crowd-puller. Despite the sophisticated audio devices I am not very sure that sounds are reproduced very faithfully since one will invariably observe bass and drums drowning out the guitar leads and even the riffs at times. Yeah, on occasions it is hard to decide on the merit of a song if you are listening to it for the first time though, owing to the general ambience, you may be inclined to headbang mindlessly to it.

Though the beer is priced reasonably at Rs. 45 for Tap and 210 for Pitcher, hard liquor is quite expensive with 30 ml of any regular whisky or vodka costing 45. Cocktails are about 200 or so. Snacks start at Rs 40 and I cannot comment much on them since I rarely have anything other than beer. And by expensive, I mean on absolute standards of worth, and not in relation to the general rates in pubs. The service is quite fast though if you wish to spend less while staying there for a relatively long time, you may be have annoying periodic visits from the waiter enquiring about further orders and not being particularly subtle, at times of excess crowd, when implying that more profitable customers are waiting to get a seat.

Now, getting to the main reason why I go to pubs in the first place and why this place falls way short of expectations, the music is by and large mediocre at best , and on several occasions, it turns out to be a series of third-grade popular music that is neither musically nor aesthetically close to true Metal. There are few select numbers that are played so frequently that one barely enters the pub than the speakers start blaring hat same song. On some typical evening, one gets to hear, between 7 and 9.30 pm, an assorted mix of Alternative Rock, Classic Rock, Mallcore (nu-metal for those of you fags who think this is Metal), Rapcore , Grunge and a bunch of other nameless retarded music including Linkin Park and in between this some 90’s Metallica, Dream Theater, post-Countdown…Megadeth, AC/DC, Gnr, Ozzy and (thankfully) Iron Maiden. Requests for even early metallica or Megadeth would be immediately turned down on the grounds that it is ‘too heavy’ to be played at that time, so don’t even think of Slayer or Sepultura. Even after 9.30 , when they supposedly play heavier/brutal music, one continues to hear mallcore like Godsmack, System Of A Down ,Marilyn Mansion while repeating for the umpteenth time Holy wars …., The Wasted Years .. , Enter Sandman. And when they do get ‘heavy’, you’d probably watch and hear Seasons in the Abyss losing its edge and vitality due to repeated listens. Same goes for Cemetary Gates, but still that’s better then having to sit through with unabashed posers like Cradle of Filth mutilating Hallowed Be Thy Name. Some Melodic Death Metal stuff like Arch Enemy or Children of Bodom is thrown in occasionally which, by the way, is far inferior to several others more talented and creative bands out there. Now, I don’t know if the reason behind this unquestionably crappy music is popular demand or that their DJ has no clue about what Heavy Metal should be, but whichever be the case, it really sucks when you realize that you are paying two and a half times the regular cost for everything that you order and yet you don’t get to listen to quality music.

On requesting songs, I found out that their collection itself is very limited –no Exodus, Iced Earth, Sodom, Blind Guardian and no album of Kreator except their worst release Endorama. I haven’t checked out but it should follow from above and the fact that one never gets has hear them that there are hardly any Death/Black Metal records not to mention Doom Metal or Power Metal. Among respectable METAL bands, I ‘d bet there are few outside Iron Maiden, Metallica, Megadeth, Pantera (respectable?), Slayer, Sabbath , Priest and Dream Theater. You may happen to hear Queensryche or My Dying Bride on some blue moon but that dosen’t count.

The crowd is predominantly late-teens who come there primarily to socialize with their pals and aren’t too bothered about what is being played. Linkin Park T-shirts are not all that uncommon so you can infer their taste from that. You’ll find quite a few yuppies and also a few middle aged men and women who would be so distinctly incongruous to the place that you can’t help wondering if they accidentally stepped into this place mistaking it for family restaurant.

That just sums up the pub for you. Not a bad place to spend an evening if you are haven’t been there before but if you are a serious fan of Metal and want to check out new or diverse stuff, don’t get anywhere in the vicinity of this place.

Rating : 3 out of 10