SEX & DRUGS & ROCK & ROLL >>

• BEST ACOUSTIC PERFORMER
  Though only one of piano man Tom Siler's many hobbies--he is the key arranger for Tulip Sweet and Her Trail of Tears--Larmes de Colère ("Tears of Rage") have emerged as his rarest creation. The acoustic trio's theatrically poised sound draws equally on torch ballads and circus music for... More >>
• BEST ADULT VIDEO STORE
  While Lickety Split gets points for its creative name (or loses them, depending on how easily offended you are), for sheer volume there is no beating SexWorld. This multilevel, carnival-themed erotic superstore fills 20,000 square feet and overflows with the kinds of graphic sexual... More >>
• BEST ALBUM OF THE PAST 12 MONTHS
  There's nothing like a healthy dose of musical Valium, conveniently packaged in the form of a brand-new Low record, to get you through the long Minnesota winter. Somehow, listening to Low's ethereal slowcore has the ability to make even the bleakest December on the frozen plains seem like June... More >>
• BEST ALL-AGES NIGHT
  Easily shaping up to be one of the hippest hangouts around, the Dinkytowner Café is letting the kiddies get in on the deal, with "In the Garage: All Ages Underground" every Sunday at 7:00 p.m., sponsored by KFAI and Radio K. Since the cancellation of First Avenue's "Spectrum" Sundays,... More >>
• BEST BAND NAME
  'Nuff said. More >>
• BEST BAND TO BREAK UP IN THE PAST 12 MONTHS
  The party that was Lifter Puller rocked on for six years, attracting one of the most devoted and diverse assortments of guests since the Replacements. It seemed as though Lifter Puller was bound for indie stardom, but in the end they decided to pack it up before the cops broke it up--leaving... More >>
• BEST BAND TO LEAVE THE TWIN CITIES IN THE PAST 12 MONTHS
  We'll allow that American Head Charge sound like Korn, and that their torsos alone could subsidize the south Minneapolis tattoo industry for a fiscal quarter. We'll admit that the band has gone Hollywood fast enough to make Tommy Stinson look like a tourist, moving into Rick Rubin's Hollywood... More >>
• BEST BEER SELECTION IN A BAR
  Eighteen beers on tap. Eighteen! Pilsner Urquell, Bell's Amber, Hop Ottin' IPA, Grain Belt--all for a mere $3.75 a pint, and that's not even counting the special, guest beers. Then, another 15 lagers in cans or bottles--from Hamm's in cans to Sapporo. Ten ales of every stripe, from... More >>
• BEST BLOODY MARY
  These days it seems that most joints have forgotten that divinity lies deep within a bloody mary, not in all of the ancillary food fixings stuffed in as an afterthought. In other words, what is in theory a cocktail is too often presented as an appetizer. So, purists take heart: Elegant... More >>
• BEST BLUES ARTIST
  The thrill of Joe T. Cook's Longshot (Blue Loon) is in hearing a regular Joe become a bona fide blues singer. It's the sound of a guy who has toiled for years in the local scene, taken a half-decade break from recording, then emerged again sounding none the wiser (or more wised-up) but somehow... More >>
• BEST BLUES BAR
  Where else can you catch both Johnny Winter and Edgar Winter in one exhilarating week of Texas sibling rivalry? Where else can you see exuberant local R&B stalwart Big Walter Smith celebrate his 70th birthday onstage? Where else can you pick up some toilet paper at the neighboring Target... More >>
• BEST BOUNCERS
  Whatever you do, kindly refrain from using that hostile, archaic term in their presence. Bouncers. The very job title makes it sound like these people spend all their time sending heads caroming off a wall. Security personnel deserve a little sensitivity, just like you, and at the Quest, the... More >>
• BEST CLUB DJ
  Before DJ culture became so visible as to be co-opted by candy-bar commercials, Tony Larson (a.k.a. DJ E-Tones) was teaching himself to spin with how-to books he'd checked out from the library. E-Tones played the role of bedroom DJ for nearly a year until landing his first gig, at age 18, at... More >>
• BEST COCKTAILS
  We debated what it meant for a bar to have the best cocktails. Does it mean the strongest drink for your buck? If that's the case, we recommend your local American Legion or VFW, where you can play pull tabs and drown your sorrows with vets and neighborhood drunks (who aren't always the same... More >>
• BEST CONCERT OF THE PAST 12 MONTHS
  Something is missing--something essential. "We need a jug player up here," declares a squat woman with a professional wrestler's voice. She motions to an empty microphone beside her, on the otherwise crowded stage of the Cabooze. It is Sunday, February 4, the afternoon of the 19th Annual Jug... More >>
• BEST CONCERT VENUE
  Perhaps City Pages has been too harsh with the 400 Bar. In the past, we have griped about their beer prices, badmouthed their bathrooms, and, perhaps most unforgivable, unleashed countless lengthy rants about 400-bound artists. (Our feline friend Cat Power was so misunderstood!) What we don't... More >>
• BEST DANCE CLUB
  For the past several years, the Quest, located in the historic Wyman Building, has raised the bar (so to speak) on the quality of Twin Cities nightlife. Though it remains a newbie in comparison to other local venues (it opened in October 1990 as Glam Slam, under the ownership of the Artist),... More >>
• BEST GAY BAR
  Tourists walk into the Stonewall in Greenwich Village--the descendent of many decades of clandestine gay bars and ground zero of the gay-liberation movement--to find a snug little hole in the brick wall. It's as if this symbol of affectional freedom among men feels like the closet, expanded.... More >>
• BEST HAPPY HOUR
  Too often "happy hour" can be a misnomer, with some bars harboring an air of melancholy that is only aggravated when the bill arrives. Tracy's Saloon, a quaint joint in the Seward neighborhood, provides a true antidote to the pocketbook blues. All beer and liquor is 75 cents off from 4:00 to... More >>
• BEST HIGH SCHOOL BAND
  In a deflated, post-Foxfire all-ages music scene dominated by bands that take their cues from the likes of Green Day and Papa Roach, the Arts High School's Linus stay true to the indie-rock school in a way that appeals to old-timers and the kids alike. With a surprisingly polished EP recorded... More >>
• BEST HIP-HOP ARTIST
  Sometimes the best way to act defensive is to be offensive. "My music ain't for liberals/I make cuts for the streets," declares Musab on his newest EP Actin' Rich (Rhymesayers Entertainment), adding, for the benefit of liberals, "So playing me is like the cops bumpin' '[Fuck] tha Police.'"... More >>
• BEST HIP-HOP DJ
  Remember when adding a DJ to a rock band was a radical move? When hip hop's influence on metal was supposed to save popular music? When we thought every band on earth would have a DJ by now, alongside the guitarist, bassist, and drummer? Well now DJs in rock are more like...tambourine players.... More >>
• BEST JAZZ ARTIST
  He is Mr. Smooth, the dean of local jazzmen, the octogenarian tenor saxophonist who settled here after WWII, and following stints with Fletcher Henderson and Mary Lou Williams. He is the beloved elder statesman, the guy who remembers the Flame, the Key Club, Cassius's Bamboo Room, and countless... More >>
• BEST JAZZ CLUB
  Lowell Pickett celebrated his club's 15th anniversary in regal fashion this past year, packing his monthly calendars--and testing his precarious bottom line--with a list of national treasures that rivaled jazz-festival lineups from San Francisco to Glasgow. As the seasons changed, the... More >>
• BEST JUKEBOX
  Used to be that a jukebox was a window into a bar's soul. Old Wurlitzer machines that took nickels, dimes, and quarters could sometimes house a charming obscurity here, a potent standard there. Now that pretty much every joint has a fancy CD jukebox that contains greatest hits and reissue... More >>
• BEST KARAOKE
  Some might argue that there's something depressing about karaoke: It inevitably leads to tears of some sort, whether they be tears of laughter or of pain. But karaoke at the Poodle, under the wing of host Cary Carlson, goes a long way toward dispelling such notions. It's been ten years since... More >>
• BEST LESBIAN BAR
  A good lesbian bar should be like the one in the Jonathan Richman song: It should take a few moments for you to realize that's the kind of bar you're dancing in. Although Club Metro's location makes it a difficult place to stumble into by chance, the neighborhood-hangout vibe and jovial crowd... More >>
• BEST MARGARITA
  A quick look at any bartender's guide lets even the most clueless guzzler in on the little secrets that make for a good drink. In the case of margaritas, it's simple: a shot of primo tequila, one-third that amount of Cointreau--the orange liqueur--and ice and a hearty squeeze of lime juice.... More >>
• BEST MARTINI
  Walking into Moscow on the Hill you are instantly hit with a wave of nostalgia. The paisley-print scarves draped over the lights, the worn red carpeting and matching red tablecloths and drapes, the antique dishes lined up on wooden shelves--all this is warmly reminiscent of Thanksgiving dinners... More >>
• BEST NEIGHBORHOOD BAR--MINNEAPOLIS
  Okay, okay, here it goes. An octogenarian, a neighborhood sheetrocker, and a cutting-edge hipster walk into a bar. The octogenarian says, "I'll have a Grain Belt Golden," and the sheetrocker says, "I'll have a Grain Belt Premium," and the hipster says, "I'll have a half-and-half, Premium and... More >>
• BEST NEIGHBORHOOD BAR--ST. PAUL
  St. Paul's neighborhood bars are as integral a part of its fabric as Catholic churches and an abandoned downtown. There's Schwietz Saloon on the East Side, with its rock-bottom prices and its patrons who have been regulars so long that they have their names emblazoned on the bar. On the West... More >>
• BEST NEW BAND
  The contrast isn't exactly "librarian by day, stripper by night," but the difference between Alan Sparhawk of Low and Alan Sparhawk of the Black Eyed Snakes is nonetheless comic. In his notoriously slow and achingly lovely pop trio Low, the Duluth singer-guitarist evokes spiritual struggle... More >>
• BEST OLD BAND
  Bob Stinson never released an album after the Replacements showed him the door in 1986--not with the Bleeding Hearts, not with Sonny Vincent, not with Dog 994. If this trash-punk guitar virtuoso had a way of making fellow musicians feel like it was him and them against the world, most friends... More >>
• BEST OPEN-MIC NIGHT
  Sitting back at the bar provides an ideal vantage point for appreciating this club. Its pitch-black walls and lack of windows make for a smoky jazz ambiance that will lure even the most timid to take the stage, backed by a smooth drumbeat. Most recently hosted by local poet Matt Harmoning every... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO DRINK YOURSELF SILLY
  Sacre bleu! The one Jacques tied on last night! Mon Dieu! Eet is no surprise, though. What dreenks! A wine list of hundreds--hundreds!--of never-before-seen-around-here French wines, bewitching house cocktails, French and Belgian ales, even house-made spiced wine. (Try La Trappe Belgian ale on... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO MEET SINGLE MEN (GAY)
  Okay, so this category is a bit misleading. Everyone knows that the best way to meet gay men is through friends or at parties or through various leisure activities. But let's say you're feeling old, fat, unloved, in need of a self-esteem boost. Then welcome to the Saloon--a.k.a. "Old Faithful."... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO MEET SINGLE MEN (STRAIGHT)
  Once upon a time, a twentysomething Minneapolitan female who was considering a more rigorous study of the Japanese language gathered up an array of textbooks and planted herself at a little table inside this alcove of bookshelves. Preoccupied in a reverie of katakana characters and seemingly... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO MEET SINGLE WOMEN (LESBIAN)
  Look, we hate to marginalize any facet of the crowd. And we hate to solidify stereotypes, especially the one that insists that all women athletes and their fans are a bit butch. Still, even if the National Basketball Association doesn't want to admit it, we will: Lesbians attend women's... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO MEET SINGLE WOMEN (STRAIGHT)
  First, there's las matemáticas. When the Quest's dance instructors show you the steps every Monday night at 8:30 p.m., women outnumber men by a factor of two. (Lessons are complimentary with the $10 cover.) Those "odds" improve still further when the Caribbean and Mexican rhythms of the... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO PLAY BOCCE
  Saturday afternoon in January and we're whiling away the winter hours stupidly drinking beer in the middle of the day--again. A pint here, a bottle of Bud there, another pint God knows where, until we somehow find ourselves jacketless at the Winter Carnival, standing slack-jawed in the middle... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO PLAY GOLDEN TEE
  There's something perverse about the soul who seeks sports and recreation within the confines of the darkest, smokiest bar in the Twin Cities. But several such souls can be found on any given sunny afternoon at Mortimer's, standing among the rows of antiquated pinball machines and video poker... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO ROOT AGAINST THE VIKINGS
  Though this joint has achieved near-legendary status as a great roadhouse for local and national live music, Lee's Liquor Lounge is still essentially what owner Louie Sirian calls a "saloon." And so on Sundays the regulars trickle in to catch the games in what was once a liquor store owned by... More >>
• BEST PLACE TO WEAR BLACK LIPSTICK
  For this weekly goth drama scene of tortured industrial music and gloom-and-doom ambiance (appropriately placed on the most depressing day of the week), it's best not to stop the theatrics at the lips. Black, and nothing but black, is the unstated but understood dress code. For how does one... More >>
• BEST POP GROUP
  One barely adequate explanation of the difference between "rock" and "pop" is that the former describes a song's life in the moment (e.g., "That song rocks!") and the latter describes its half-life in your memory (e.g., "How did that song go again?"). By these definitions, 12Rods are...a very... More >>
• BEST R&B ARTIST
  Sure, the hallucinatory hip hop of Red Lights and Poetry-founder Toriano Sanzone resembles R&B (a.k.a. contemporary black pop) about as much as Basehead, Tricky, or the Black Album does. But, like that company, Sanzone deserves a special designation outside of rap, even if the new Beautiful... More >>
• BEST ROCK BAND
  Too pigheaded to admit that they are no match against Yahweh, too popular to play the basement shows that made them legendary, and probably too proud (or punk) to accept this award from your favorite alt-weekly behemoth, Dillinger Four are more themselves than ever in 2001. They teach the... More >>
• BEST ROCK CLUB
  In case you hadn't noticed, First Avenue is that Walkman next to the Target Center's boombox. It's that old black bus station that's been turned into a concert venue and dance hall. It's a former transfer point between Seattle and the East Coast that now serves as a transfer point between... More >>
• BEST RUMOR ON THE LOCAL MUSIC SCENE
  Not that we blame ravers for being edgy: From 7th Heaven to Coca-Cola spots, from Groove to the evening news, rave culture has gone from underground youth phenomenon to object of mass parental concern. Locally, the war on Ecstasy has led the city to crack down on public events that just... More >>
• BEST SONGWRITER
  The late Glenrustles piled great line atop great line like coats on a bed at a party, but frontman Rich Mattson always seemed ready to flop down on them anyway. It wasn't that his songwriting lacked wit or passion, just that his spiritual weariness ran so deep that for 12 years he seemed... More >>
• BEST STRIP CLUB
  If your ideal night at a strip club involves jockeying for position with a mob of drunken, Dockers-clad conventioneers, paying eight bucks for a juice concoction, and hooting at a silicone-stuffed porn star as she submits to something resembling a full-blown gynecological exam...well, BJ's is... More >>
• BEST VOCALIST (FEMALE)
  "These are the good years," begins the fake "Ketchup Advisory Board" commercial on A Prairie Home Companion, in which an empty-nesting dad touts ketchup's "natural mellowing agents" as a panacea for his wife's boomer angst and restless sexual urges. It's a good joke, but some people over age 30... More >>
• BEST VOCALIST (MALE)
  Plenty of young R&B lovermen tout their bedroom stamina, but few prove as enduring in our bedrooms as Next. Nearly a year after entering the Billboard charts, the trio's conjugal hit "Wifey" is still at No. 4 on the Hot R&B/Hip Hop Recurrent Airplay chart. That's above Memphis Bleek's... More >>
• BEST WINE BAR
  How do we say this place is perfect without sounding over-the-top? Tucked in the first floor of a nondescript warehouse on a one-way street just off Washington Avenue North, Bev's is every bit as understated as its location. Yet there's something about the sparsely modern but warm atmosphere of... More >>
• FOURTH-BEST BAND NAME
  The name might easily prompt you to dismiss this band as another amateur blues duo awaiting their once-in-a-lifetime gig at Famous Dave's. But insiders are on to the fact that this experimental electronica outfit is cheekily spoofing on a certain holy connotation. And while said connotation... More >>
• SECOND-BEST BAND NAME
  Finding the right band name is as difficult as finding the right bandmates. The perfect moniker should be catchy, memorable, unique, easy to pronounce. In short, it must distill the band's essence down to a few syllables. If nailing these elements constitutes success, then Har Mar Superstar is... More >>
• THIRD-BEST BAND NAME
  Did you know the city of Montreal has a monument to its own 'Nuck nosecrooner? Here, we have to settle for the next best thing--a dollop of mustard and a slice of satirical cheese. More >>