Salient

Bar Review

By Haimona Peretini Gray | 7 Jul, 2008

“Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy.” - Benjamin Franklin

Mighty Mighty is often the butt of harsh remarks (even by this magazine), it’s been called “a hideous reminder of how Wellington can turn something like indie rock’n’roll into a pretentious activity”, but to these I must ask… so what?

Sure it is a porous symbol of all that is wank about this town, but that is what’s great about it, it’s a critique of trendy self important bars like the one that IT IS, oh god my brain just exploded.

The décor is worse than most student flats, the smoking spot attracts rain like Estab attracts Chlamydia and you constantly see the same caftan wearing, sunglasses inside, Fluro Scenester wanks.

The majority of its clientele are dull middle class white people (damn us whiteys) but where else can you drink with an Asian punk on acid, teenage rockabilly fans, girls dressed like Penny Lane and boys dressed like Pete Doherty and a wide array of New Zealand ‘celebrities’ spanning from the Flight Of The Conchords boys to Jason Faafoi (who unbeknownst to him, is worshipped as a god by a handful of people who have hung a poster of them in a bedroom and pray to it each morning as if he was their own private Mecca).

And where else can you get that knowing look of worry from the bartender as you order your absinthe. Sit at a table where you and the three other people at the table are wearing the exact same jeans… both male and female. Get into a fight with a complete stranger and NOT because they called you an emo. Get pissed while listening to your lecturer DJ, drunkenly debate Camus while holding your fifth crate bottle, and speaking of, where else could you buy a crate, that in itself deems it a bar of great esteem.

Sure it can feel a tad stuck-up, but that’s just to keep you out.

“Get up and dance, get up and smile, get up and drink to the days that are gone in the shortest while.” - Simon Fowler