What should be a welcome respite from the hellhole of trendoid clubs that the Meatpacking District has become, Gaslight puts about as much effort into their bar as you’d expect a joint with no competitors would. So you’re an ordinary working slob without the cool duds or the 6’2″ Asian model girlfriend on your arm. Where do you go if you’re down in this ‘hood? Let’s assume you don’t want to hang with the pool playing, beer swilling crowd at The Hog Pit or Hogs & Heifers (because you’re an adult in shoes you value), and you just want a damn drink in a place that doesn’t smell of barf. Gaslight is pretty much it. So they throw some fakey velvet ropes out front, splash a little Clorox in the slop sink and turn on the lights. We entered while the sun was still out, and were greeted by a total of two patrons. The place had clearly just opened, but there was already trash on the ground for some weird reason. The cleavage-bearing bartender looked like she would have rather been reading a crappy romance novel than tending bar, and lazily handed us a drink and sat–in a very short skirt–on the ledge behind the bar. Despite the view, the place made me want to stab myself in the neck with a corkscrew. We were apparently listening to somebody’s awful iPod, as the music was bad enough to make the roaches squeal. I’m not sure it was fair judging this place at such an early hour, but all indications point to the fact that there might not be much difference between hanging out at Gaslight and drinking a 40oz. in the fluorescent light of the fridge section of a damn Wawa. [MF]
