2005 Index of Winners

Decatur’s Brick Store Pub has long been a favorite haunt for beer lovers, but the local spot stepped it up earlier this year with its BELGIAN BEER BAR. At first glance, the pub may look exactly the same to infrequent visitors, but a walk up the stairs reveals a magical beer enclave to the left. Decorated with dark woods and dim lights, the Belgian Beer Bar fills up as fast as the clientele scans over the multipage beer menu. Several coolers hold an intimidating number of bottled brews, but the staff knows beer like sommeliers know wine.
125 E. Court Square, Decatur. 404-687-0990.

Located conveniently between the International Village of Doraville and the modern shopping of the Ashford-Dunwoody corridor, the venerable CHAMBLEE LANES stands as a bridge between class and culture. Any given day or night, you’ll likely find timid, newly transplanted Americans rubbing elbows and renting shoes next to boisterous, “We’re No. 1” Red-State Dixiecrats. And that’s the beauty of the place. It’s like a United Nations of bowling, bringing the huddled masses together to have fun and roll a few gutter balls. Isn’t that what America is all about?
2175 Savoy Drive, Chamblee. 770-451-8605. www.findthefun.com.

Promoters J. Carter and Kenny Burns may describe their popular nightclub event SOL-FUSION as an “intercontinental love fest,” but really it’s just one hell of a good time. No other event in Atlanta features music provided by some of the industry’s coolest personalities, such as ?uestlove and D-Nice, and a serious blend of genres from alt-rock to house to reggae. No other event assembles such a multicultural collection of people serious about partying, not posing.
www.sol-fusion.com.

Maybe we’re using the word “date” too generously, but MANHUNT is one Internet success story that’s left countless numbers of local guys smiling. Some swear they use it as a social outlet — a place to chat up strangers without having to deal with smoky bars and the accompanying attitude. Others see it as more of a delivery service (with “service” being the key word, ahem). Either way, there’s got to be a good reason so many ATL boys are always “on the ’Hunt.”
www.manhunt.net.

Opened by local restaurateur/self-proclaimed Anglophile GOVANTEZ LOWNDES, Technology Square-situated bistro the Globe celebrates the fresh-from-the-garden multidimensional cuisine of chef Joshua Perkins in a space-age, unfussy environment. And the clarity extends to the cocktails. The space overlays sleek textures and organic flavors, and the mixology of Lowndes follows suit with concoctions inspired from travels in London and Sydney. Served from behind a 30-foot zinc bar, the Globe’s bracing cocktails contain juicy ingredients like guava, passion fruit, mango, and rhubarb puree and combine them with worldly libations, including molasses rum, Pimms and Campari. The impact is mod yet classic, discreet yet zesty.
The Globe, 75 Fifth St. 404-541-1487. www.globeatlanta.com.

Tucked beside the lanes at Buford Highway’s INTERNATIONAL BOWL AND ARCADE are a hallway of private, by-the-hour rooms from which emanate all kinds of moans, groans and guttural noises. But these aren’t sex scenes, it’s karaoke! With the right amount of reverb in the resounding stereo and a background of Thailand rice patties on the big screen teleprompter, anyone can sound like Usher ... if he were in a car wreck ... underwater. But who cares? Cheap pitchers of beer are the great equalizer, and your entire party can take it as a challenge to one-up each other without anyone giving you shit. Karaoke here can be serious fun, and seriously funny.
5600 Buford Highway. 678-281-0270.

With its “no alcohol” policy and well-organized venue management, LANIERLAND’s Concerts in the Country is the sort of place you can safely take your grandma to enjoy a show. Plus, the attendees are some of the best behaved (and most sober) people in the state, having paid their hard-earned money to hear some real country music. Well worth the 45-minute drive out of town, the setting is beautiful, the sound is great, and the performing acts are a cross-section of old-timers such as George Jones and Tanya Tucker, and newer artists like Joe Nichols and Blake Shelton.
6115 Jot-Em Down Road, Cumming. 770-887-7464. www.lanierland.com.