Review: Pop's Blue Moon in St. Louis

There is a really hip bar in the Hill called Pop's Blue Moon. It may not be the part of the Hill that you automatically think of when you visualize "The Hill". This bar is on Pattison, the street on the North side of 44. The highway stabbed its way through the Hill decades ago in the name of progress. The interstate wiped out a block wide swath and rammed a noisy freeway through the northern end of this tight ethnic Italian community. There are a few solid blocks of the signature Hill shotgun homes on this side of the neighborhood before it blends into Gateway High School and the industrial corridor that runs along the train tracks south of Manchester.

There are no restaurants in this part of the Hill, but this somewhat hidden watering hole opened up in the past year in the place of a long time neighborhood tavern called Pop's. The new owner, Terry Grigaitis, has added on to the original name and now it goes by Pop's Blue Moon. The bar is built out of what looks like an addition to one of the shotgun homes that directly faces the highway. The structure that houses the bar comes straight out of the front first floor of the home and juts over the postage stamp lawn all the way to the sidewalk.

The owner's son, Josh, who is in his early 20s, lives in the house and makes the long commute to his bartending gig by going downstairs to work in his father's bar. He opens up the bar when he wakes up, which can range from 2 to 4. You can tell that the place has a natural "in the know" type of feel because you will often hear a hip radio show on the community radio station in the afternoon (a.k.a. KDHX). There is no pretentiousness given off by the bar: everyone feels welcome. The clientele is a mish mash of locals from the Hill of all ages, from people that work in the restaurants to those that moseyed on in from around the block or over the Edwards bridge. (The extra Edwards bridge was one of the compromises that the Hill got in return for having a highway slice through it.)

Pop's Blue Moon does have a hipster element with many young kids who have just passed the legal Missouri drinking age. This adds to the diverse blend of folks. Many of Pop's clients are old guard Italian, but many come in from all over the city to give it a diverse feel in age, income and race without compromising its neighborhood tavern status.

The cocktails and beer range from a rather extensive beer list, which includes the southsider's favorite Busch beer. They also offer a variety of imports including the Guinness big cans and of course the Blue Moon microbrew (not brewed by the bar) for those with more expensive tastes.

At the end of the bar is a broken vinyl record jukebox, which unfortunately might make way for a popcorn machine. A couple of nights during the week they will have a live original solo artist perform. The overall hue is blue, as the name would suggest., A blue glow emanate from the neon signs and the clever back lighting of the bar.

Probably the most biziarre trait of Pop's Blue Moon is the area around the bathrooms in the back of the bar. There is a table with a religious/holiday shrine that changes seasonally. It has sort of a Pagan/Catholic statue worship thing going on. But to match the shrine in the back of the bar is a several foot high bomb that stands next to the boys room. Josh assures me that it has been "deactivated."

Pop's Blue Moon has a relatively sophisticated feel, but it does not hold back from its neighborhood tavern origin. On the wall is an old handmade piece of woodwork of the American flag with the names of all the young Italian Americans from the Hill that served in the Second World War. There were more men that served in W.W.II from the Hill than from any other city neighborhood. There are also looming pictures of intimidating/prominent looking local Italian men in suits along the wall. Instead of distancing themselves from the old drinking establishment, the new owner Terry kept these items as artifacts from the old bar.

Anyone should feel at ease in Pop's Blue Moon and could easily be on the rounds for a night out.