Seattle Eagle is Best Gay Bar of 2009: Embroiled in disagreements with authority figures (including one with the “porn police” over a poster showing breasts and butt cheeks), a ricin threat back in January, and even an uproar over its shirtless night called Bareback, Seattle Eagle has survived through it all much because of the enthusiasm and resilience of Keith Christensen, owner and manager since 1998.
Somehow fitting, before The Eagle, Christensen managed the Jim Rose Circus Sideshow and is still very involved with the music scene where he writes and produces music with his GhostLight Studios.
But even Dan Savage was angered by the attacks from the Liquor Control Board and started his “Dicks In Bars: A Growing Public Menace” recently in this story (NSFW!). But times are a-changin’ since the bar was born over 25 years ago. A little background and history is provided by Adrian Ryan:
The Eagle is ancient. It was born to be the most scurrilous of gay bars—a rough old stand-and-deliver fagbar standard, a deeply niche-marketed leather-daddy gay bar chain of sorts. Yes, chain! There are/were Eagles in New York, San Francisco, Portland, Atlanta…Jesus, everywhere with a pulse, a fresh supply of chaps, and a protracted anus. To be quite blunt (oh, innocents! Shield thine eyes!), The Eagle was designed for and populated by lusty leather-lovers, the piss-thirsty, and the fisty. The boot-licky. The cigar-chompy. It was shadowy and seedy and conspicuously secret by design. Tom of Finland, the whole thing was, if you get my drift. And so it went for ages.
They were the first men’s gay bar in Seattle to provide a woman’s night on a monthly basis back in 2002 called “Vibrator” and it is still going strong today.
And as the gay dance crowds continued to pack into nearby Cuff Complex, The Eagle decided to do away with their iconic pool table, replacing it with a disco ball and dance floor.
Then, on December 4, 2009 along came Kevin Kauer (from Nark Magazine) and Team Dandy with their new “Fringe” event. Some feel strongly that maybe The Eagle was selling out but no one can deny how popular this new weekly event has become. Targeting young “hipster fags”, alterna-gays and a whole mess of others, and while the intent has been to include everyone, the event also makes it more likely that they can continue to serve the Leather Levi crowd the other six days a week.
Fringe at Seattle EagleSeattle Eagle is our Gay Bar of 2009 not because it is just surviving but they are still able to thrive in the ever changing gay culture and environment of Capitol Hill’s relentless gentrification.
