Jesus, Ghandi and most other secular or non-secular dieties would probably have never set foot in here — and for good reason, because The Meet Rack is best described as a local’s haunt shadier than a crack whore’s love den.
On my first visit, I sit down at the bar — It’s grimy, or filled with character, depending on your point of view. As the owner, named God, serves up my first cocktail, he asks me, “Been here before?” I shake my head.
Then, right on cue, a 40-year-old man with sleeve tattoos depicting the devil fist-fighting with some sort of ornate Asian dragon turns to me and tells me to “take the damn tour” with a beer in his hand and a snarl on his face.
He thought he was trying to be friendly. I almost cried. Oh, but did I mention it’s awesome and I had a great time?
Just in case you’re in doubt, feel free to look at the ceiling when you take a visit. Those bras and panties hanging from clotheslines are real. Those people you hear screaming probably just lost a bet and are now getting branded.
Branded. Yes, you heard me — branded — like cattle.
Pitchers of drinks can be found all over the bar, the wall decorations could make some conservative parents pass out, and God, the aforementioned bartender and owner, makes the kind of crude, gleeful jokes that would get you a nice visit from the FBI if told around the wrong crowd.
It’s just another night at The Meet Rack and all for the better, because it drives the point home: Once you walk through the doors, you’re not in white-bread Tucson anymore.
This is much different from a bar on University Boulevard. True lovers of the city will feel right at home here among its rusty edges and sharp-tongued people.
The cheap drinks run around $4 and the food is about the same. All of it is passable, though this being a dive bar, the smart move would be to eat before you come and spend your money on the sexually named drinks.
The Meet Rack is never a bad deal. It’s a steal in fact because the best special they serve up is the atmosphere — and that’s 100 percent free.
