Dive Bar Jukebox with Emmett Burke
Dive Bar Jukebox
Welcome to Dive Bar Jukebox, where bartenders, writers, chefs, musicians, and a cast of cool characters answer the question: If we were hanging out together at a bar and I put ten credits on the jukebox, what songs would you punch in and why? Their responses reveal thoughts on their favorite dive bars along with a hand-picked, annotated playlist for your weekend listening pleasure.
Please join me in welcoming today’s very special guest…
Emmett Burke
Take it from me, Emmett Burke is a great guy. I always love running into him at one of the two popular New York city restaurants he founded and owns, Emmett’s and Emmett’s on Grove. He’s affable, approachable, down to earth, and passionate about a number of pursuits—whether it’s collecting 1980s movies on VHS, the finer points of deep-dish and thin-crust Chicago-style pizza, frequenting dive bars, or reciting lyrics from the songs by his favorite ‘80s bands (Orchestral Manoeuvres in the Dark, The Tubes, and A Flock of Seagulls, to name a few).
The Chicago-born entrepreneur opened his namesake tavern in 2013 just south of Houston on MacDougal Street, specializing in deep-dish pizza, an overlooked regional style in a city with a pizzeria on every corner. “Yeah, that’s my baby. It’s my first. It’s like a band’s debut album,” says Burke. Specialized pies include the Magnum P Eye with ham and pineapple and the Gabe Froman, with half-pepperoni, half-sausage, and spinach. You’ll find other Chicago foodways classics like Italian Beef and a Chicago-Style Hot Dog, but the thin-crust tavern-style pies (the type of pizza most Chicagoans favor) cut into small squares like a cheesy jigsaw puzzle have proven to be the the runaway hit.
It’s all thin-crust pizza at Emmett’s on Grove, the popular supper club-style restaurant in the West Village that also has a full-service bar—the $9 Happy Hour & a Half Martinis and a sidecar of Pigs in a Blanket is one of the best deals in town. The roster of thin-crust pies there include the bestselling Hot Papi (pepperoni, jalapeño, red onion, ranch) and the Pegg O’ (grana padano, Parmesan, pecorino Romano, fresh basil) along with mains like Baby Back Ribs, Chicken Parmesan, and Shrimp Scampi. The place is always packed—there’s an electric buzz of the crowded bar, Emmett’s curated playlists are coming from the speakers, and everyone is having a great time.
Last November I had the chance to interview Emmett for LAST CALL on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the original Emmett’s and we covered a lot of topics, including the philosophy of taking the unexpected left turns in life and the story of how he got Bill Murray to guest-bartender at the opening night of Emmett’s on Grove (It turns out Murray dated Emmett’s mother when they were in high school together and surprised her by stopping by her son’s bar to help celebrate and pour some beers).
This is one of my favorite quotes from that interview:
“Pizza is the ultimate equalizer. Everyone likes pizza. And the cool thing about that is pizza brings everyone together, right? We get celebs in here from the neighborhood and people who come in from all over and they want to eat our pizza because it’s good.
But it’s also accessible for anyone who just wants to have a good time. That’s been the super-fun thing for me—that people also appreciate us for a well-made Martini, a nice bottle of wine, or a piece of art on the wall.
I hate to use the word elevated because everyone does that. Like an “elevated” dive bar? Fuck that. But everything we do we try to have an intention behind it. But there’s no airs to anything we do because, hey, I grew up delivering pizzas. And that’s still what I kind of do for a living.”
—Emmett Burke
Read on as Emmett philosophizes on the bar in the movie The Wrestler, what makes a dive bar a dive bar, his love of jukeboxes at bars, and an eclectic playlist that seamlessly cuts between Buddy Holly and Tom Petty to The Velvet Underground and The Cars.