I must disclose a personal bias in writing this review: karaoke holds fond nostalgic memories for me. As a young teenager, I spent the night in a booth in a karaoke bar in Tokyo with my family and a group of Japanese businessmen we had never met before. By the end of it, the businessmen were in their underwear singing Paul Simon and I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up. Today, I am on the way to Ukiyo to celebrate a mutual friend’s birthday with Anton. He tells me about the time he locked himself out of his house and used his katana to cut down the front door. “The insurance company wouldn’t pay for it cause it was an act of God,” he says, seemingly without irony. “Don’t know how I let you convince me not to bring it out tonight.”
Let us be honest, to begin with: you can’t go wrong with karaoke. It’s a tried and tested formula and, for its advocates, an unmatchable night out in terms of enjoyment. Once you’ve had a couple of drinks, too, it’s hard not to get utterly engrossed in the absurd pageantry of it all. And Ukiyo, as one might expect of a Japanese restaurant and bar, does not get it wrong. The Exchequer street haunt provides a functional (if not much else) environment in which the public may pay to embarrass themselves singing along to Michael McDonald songs all night. If it didn’t exist, you’d have to invent it!
After shuffling through the delicious smell of cooking, past the assembled diners, down the stairs and beside the bathrooms, the fun begins. Karaoke booths line a thin corridor, in which the sounds of others’ fevered singing leaks from the almost soundproofed rooms: a liminal and dissonant space between parties. The booths themselves show insignificant signs of wear, and the general set-up is strictly functional and ergonomic rather than especially comfortable, but one is inclined to spend most of the night on one’s feet anyway. A gigantic catalogue containing over 50,000 songs (listed alphabetically by artist – note that “Steal My Sunshine” was sung by Len) sits beside the karaoke machine, complete with keyboard for inputting track-codes. There is a telephone with which you can communicate with the bar upstairs, to order drinks or, perhaps, ask for requests.
Prices are reasonable enough (3 bottles of Asahi for XXX), though you do have to pay to rent the karaoke room (€25/hour for a small room, and €50/hour for the larger, 30-capacity room), and there is a full cocktail menu. Of course, Ukiyo is a restaurant first and a bar second, but the drinks service is good, draft beer is available, and the staff are uniformly attentive, pleasant and helpful. Just make sure nobody tries to rap.
Anton flips a two euro coin and plants it on the bar as we settle the bill upstairs. “This guy’s reviewing this place! He’s a bar reviewer!” he says to the waitress as we leave. He holds my head as I get into the back of a taxi, in the manner of an arresting officer. “Well, what did you think of the raps I did?” he beams from the front seat. “Put them in the review, man.”
Ukiyo
7 Exchequer Street,
Dublin 2
www.ukiyobar.com
