The Little Orange

The best place to dance on West 6th? The best dance spot I’ve been to in Cleveland? Mercury Lounge.

First, I have to admit that if I had my druthers, I’d dance to rap and electronica, neither of which is the centerpiece at Mercury. Most nights I’ve been there, Mercury has been basic dance music with some current chart-toppers sped up and mixed in. That’s the only kind of dancing music I’ve found in Cleveland; if it’s not that, it’s straight-up pop hits of varying danceability. While Mercury’s music is fine for dancing purposes, that it isn’t my ideal dancing music keeps Mercury from being the ultimate place to go. Sigh.

But that’s my only real complaint about Mercury. Beyond that, it’s fabulous. The music is usually pretty good, all but forcing you to get up and jiggle. The crowd is more interesting (and probably older) than the rest of West 6th, a mixture of people you want to get to know instead of droves of assimilated teenyboppers. And perhaps because it’s south of St. Clair and therefore apart from 6th’s main drag, it’s marginally less crowded than the rest of the bars, which means about three more square feet of dancing space per person — essential for a “nomadic dancer” like yours truly.

Hey, the women’s bathroom even has hair products and appliances available for your hair-maintenance needs — if you’re into that sort of thing.

Something that has never happened to me at Mercury is the pouncing that’s inevitable at every single other bar on 6th. Walking through those places is like entering Night of the Living Dead: ghoulish crazed men lurch out of the darkness towards you — towards your front if they’re polite, and if they’re not, up to your derriere, there to wriggle unseen until they get too close or a friend points them out. Even walking past the bar to the dance floor you get assaulted, claws scratching, teeth clacking, strained voices grasping for a clever word.

Mercury, on the other hand, seems to lack the final catalyst that puts the zombies in motion, gripping them in a state of relative reservedness. If men do approach you, they always approach your front first, and they usually make fair — if passing — efforts at eye contact and conversation before going in for the grab. I personally think it’s Mercury’s couches that keep the zombies on good behavior. Ringed around the small dance floor, they ensure that someone is always watching, a sort of dance-club Santa Claus divided among your fellow club-goers.

So thank you, Mercury, for being different, for being better, and for those ass-protecting couches arrayed around your dance floor.