Melody Lanes – The Dude’s Wet Dream

Bowling has been experiencing a renaissance in New York for the past couple years. What used to be just a fun way to pass the time at the Port Authority if you missed your train has now turned into a full-fledged nightlife machine. Every other birthday invitation seems to involve this timeless sport of drunken competition.

With the arrival of Brooklyn Bowl on the scene, you can now enjoy Atlantic Salmon and Champagne with your $50 an hour game.  Gutter, another  spacious Williamsburg bar with a few lanes tossed in is the perfect way to drink for 4 hours as you wait for your game so by the time your turn comes around you have a better chance of hitting a patron with the ball then landing a strike.

Manhattan also has its share of bowling trappings. Bowlmor can also easily liquidate your pocket money in no time, and Chelsea Piers does the same without all the bells and whistles. But if you can manage to convince people to hoof it to Sunset Park in Brooklyn, I swear there is a rainbow-tiled oasis waiting for you.

Melody Lanes is everything a bowling alley should be. Cheap, filled with entertaining characters and a jukebox crammed with every R.Kelly song you’ll ever need. After you get past the gestapo that runs the front desk head over to the bar where you will meet Peter Carmine Gaetano Napolitano, otherwise known as Pete. I first met Pete two years ago when I had my birthday party at this fine establishment. Done up in a dapper bow-tie and sporting the best side burns this side of the seventies, he is a New York original. His personal concoction, the “Pete’s Special” also known as “one..and she’s done”, is a mystery mix of various rums, food coloring and god knows what else. Pete is a philosopher of sorts and it’s tempting to talk with him the whole night then embarrass yourself with gutter balls. So when I recently made my second pilgrimage to Pete’s bar stool I was an experienced veteran. I coolly asked for the Pete’s special and he responded with, “Lady the last time I did that, they gave me six months for it.” Ah yes, just another gem from this unsuspecting local celebrity.

Courtesy of NY Times

Once I finally pulled myself away from the bar, I enjoyed some sweet disco lights and freshly microwaved dinosaur-shaped chicken nuggets. Because sometimes things just taste better in juvenile shapes. At about $7 a game, and free shoe rentals if you wrangle up 13 people, the only downside to Melody is it’s location. Or maybe, this magical place is only the way it is because it’s not somewhere in Midtown or Hipster heights.

Melody Lanes, 461 37th St [Sunset Park, Brooklyn]