.Best Bluegrass Bar

You’ll get a heaping helping of pickin’ and grinnin’ with your beer at
this Lincoln Avenue hangout. We all know McGrath’s is a sure-bet fun
night with its weird kitschy decor (including an impressive array of
antique model airplanes) and the charming Alameda local color that’s
regularly in attendance. Lesser known is the burgeoning bluegrass music
community that’s built up around weekly Monday-night jams, which the
bar’s web site touts as “the Bay Area’s best” — and they are!
Several thriving bluegrass projects have splintered off from the
regular Monday-night sessions, which are religiously attended by
pickers and fiddlers both young and old from around the greater Bay
Area. There are two rooms — one for more serious pickers, and one
where a huge circle of jammers forms for an all-out, all-comers
hootenanny. Don’t be shy — everybody’s welcome to take a turn
leading a song. Check out the Kentucky Twisters and Grizzly Peak, two
new bands of gray-hairs that met at the jam sessions over the past
years.