I find it baffling to see so many comments about this place being unfriendly to foreigners. I don’t know about what was going on before but I went there last Sunday with 3 friends. It was the first time for me but not for my friends. Their last visit, however, was pre-Covid, and the owner didn’t recognize them at all. From this experience I wouldn’t say this is a 一見さんお断り joint (one that refuses first-time patron) as one commenter said. The idea that you would need ‘letter of introduction from high-class people’ to enter this place is quite frankly absurd.
We went there on a Sunday night at 22:30, without knowing that they close earlier on Sunday. At first knock the owner told us, politely, it’s beyond business hour. (I speak broken Japanese and we are all non-caucasian foreigners.) 20 seconds after we started to walk away, he apparently changed his mind and called from behind, telling us we’re welcomed to come in until 23:00. We gladly took the deal.
There’s McIntosh amplifier and vintage JBL speakers in the bar and the owner put on a Carmen McRae record for us. I asked him if he takes requests, and he told us there are 1,000 jazz and 1,000 classical records but no list. I ventured to request something by Fukui Ryo, the late jazz pianist from Sapporo whose reissues kind of take the little global community of Japanese jazz lovers by storm in recent years. Although he doesn’t know the name, I think he made a mental note of my proclivity for Japanese jazz. When the next McRae song was over, he put on Takeda Kazunori’s Gentle November (1979). I know next to nothing about whiskey but my friends were very impressed with his vintage collection. All in all a wonderful and shibui experience.
