Spleen Bar

Criteria	Rating	Comments
Comfiness and Availability of Seating	10/10	They have booths! You can roll into this place at 8pm on a Friday and still somehow have a whole booth to yourself. Every other bar in the world is heaving with the sweaty, grasping mass of humanity but this place is shockingly empty.
Cheapness of Drinks	9/10	Two gin and tonics for $16 seems like a pretty sweet deal. Earlier that night I had been to Gin Palace and they were trying to sell gin and tonics for upwards of $25 each which (to me anyway) just reeks of corruption.
Decor/Bathroom Cleanliness	7/10	Neither of the doors to the cubicles in the women's bathroom lock and one of the toilets doesn't have a seat so you're forced to hover while you pee (which can be harder than it sounds). There are lots of security cameras throughout the joint and at the bar downstairs they have a huge flatscreen TV pointed towards customers so we can see ourselves on camera and know that everyone at the bar can see us on camera no matter where we go in the venue. Is this for security or for the entertainment of guests? Impossible to tell. On Yelp, a chick named Anna-Claire A. wrote of Spleen Bar: "Seriously how weird is this place. Music was not loud enough - the floor is sticky and the vibe is just weird! There is a big screen - cctv like - showing random offices and the bar. Very weird." Haven't you ever heard of a panopticon, Anna-Claire? If it can work in a prison, I don't see why it can't be a cool addition to a bar! She continues: "There is an indoor smoking room if you are into that (with a pool table) Not my type of place! Especially with so many other cool places in the Melbourne cbd!" I think we can all agree that Ann-Claire sounds like the worst (is she trying to use "weird" pejoratively? wtf?) and the fact that she didn't like Spleen Bar is actually a ringing endorsement. If all it takes to keep idiots out of a bar is a toilet with no seat then I say: welcome to a seatless world or something.
Overtly intimidating bar staff?	8/10	Bar staff seem incredibly chill. A lot of them free pour which is cool and they're not stingy with the limes. I live in fear of going to a bar where the young, frighteningly attractive barstaff look down their perfect noses past their perfect eyelashes with their perfect eyes at me (your friendly local sewer rat) and judge me for ordering something stupid or for looking ugly.
Music	5/10	I have no clear memory of ever hearing music here. Probably just because my senses are being overloaded with the visual splendour of the dark, dirty walls and the dark, dirty furniture and the dark, dirty floors.
Total	39/50	Final Remarks: I'm ready to commit this place to part of my regular roster. The lights are dim, the people are grimey, the drinks are cheap, the seating is plentiful, chicks like Anna-Claire have opted-out. It's paradise.

I'm still considering other qualities in a bar which might be important enough to me to include them in these reviews. Could include: proximity to home, strength of internet signal, willingness of friends and family to go with me. I'll think about it a bit more and maybe update my criteria later on.