LA's last gay piano bar

The Other Side, located on Hyperion Avenue in Silver Lake, is the last gay piano bar left standing in Los Angeles, according to John Rabe at KPCC. "There used to be many, but after June 24, there won't be any," he writes. "Over 40 years, it was a refuge from homophobia, a last preserve for pro-am show tunes, and just a reasonably quiet neighborhood bar where the bartenders made the world's best well drinks." (I guess we know where Rabe has been drinking.)

Documentary filmmaker Jane Cantillon is wrapping up production of a doc, "The Other Side, a Queer History." She and Rabe contend the bar's demise mirrors Silver Lake's waning status as a gay community. "The gay population slowly, quietly migrated to the West Side, to unincorporated West Hollywood, where the Sheriff's department wasn't as cruel or harsh," she says.

As for The Other Side, "it's a landmark the city doesn't even know existed," a bar patron tells Rabe. He writes about it on his KPCC blog and there's a segment on this weekend's "Off-Ramp." The show first airs at noon Saturday.

Photo of Cantillon and pianist Bryan Miller: John Rabe/KPCC