Lionheart Pub

The Lionheart has its good qualities, pool tables, darts and an excellent beer selection, which is why you should go to Lionheart.  One can find a quality amount of beers on tap, especially from some smaller breweries and some craft brews as well.  On the flip side, it can be a rather crowded environment, especially on a weekend, which knocks down the rating for me.  My suggestion, pick an offpeak time to come to Lionheart and you'll enjoy yourself, but avoid the bar on a Friday night or Saturday night.

When I first came to Lionheart, I must have been drunk, because I was very surprised and pleased to find a bar with such good beer selection on Lark. However, on many more sober trips, I could feel myself slipping from my original 4 star feelings. How could this have happened?

Pros (While the lights were out)
+ Look at all those pretty taps!
+ Non-hipster girls on Lark?!
+ Patio!
+ Mmm, popcorn...

Cons (Turn the lights back off!)
- This beer seems expensive...
- Who are all this sororiety and frat kids...
- Fight!  Duck!  Watch the beer fool!
- This bathroom seems small and incredibly dirty.
- I'd play pool or darts, but I can't get anywhere near the tables
- What's that burning smell, is that the patio?

With the burnout on frats and expensive drinks, it's just not as fun as it was.  It's a shame too, since before the crush of people, Lionheart was a cool place. It's just too popular for it's own good.  Yogi Bera may have put it best, 'nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded'

Dart leagues, free popcorn,  back bar with not 1 but 2 billiard tables, front outside patio, amazing selection of microbrews and the best happy hour beer special in Albany.

Lionheart Pub is a 5 star drinking establishment that is only hurt when the chill vibe remarkably changes for the worse to a boisterous college bar come Thursday night.  Not that I complained about this when I was in college; sharing a smoke in the outside alleyway and getting phone numbers or making out with scantily clad female patrons.

Those days are all but over. However, outside of the student weekend binge drinking that takes place here, Lionheart is a very enjoyable and warm place.  All anxiety and/or stress from work is immediately lifted as a sip a hoppy Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA.

The bartender, during weekday happy hour, is the best in Albany, recommending great beers to sample and cautioning you when you are asking for another Southern Tier "Pumking" ale.

Bartender:  "I guarantee you are going to have to stumble home. That pint is 9% alcohol and you just had 3. And after that abysmal showing you just had on the dart board, it could all but help your cricket game."

No worries, I have the complimentary popcorn to soak it all up.

Me: "Fill her up again please!"

Bartender: "You bet"