Kegs A Good Beer Bar Alternative To Najas On The Redondo Beach Pier

Live Music And 25 Taps Provide Another South Ba Bike Ride Destination

Finally!

It’s about time.

For the past couple of years, I’ve been searching for a good beer bar alternative to Naja’s on or even around the Redondo Beach Pier. I tried to like On the Rocks, but it’s not been anywhere close to a happening place since it was Chiller’s a few years ago.

Kincaid’s is great – you can get a Stella Artois draft for $4 on Saturday and Sunday afternoons because its Happy Hour is good even on weekends– but it’s sit-down style, is not a beer bar and has no band. I want a place with live music where I can stand or lean against a table or bar. For some reason, I prefer leaning in bars to sitting.

There is, of course, Old Tony’s. But you go there for Fire Chiefs at sunset, not for beers. And yes, there’s Rocky Point, where you grab a beer out of a convenience store type of cooler and sit on a picnic bench by boats in King Harbor. But it’s not not a bar and there’s only one or two other people there anyway.

 

 

 

But now I have found what I have been looking for a few doors down from Naja’s at a place called Kegs. It has a wall of fine, craft beers off all varieties on tap and live music Saturday and Sunday afternoons (3-7 p.m.). Saturdays have full bands while Sundays are more acoustic, and the place can rock.

Keg’s is not as big as Naja’s – just a little bigger than the smaller bar area of its neighbor, in fact – and there are not 77 beers on draft.

But it’s newer, fresher and cleaner, and that is a welcome upgrade from the well-worn Naja’s. It has 25 taps and a good menu that consists of salads, sandwiches and burgers. In addition to the bar it has a limited liquor selection and serves Bloody Marys, margaritas and even a Long Island Tea.

The one thing it needs is something it can’t control, and that is a bike rack because there’s no place to lock up your bike. That’s up to the city, and putting bike racks throughout the Pier should be a priority.

Let’s face it, Naja’s needs a wake-up call.

The place is dreary. The blue paint, tiny round tables and neon beer signs on the walls have been there seemingly forever. The staff walks not with a bounce in their step or a smile on their faces, but hunched over and with the kind of depressed facial expression that indicates they would prefer to be elsewhere. Like stuck in freeway traffic.

Competition may be just the thing to get Naja’s attention.

We need choices because Redondo Beach’s marina offers too few of them.

And that’s a shame, because there are thousands of fun, young and mostly single people who want a place to have some beers in a casual atmosphere while riding bicycles or on rollerblades along the beach. We need a destination so we don’t reach a point and stop and stare at each other with “okay, well NOW what” expressions.

I’m not crossing Naja’s off my bar list, not by a long shot. It’s been there so long and it’s an institution. I just am glad to have a more refined alternative.