The Station Inn, like many perfect places, is simple: All it needs to exist is cold beer, live bluegrass, and a few true music fans. Widely regarded as one of the city’s best bluegrass venues, this humble dive, with its original Hatch Show Print posters and neon signs on the wall, thrives in the shadow of the slick and shiny Gulch outside. Live music is on tap 7 nights a week. Seating is first-come, first-served, and you if you arrive any time after 8pm (shows are typically at 9pm) you will see a battalion of regulars who have taken their rightful place in the back of the venue against the wall in their folding chairs, which were salvaged from Lester Flatt’s tour bus (of Foggy Mountain Boys fame). The dedication runs deep here, and it should: The Station Inn is revered because it attracts talent (think Allison Kraus, Dierks Bentley, and Old Crow Medicine Show, who all played here on their way up). I can personally attest to this because I used to come every weekend to see a band called The Steeldrivers, which was fronted at the time by an unknown singer named Chris Stapleton, who now routinely sells out arenas hundreds of times this size. Plan to arrive early, pay in cash (there’s an ATM outside), and share a pitcher of beer and a high-school-cafeteria-style pizza before the show while you kill an hour. One of the best nights to come is Sunday, when there’s a weekly bluegrass jam where anyone could pop up.