Le Pif is a French Wine Bar concept with two locations in NYC. “Le Pif” is a French expression used to refer to a good wine, a sommelier or a small intuition. Do you have the Nose for it ? Come to experience our typical French recipe… View The Full Menu With a selection of 65 bottles of French wine and 40 by the glass, we promise to personalize your experience and match your taste.Outdoor Vintage Flea Markets and Farmers Market in NYC and Brooklyn Top 10 Things To Do In NYC to Truly Feel New York Sailing Lessons NYC - Best Manhattan Sailing Schools and Clubs Candy Bar Experience - Sweet Treat Inspired Cocktails in NYC Chinatown NYC - Guide to Manhattan, Brooklyn and Flushing Queens Chinatown Best Day Spas in NYC to Pamper YourselfChinese food will be coming to this space… There’s good news and bad news in this edition of Upper West Side openings and closings. New Chinese food is coming, a wine bar has served its last drink, and clothing stores and thrift shops look set to close.

Han Dynasty, a Sichuan restaurant with a downtown location, will open on West 85th street in the former home of Bocca di Bacco, Eater reports. “The menu at the new Han Dynasty will be the same as it is downtown (think dan dan noodles, wok-fried meats, and those blistering hot dry pepper chicken wings), and Chiang is bringing his chef Mei da Liu from Philadelphia to set up the kitchen. Chiang will be applying for a full liquor license, which would be a step up from the original East Village outpost, which operates with only beer and wine. The restaurant is expected to open in early May.” Cava, a wine bar on 80th street just off of Amsterdam Avenue, closed a few days ago, according to a longtime regular who contacted us. “They were unable to negotiate a new lease with the landlord–sounds like the landlord wanted a huge rent increase. Definitely not due to a lack of business, as it was always packed…The regulars are deeply saddened.” Valley Thrift Shop at 949 Amsterdam Avenue (107th) is set to close after at least 20 years at that location, said Myrta Maldonado, who works at the shop and sits on the board of the nonprofit that runs it.

The thrift shop is run by the Valley Restoration Development Corp., a nonprofit that has been instrumental in the development of Manhattan Valley since it was founded in 1979 — they helped turn the landmark building at 891 Amsterdam Avenue into a hostel in 1984 after it had become a burned-out shell. Myrta says she also expects the nonprofit to shut down, although that will be a longer process. We heard from one source that there is some dissent on the nonprofit’s board about the potential closure and “it remains to be seen” whether it closes, but we did not hear back from other board members when we attempted to contact them. best wine list in orange countyMyrta says they need $200,000 to keep it running.best wine for christmas present The big Urban Outfitters at the corner of 72nd street and Broadway (pictured at left) is on the market, seeking a tenant to move in as of July 2015. beer and wine gifts

The Cushman and Wakefield listing calls the location “the best retail corner on Manhattan’s Upper West Side.” Urban has occupied that space since 1999, when the HMV music store closed. The listing doesn’t mean Urban will definitely close — sometimes landlords list the space but still come to terms with the tenant — but it does look like the brokers are serious. Their renderings call the new tenant “L&M” — a nod perhaps to H&M, one of Urban’s arch-rivals. Also being marketed by Cushman: the Burberry Brit store on 68th and Columbus, and Ann Taylor Loft on 69th and Broadway. FOOD, NEWS, OPEN/CLOSED | James Murphy knows where to see all of his friends tonight. When the former LCD Soundsystem bandleader announced he was opening The Four Horsemen, a Williamsburg wine bar, it seemed like an IRL manifestation of self-parody that Gentrified Brooklyn™ has used to skewer itself fictionally for years; the jokes to make here are just too easy. It’s understandable that one might be skeptical of what seems like Murphy’s more dilettantish impulses.

I was, until I had dinner there. Chef Nick Curtola’s food and the accompanying wine (curated, in part, by Murphy) are quite good. My visit gave me a particularly tasty take on Spanish tapas classic patatas bravas, which my server paired with a dry cava. They’ve lingered on my mind’s palate, weeks later. Perhaps more memorably, Murphy was in the house when I arrived on a Tuesday evening last month, holding court with his wife Christina Topsoe (also a partner in the wine bar) and celebrity friends (no names, folks, this ain’t TMZ). It would indicate Murphy is settling into the role of New York high-profile bar/club/restaurant owner. It’s what they’re supposed to do: host VIP friends at their place, "inconspicuous" yet anything but, as a kind of passive promotion. (It’s New York, so patrons pretend not to notice.) Front of house ended up seating me so close to his table, I couldn't not hear him prognosticating openly about the music industry: the pitfalls of Apple Music for artists and a speculated-upon proprietary Beats plug/jack to replace Apple devices' current 1/8" universal standard.

I tuned him out the rest of the night. It seemed only polite to him and my dinner companion. I didn't even notice the bar’s music until Murphy went behind the bar to turn it up about an hour later to play selector. Shazam failed me, so I pointed upward and asked, "What is this?" Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band’s "Zig Zag Wanderer". It felt like a moment out of High Fidelity. Maybe because we’re short so many record stores these days, bars/restaurants is where more of these moments happen now. That cultural shift seems like an incidental-yet-powerful part of The Four Horsemen’s appeal. The creation and curation of music—beautiful and supposedly revered—are rarely sustainable as cash flows by themselves anymore. The pursuits have to be paired with tech companies like the Google-owned Songza or the newly debuted Apple Music to make a career. Indeed, Dr. Dre and Trent Reznor have done very well. But for legacy artists building a cottage industry like Murphy, it isn't enough to make a living.

So he opened a wine bar in a tony neighborhood. Not that it’s a cushy gig. Murphy joked to the New York Times, "I need something with really low margins, high risk, brutal hours and which I have no experience at." His self-deprecation aside, Murphy has foodie cred (befriending and learning from chefs, baristas, and sommeliers around the world, eating so much rich food he got gout, he told the Times) and a mature vision of what he wants The Four Horsemen to look and taste like. He might be new at this, but he’s a natural. With his cultural caché, it’s a smart business play. It's not like it’s entirely without precedent in his career or in the industry as of late. In a collaboration with Blue Bottle, Murphy’s hawked his own brand of coffee. A few of his friends in Arcade Fire are planning a modern Haitian restaurant and cultural space in Montreal. Fellow DJ/producer legacy act Moby opened Teany years ago. There’s no shortage of musicians, from country stars to rappers, partnering in branded bar and/or restaurant ventures.

Murphy’s musical pursuits are no stranger to brand integration (IBM, Converse, McIntosh Labratory) and aspiration (New York City’s subways, the sounds of which he’s wanted to change for over 15 years and may be able to do in some form soon). Murphy—with his slate of interests and a devoted audience he left wanting more when LCD ended in 2011—is bound to diversify his bonds, like GZA told us to. Hip-hop has upped the ante for musicians’ entrepreneurship since the '80s (Run-D.M.C., with their Adidas line) and '90s (Sean Combs, with his everything). Not that it’s without precedent in the music world: queen of legacy pop stars Cher had Sanctuary, a branded catalog in 1996. No rock brand has pimped itself out more than KISS  (Aerosmith is a close second). You've heard of ridiculous and expensive band merchandise but that's so 20th century. This is the era of bands as BRANDS. In his own boutique way, Murphy is forging his own GOOP: he’s called it House of Good, detailed in a 2012 Times feature, full of luxury goods (with The Four Horsemen, he’s upped his vision to include services), purposefully understated and minimally promoted.

The Four Horsemen's facade in Williamsburg is the most discreet on the block: a stenciled logo on a small pane of glass near the door. Is it fair to poke fun at Murphy for cashing in on his cred? As an indie-label impresario, you never go Full Brand, right? Or do we just accept that this is the music industry and culture we live in now? "This is an industry that makes zero sense. It made zero sense ten years ago and somehow we’re [DFA Records] still chugging along, doing the weird thing that we do," Murphy said in a 2013 interview with Billboard. "As long as we just hang out and don’t do terrible things that seem gross I’m happy." As music fans, we've become inured to corporate sponsorship—most of all at festivals, as captive audiences, and on the web. It’s hard not to see the benefits when you see what Red Bull makes possible, like DFA’s recent 12th anniversary party. On the other hand: the SXSW Doritos Jacked Stage. I saw it for the first time standing next to a member of Los Angeles band Mansions on the Moon, loading up his van to play no-doubt one of many sets they had that day.