Is there something in the air? Yet another of the city's unpretentious, unkempt watering holes has announced its closure: Upper West Side dive bar stalwart Ding Dong Lounge will close next week. The bar has lost its lease, according to a statement on the bar's Facebook page. The last day in its current home at 929 Columbus Avenue will be next Thursday, July 31st.

The bar hopes to relocate, according to the Facebook posting:

ATTENTION ALL DING DONGERS!: The Upper West Side has been a great home. We have laughed here, we have cried here we have fallen over drunk here. But alas, It's time for a change. Ding Dong Lounge will be relocating. Our last day of business on Columbus and 106th street will be Thursday July 31st. This is due to us losing our lease.



This week is what we're calling LOL week. We wanna go out in a blaze of glory. So come out tonight. Come out tomorrow. Come out every F**KING night. Thank you for years and years of fun...it ain't over. We're just going on vacation

On its website, the bar notes it currently had the "highest sales in its 13 year history," but that apparently wasn't enough to keep it from getting the boot. Ding Dong DJ Linda Rizzo puts it much more succinctly to Jeremiah Moss, saying the Ding fell "victim to landlord greed, avarice, and douchebaggery."

Opened in 2001, the Ding had an extremely loyal neighborhood following, which included Gothamist editor Ben Yakas, who loved the "crappy atmosphere we desperately desire in our watering holes," also calling it the best place to "find yourself shitfaced at 4 a.m. on the UWS."

[H/T post by Jeremiah's Vanishing New York]