Are Restaurants Too Noisy?
When the headline and the lede in Frank Bruni's restaurant review in the New York Times are both about noise, maybe, just maybe, we've reached the point of no return when it comes to restaurant noise levels. Consider the following line from Bruni's review: "Talking with tablemates at Mercat can be like watching an in-flight movie when you haven't purchased the earphones."
Here's my question: Is that state of affairs either necessary or desirable?
When you talk to chefs and restaurateurs about this issue, some will say the noise level in their restaurants is the result of faulty design, that they didn't know the noise level was going to be a problem until they opened their doors and discovered that sitting in their full restaurant was like being on an idling jet waiting to take off.
Others say they like the noise level high, that it translates into diners thinking they're at a hot, successful restaurant pulsating with energy. Some of those same people claim that their restaurants are meant for people who welcome sitting in that kind of environment, those carefree young folks who actively seek out those kinds of eating experiences.
Sometimes the noise level is exacerbated by earsplittingly loud music, which, as a serious serial music lover, I would be more appreciative of if the DJ, chef, or restaurateur hadn't chosen awful techno pop.
I don't think this state of affairs is going to change anytime soon. Loud restaurants will open for people who either seek them out or tolerate them. Quiet restaurants will open up for people who want to savor the sounds of their tablemates' voices and the food.
But as a food lover, I'm saddened by the fact that I probably won't get to eat at Mercat because I don't want to put up with a noise level that can be described as a "volume of sound that crosses over between pulse-quickening and brain-rattling." Wouldn't it be great if restaurants, like the Long Island Railroad, had quiet sections? I know achieving a quiet sub-space is much easier to do on a train, where it's a matter of isolating people in individual cars.
Maybe I'm just too old for Mercat or for Resto, an insanely loud restaurant I recently ate at with three friends. I loved the artery-hardening, incredibly delicious food, but I haven't thought about returning because of the noise level. I literally couldn't hear half of what my friends were saying, which was a real shame because the conversation was both stimulating and intimate.
The architect David Rockwell once said he designed restaurants around the idea that they were places that people went to take two-hour vacations from their lives. I've always loved that idea, but lately I'm beginning to realize that there are all kinds of vacations to be had, and that some folks like to rock and roll on South Beach all night long when they go away.
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9 Comments:
Personally I don't mind loud environments. But if the environment is so loud that you can't hear someone a foot away than its a problem. I can't find it plausible that a restaurant can survive if your group can't talk to each other. Its as simple as that. I would be interested to note how Mercat or Resto adjust their environment or even survive.
Then they misunderstand their customers - whether they be 21 or 51. If you can't talk to each other than those people -aren't coming back-. 21 year olds are a heck of lot more social than 51 year olds. Perhaps they expect them to instant message each other the entire meal?
shea at 10:10AM on 07/06/07
@shea: With the iPhone or Microsoft's Surface, you certainly could text each other over dinner service.
@Ed: Sign language courses and earplugs could solve your problem.
Adam Kuban at 10:22AM on 07/06/07
There are quiet sections on the LIRR?
alynn at 10:23AM on 07/06/07
I have never heard of, or found, a quiet section on the LIRR. Strangely, I have no trouble finding the "I'm going to spend the entire 1 hour ride babbling loudly on my cell phone about nonsense" section!
Vitello Tonnato at 10:57AM on 07/06/07
I don't know if this is an age issue or not (I am no spring chicken), but I find conversation an important accompaniment to delicious food and part of Serious Eating. There is a range of noise (exceeded in many restaurants these days) that permits this with various kinds of ambiance, including "lively".
But the noise levels that Bruni is complaining about simply preclude effortless conversation and detract from the whole experience, so much so that there are restaurants whose food I would enjoy that I avoid after my first experience. As to background music, tastes vary so much that it should be avoided if possible.
gustoct at 11:23AM on 07/06/07
i was at brunch last week at five points and it was a little painful. i like enough noise people near me can't listen in, but there are times it gets too loud.
j at 1:57PM on 07/06/07
Gotta have quiet atmosphere--won't return to the restaurant otherwise.
JEP at 6:52PM on 07/06/07
I was drawn to this article in the Times because the picture looked much like the wonderful restaurant we'd been to just last week at the Market of St. Catherina (?) in Barcelona. It was wonderful really fresh food in a very pleasing, relaxing setting in the corner of this big produce market. Given that the restaurant looked similar to Mercat's I wondered what made the difference in atmosphere, specifically sound levels. The marketplace restaurant didn't have brick, but it had similar use of wood and glass, and high open spaces. At St Catherina they did have jazz and other types of music playing from overhead, and the ceiling is wood. We were seated at a large table for 8 and could hear each other easily. The tables were made of heavy wood. Perhaps this helped also. I do like to be able to hear my friends' conversations. I hope Mercat can find some ways to reduce the noise levels. I am interested in trying it, hoping I could repeat the great meal and atmosphere of Barcelons.
pancake at 8:35AM on 07/08/07
Christ, what is it with overexuberant Americans in their tin-pan joints, anyway? Why is it that simply going out for a meal requires they assume operatic vocal cords upon entering any Resto, fine or otherwise? What is it about the delicately subdued atmosphere of a fine dining room that requires them to shriek and trill every mundane thought that the neurons in their heads push to their slathering lips?
This ain't 1849 anymore, folks. Tone it down a bit, you two-bit goldminers.
As an "FOB" (Fresh off the Boat), I've eaten in finestkind, juke joints, fast-food cesspools, sports stadiums and alongside taco vans from East Coast to West in this gigantic country and I still don't get how food that is less palatable (sans the taco vans, which are killer-bee) than an humble spaghetti joint in Belgium or a takeaway in England are beehives for braying, self-important, cell-phone-mutated, finance-obsessed Americans of pretty much all walks and economic colors, to turn it to "Volume 11" as soon as they walk into whatever passes for a brasserie in their drywall town. Do they spray the air with sometihing that makes decent citizens turn into Jerry Seinfeldian megaphones? Braying like Larry King doesn't mean anyone is more clever, more sophisticated, or more educated, but some think it does, apparently. Perhaps when they are controlling the money.
TikiPundit at 1:19PM on 07/08/07