Chopsticks Express II

New location on 34^th and Sandy! Come visit! Love this place! I have met the most amazing people here!

The food is pretty decent, and the price is great. The drinks are priced well too. The staff was beyond friendly and attentive. It was clean and fun. Even has a photo booth! How cool!

Chopsticks is always fun whether its at the beginning of the night or the tail end when you’re too drunk to even know whats happening. You probably won’t know whats going on if its at the start of your night either.
Cheap drinks, karaōke every night, fun people, and their cheeseburgers taste like Burger King which strangely is a huge plus for me.

too many songs recited poorly so i’ll tell you about the time i read poetry at chopsticks:
5−7−15
(intro, 3Memo. mp4a)
(switch from white tennis shoes to positive-​post-​review-​red jessica simpson patent leather pumps)
(quick walk to show them; sit back down)
(interlude, 2 whyshouldiloveyou23. mp4/​2 why1. mp4):
a great kingdom
welcomes you
with iron arms
but doesn’t let you read
or touch
or taste
or talk to anyone
so you walk
and you see sh*t
and you see that same sh*t
again
and again
because it’s circles,
or ovals you walk
(sriracha on french fries)
and you’re allowed to touch
yourself, so you do
too much
till you’re numb
and god bless
the kingdom
of heaven that awaits
may death come soon
praise be
(1 — .m4a):
marketing is the business of many. come again?
marketing is the business of many a fool!
.
of all the people in the world, why should i love you?
has the human animalistic feel of darkness. He’s not evil as far as I can tell
.
for instance, it’s in his nature to be engulfed in dark. just like how it’s in a snake’s nature to kill and hunt
well anyway
there’s a drug out there
for everyone
mine is withdrawal itself
how weird right
to crawl into a corner
shivering, vomiting
and feel high
and anyway
if you are in constant
freefall
then you can never
find the center of a room
you can never find
the corner to
get high in
but you’re not exactly falling
if you’re horizontal,
panting
that’s a drug too
?
if i learn to pronounce your name, can I have it?
he has the capacity for murder, but with no passion. it’s the cold kind, indifferent kind.
pencils are almost always right-​handed.
marital status? in a relationsheep.
themes and phrases:
knight in shining armor. me vs. god. expanders of consciousness. environmental concerns. looking to the horizon. hard workers. the want to be significant. working together. the art dealers. the need for deep stability. mutual interests. learning through experience. deep emotional action. self-​directed action. selfless service. striving for recognition.
it’s simple: if any aspect of your faith must be compromised, it is impermissible for you to live there.
time is on the x axis.
whether he would do it or not, i don’t know. but the void is in him. he is rare, unusual. like an old symbol on a forgotten planet
may god grant us the opportunity.
does he have a fascination with pigs? or is it because their skin is similar to humans?
he speaks about a dog their neighbors had,
«whenever there was a bitch in the vicinity it would get excited and unmanageable, and with pavlovian regularity the owners would beat it. this went on until the poor dog didn’t know what to do. at the smell of a bitch the dog would chase around the garden with its ears flat and its tail between its legs, whining, trying to hide. what was ignoble about the spectacle was that the poor dog had begun to hate his nature. it no longer needed to be beaten. it was ready to punish itself. at that point it would have been better to shoot it.‘
no more asymptote, when things are declining.
fools rush in to california.
i.e. obligatory for you to migrate.
he may equate people to pigs, am i correct?
i am curious.
(sriracha on french fries.)
«scapegoating worked in practice while it still had religious power behind it. you loaded the sins of the city on the goats back and drove it out, and the city was cleansed. It worked because everyone knew how to read the ritual, including the gods. Then the gods died, and all of a sudden you had to cleanse the city without divine help. real actions were demanded instead of symbolism. The censor was born; purgation was replaced by the purge.»
(salt on french fries and over the shoulder.)
i would not have thrown the knife if i had instead had a zellack.

look up the term oubliette.
have regular checkups on the heart and arteries.

I am by far not a karaōke singer. I am a watcher and laugher. I believe this is a bar/​restaurant that happens to have karaōke. I didn’t see much eating but the chef did bring out a fried concotion do I assume that there is a food menu. We were only in town for one night and wanted to have a drink and a listen to some karaōke. This place is crowded and full of energy. People were singing their feelings away and enjoying a good time. The drinks were stiff but with the watery make you sick feeling.
I probably will check it out again when I am in town. Oh no cover charge so that right there deserves another visit.

I like this place. I feel like everyone here is either gambling, getting their drink on while hiding from someone/​thing, or just over it all.
It’s like death’s waiting room but with Chinese food.

Best karaōke in town. The KJs are good, the staff is attentive & friendly, the regulars are great, David Chow is the world’s most wonderful host, and the food is, honestly, not half bad. It’s gonna be a damn shame when this location closes down; it is iconic, after all. But the soul will live on at the new Sandy location, and the elements that make this place great (KJs, staff, Chow) will be represented there as well. How can be, indeed.
PROTIP: It gets pretty crowded on weekend nights. Come during the week for a short rotation.

An interesting dive to get your karaōke on, with an actually quite talented group of regulars that come here just for that, sorry but I forget what night that happens on but it’s probably the one reason to come here. The beer selection is small for Portland but they do have one or two local micros on tap.

Disgusting stickiness covers the entire place. Describing the clientele as obnoxious would be an understatement. But what really blew my mind was the toilet in the men’s room which lacks a stall so if you had to sit down to handle your business anyone would be able to see and smell. That has to be some kind of health code violation, right?

This place will supposedly be demolished in the next few months. While a tragic loss of local culture, the building does kind of look like it’s on its last legs — there’s a hole in one exterior wall that’s covered by 2x4s and a tarp. Regardless, this place is best known for drunken karaōke, attracting a wide variety of freaks, geeks, hipsters, woo girls, bros and brahs. They also have a bar with decently priced (and decently poured) drinks and a chinese restaurant is somehow stuffed in here as well. The food is about what you could expect for a chinese restaurant that’s also a bar, but they do have a wide variety on their menu even late at night, which is a definite plus. The bartenders are pleasant and attentive, and the karaōke song selection is seemingly endless. For die-​hards, you’ll want to arrive early and plan to wait at least two hours before your song comes up.

Wish I could give this review no stars. Went there on a BarFly Bus tour, and my group was drugged, a couple of the girls had to even go to the hospital. From talking around town I’ve heard that my group wasn’t the only one to ever experience this before. Be weary of the community water and shady bartenders.

I love the bar and especially the bar tender Aarik. BUT the kj was BEYOND rude. I understand you dont want people going wild with drinks in their hands but you dont have to immediately approach everyone nearing the dance floor and tell them to set their drinks down. Debby downer. Made me feel intimitated and awkward.

This review is for the Karaōke. From us the Karaōke Nerds that go out of our way just to find and review Karaōke throughout the Portland Metro area.
We give this place a 2.75 star.
They have karaōke 7 nights a week.
We arrived at about 8:30 P.M. on a Thursday night for Karaōke.
I had never been here before but I heard some decent things.
There were little to no people when we arrived. We ordered food.
Which was fair. I have probably had better frozen dinners than their style of general chicken. Mr. Chad liked his broccoli bean curd. He said he would get it again.
Anyway, The karaōke is set up so one can only put in one song at a time with little slips of paper. They have computer terminals set up so patrons can look up songs of their choice. We felt the singer rotation was set up fair. Karaōke started around 9:00 PM the standard karaōke time. We each were rotated in right away. The sound here is very muffled. I only saw speakers in and around the KJ booth and not in and around the lounge. Most of the male vocalists about 80% were audible, however of the female singers only about 10% were audible. I asked the KJ if he could turn up the vocals and he said that he adjusts it accordingly as per the singer and he can’t help it if they choose to sing softly. Different types of voices have different vocal qualities. i.e. The Fach System– different vocal tone, weight, coloring/​timbre and sound should be adjusted to fit those qualities. Every vocalist is going to bring something different to the mic. A KJ should make every effort to make the singer sound as best as they can. It seems to me that the levels were quite good for about 2 – 3 singers. Those singing R&B and soul from the 60’s and 70’s seem to have the best levels. I am not saying it is 100% the KJ’s skill set, but I will say that 100% across the board that this place needs a new sound system. By 10:30p all the tables were filled with patrons of 21 – 32 age range. By 11:30P it was so crowed and so loud that they might as well just had a DJ and not Karaōke because unless one was literally two feet in front of the vocalist they could not be heard. At that point things kinda changed. It became more of a sing along piano bar without the piano. You had the singer out front and then 2 – 3 people standing in front shrieking the lyrics overtop of the singer that you couldn’t hear anyway. Also a handful of patrons in the back singing along as well. So it didn’t matter that there was a vocalist at the mic, everyone just sang everything anyway. Strange. Maybe they should rethink this establishment and make it into a piano bar? (jokingly) Then everyone can be the center of attention all at once. I am not saying that we would never go hear again. Maybe on an off night at the beginning of the week when it is slow. But certainly more of a social scene than a vocal scene.

I have only tried take-​out from here — I got the dumplings (just steamed, not pan seared) and shrimp fried rice. A little over $ 12 for both, decent portions.
Satisfying meal, very tasty for cheap cuisine. Will be back to check out the kareoke scene!

My coworkers and I like to stop in here during the week after work for happy hour. Very kind, hard working, personable staff serving a usually reputable blue-​collar clientèle. There are two pool tables, video lottery machines, tvs and a touch tunes jukebox for your entertainment. The one glaring need for this establishment is a fumigation for gnats. All said, «Chops» is a good place to go after spending a day at work.

The fun vibe at this divey karaōke bar is worth checking out if karaōke is your thing.
This was stop number two on our Barfly NYE party bus tour. We were only there for about 30 minutes. I have been to Chopstix before for another group party last summer and the drinks were just as strong as I remembered… kinda like jet fuel (in a good way).
I would totally come back for the cool divey atmosphere, strong-​ass drinks and fun karaōke. It’s close enough to downtown that sharing a cab with friends would still be affordable.
2014 — Review # 2

Great cheap, saucy, Chinese food. Amazingly happy people singing their hearts out at karaōke. A plethora of beer and cigarettes.
This place is the best!

I like to start positive: Friendly staff. Good Drinks.
But… the song books are so disgusting and nasty I wanted to wash my hands with bleach after I touched them (and I’m not a germ phobic person at all). Honestly, if someone ruins a book by spilling a beer on it, THROW IT OUT AND PRINT ANOTHER. Keep your song books up to date with the music you have and recycle/​reprint them every few months.
The weekend crowds here are the absolute worst. I miss The Galaxy.

This place… haha. If you go on weekends, it’s a total shit-​show. I went on a Tuesday night most recently and got to sing right away. There was a decent crowd although I wouldn’t consider them too involved (which makes or breaks a night of karaōke).
As far as the restaurant goes, I’ve never had their food. Their cocktails I find overpriced so I just order beer. I wish had more definitive things to say about this place, but for the most part, it’s just an average karaōke spot.

I’d rather sing in my car than sing at this craphole.
Rude rude rude people, not sure if they could sniff out that I’m not from there or if they’re just flat out racist.
Came here with 5 of my friends & ended up getting in a fight in the parking lot. My girlfriend & I were having a blast at first, dancing & singing karaōke then some random girl pushed us & openly admitted that she had done it on purpose, I was pissed but since it was my last night in Portland I decided to brush it off & just continue dancing. As hard as it was to brush something like that off we decided it was time to either bar hop or go home & as we left some white guy (who seemed like a regular), was yelling at my girlfriend calling her the B* word & all sorts of nasty names, we told him to leave us alone but he continued to follow us & provoke us.
My friend who is a male told him that he cannot be disrepecting females like that & needs to leave us alone, the guy called my friend the «N», word & swung at him & his other friend tried to jump in to jump him.
2 guys against 1 guy & 2 girls, how is that fair? After a little scuffle, we tried to leave again & one of the guys threw rocks at us… At the end of the night, one guy got knocked out, the other guy got a boot in the face & ran off like a little B*.
No one tried breaking it up other than yelling «YOU REAVE NOW!» (the Chinese guy; which I’m assuming worked there)
Yeah this place is racist. No thanks!

DIVE!!!
I love dives and the crowd ranges from hipster to local dirt bag. It’s all good. It’s really hard to give a dive like this more than 2 stars.
The drinks were CHEAP and not weak. I ordered 2 mix drinks and a beer and it came to $ 10. Sweet!
I also heard some of the worst karaōke in my life. I left shortly after some hipster attempted to sing «Build me up buttercup».

I am on a Karaōke kick… in a big way.
My first trip to Chopsticks was on a Saturday night. I spent about 10 minutes in the place. In that short time I witnessed a bro fight, group birthday blow job shots, a Morrissey look alike, and a sweaty overweight man sing «Do you think I’m sexy?» with unmatched enthusiasm despite not knowing the words. Remember in Fear and Loathing when Johnny Depp is wondering around Circus Circus? That’s a little like how I felt.
Always one for second chances I headed back to Chopsticks, this time on a Sunday. I was happy to see a smaller, yet still diverse crowd. I grabbed a PBR and a song book and settled in by the stage. Thirty some minutes passed and my song came on. I can only imagine how long it would take with a larger crowd. This place lacks the enthusiasm for your fellow karaōke-​ers.
Meh…ya thats it.