BierWax — Brooklyn’s Groove on Tap
By Rafi Mercer
New Listing
Venue Name: BierWax
Address: 556 Vanderbilt Avenue, Prospect Heights, Brooklyn, New York 11238, United States.
Website: bierwax.com
Instagram: @bierwax
Phone: +1 347-533-8449
Brooklyn is a borough that rarely sleeps. Prospect Heights in particular carries its own tempo: families at brunch, subway hum on Atlantic Avenue, the spill of bars along Vanderbilt after dark. Yet on one corner sits a room that hums differently. BierWax is a craft beer bar built on vinyl, a place where the pint glass and the record sleeve share equal weight, and where listening is folded into the everyday act of drinking together.
The name says it clearly: beer and wax, taps and records. Inside, the walls are lined with shelves stacked deep with vinyl — more than 5,000 pieces, most of them hip hop, jazz, funk, and soul. The founder, Chris Maestro, is both a beer curator and a lifelong record collector, and the room feels like his double devotion made public. Walk in on any evening and you are greeted by a turntable already in motion, a selector dropping cuts with care, and a row of taps pouring craft beers from New York and far beyond.
The sound is not club volume; it is room volume, tuned so that you feel immersed without needing to shout. The system has warmth and presence, letting a Tribe Called Quest track land with detail, or a Donald Byrd trumpet solo bloom with air. Bass carries but does not overwhelm; highs stretch without harshness. The result is that you can sit at the bar, sip a stout, and still catch the crackle of a snare, or hold a conversation while nodding along to the rhythm. It is fidelity designed for community, not isolation.
The beer list is as serious as the record collection. Twenty rotating taps bring in everything from local hazy IPAs to imported Belgian sours, barrel-aged stouts to crisp pilsners. Staff are fluent in the flavours, able to guide you through a pour that suits the night’s soundtrack. The pairing becomes part of the experience: a smoky porter while Coltrane plays, a bright saison to match Afrobeat, a double IPA cutting sharp alongside boom-bap drums. It is curation by another name.
Programming keeps the room alive. Resident DJs and guest selectors rotate through evenings, each bringing their own crates. Hip hop is a backbone — BierWax has been called one of the few true hip hop craft beer bars in the world — but the sound never stays fixed. Funk, reggae, Latin, house, and jazz all find their way onto the decks, and the crowd follows. People don’t come for a single genre; they come because they trust the room to deliver quality.
The atmosphere is democratic. Neighbourhood locals stop by after work, beer nerds cross the river from Manhattan, music heads settle in for long evenings, and out-of-town visitors make it a pilgrimage. The energy is lively but rarely rowdy, carried by the twin anchors of respect for beer and respect for vinyl. You sense quickly that the regulars are protective of the space: it matters because it is one of the few places where two obsessions — craft brewing and record collecting — meet with equal seriousness.
BierWax has also become a platform. The bar hosts listening parties, artist showcases, and even outdoor sessions in warmer months. It collaborates with breweries on special releases, pressing its own mark into the beer world, just as its DJs carve grooves into the room each night. That crossover gives it reach far beyond Prospect Heights — a model now expanded with a second location in Queens, proof that the idea resonates widely.
What makes BierWax distinctive is its refusal to compromise either side of its name. Many bars use records as décor; here they are the foundation. Many beer bars play background playlists; here the music is curated live, each track a choice. Together, the two elements form a rhythm of their own. You drink more slowly, you listen more closely, you stay longer than you planned. That is the mark of a true listening bar, even if its language is different from Tokyo’s kissaten.
Step outside onto Vanderbilt Avenue and the Brooklyn night resumes: cars moving, conversations spilling onto stoops, the throb of the city just blocks away. But you carry something with you — the memory of a track you hadn’t heard in years, the flavour of a beer that surprised you, the sense that for an evening the two had been in dialogue. BierWax shows that listening bars need not be temples of silence; they can be social rooms where beer and wax hold equal weight. In New York, that feels like the truest expression of the city: diverse, democratic, and deeply tuned.
Rafi Mercer writes about the spaces where music matters. For more stories from Tracks & Tales, subscribe, or click here to read more.
