There’s no particular reason why 10cc’s “I’m Not in Love” sounds so right over beers at Tap x Tap. It’s just one of those countless Tokyo things that doesn’t make sense unless you experience it yourself, and if you do, well, it usually makes perfect sense, even if you can’t really explain why.
Yacht rock interludes on a buzzy Thursday evening are one thing going for this cozy beer bar; a novel focus across 20 taps on craft breweries based in Japan’s western Kansai region is another.
Located a few minutes by foot from Kanda Station, Tap x Tap offers when we visit a red miso lager from Kinshachi Beer (Nagoya), Fruit Bomb Sour IPA from Swan Lake Beer (Niigata), ASC Hazy IPA from IN International (Kobe), and Imperial Stout from Daisen G Beer (Tottori Prefecture), among others. There are two ciders, as well, including Yaoyorozu 2019, aka A Lot, a collaboration between new Nagano-based cidery Son of the Smith and one of its inspirations, Reverend Nat’s Hard Cider (Portland, OR).
Related: At Osaka’s Hibino Beer, Craft Beer Away from the Crowds
Prices range from ¥600 for a small glass to ¥1,280 for a large—there are no measurements given—and staff pours beer into glassware from Craft Beer Live, an annual two-day event in Osaka that this year featured more than 200 beers from 45 Kansai craft breweries. It’s not all Kansai all the time, however, with guest taps on this occasion for lagers from Germany’s König Ludwig and Warsteiner, and a brut IPA from California’s Santa Monica Brew Works.
On the counter, rubber duckies wearing either traditional lederhosen and alpine hats, or gear from the German fútbol club Borussia Dortmund, sit in pint glasses next to a handful of sake and whiskey bottles. In a Tokyo craft beer bar specializing in Kansai breweries, in a place where the rest of the décor is all Japanese beer paraphernalia, the German-themed rubber duckies might seem out of place. At Tap x Tap, however, for a reason we can’t really articulate, they make perfect sense.
###
Tap x Tap is located at Chiyoda-ku, Kajicho 2-9-18. +81 3 6206 4672. Open daily 11am – 2:30pm, 5 – 11pm. Three-minute walk from Kanda Station.
