This place literally saved our trip to Toronto. We were in town about 5 hours and kept having bad experience after bad experience. We just picked all the wrong places to go when we finally saw a little chalk sign outside a basement bar that read "Metal, Rap, Rock, Beer" and said fuck it, let's go in.
The dj cranked out killer tunes. The beer was affordable. We made friends within minutes. The ambiance was exactly what we were looking for and the bartender/owner spent about 20 minutes writing out suggestions for places to go, things to do, and areas to avoid. Though we only ended up going to a few places on his list, his attitude and overall coolness changed our outlook on our trip and we ended up having a blast during the rest of our stay.
Give it a try, even if for nothing else but karma points for these cool people.