The STUD is the quintessential San Francisco bar, where the crowd exhibits the characteristics of a microcosm of the city itself. Although there are persons of every age and sexual persuasion who frequent the club and gyrate to the multi-faceted music scene that runs uncontrollably every night of the week, the Stud of the present day (it’s 44 years old this year) is pretty much the artsy/tattooed/pierced tongue and leather straps variety of queer, although it has been home to the now-defunct and legendary Trannyshack, so go figure. Someone might come up with a label for this place someday, but for now, when asked “what type of crowd frequents the Stud?” we just have to shrug and shake our heads in wonder and mystery. But the mystery is what is most compelling about this old, graying, but still feisty, SF monument to its glorious youth.