The closest form of hell on Earth comes in a Belmont-Cragin bow wrapped around a small bar dubbed White Star. Here, orange dietz lights glow hellishly in a room of satanic paintings with horned men, melting skeletons and odd fetus-looking spiders.

Pretty much a neighborhood Polish-dive bar, White Star attracts the crowd Euro, Paris and Martini Club turn away at the doors. This, judging by the same seven faces in the Polaroids tacked onto corkboards and the three non-English speaking staff I embarked upon my visit. As opposed to the glamor and shimmy at the previously mentioned clubs, White Star patrons come rough around the edges, porky, metal head-ish and riffing of BO.

My faux hawk lacked the edge I needed to blend in; my getup, compiled of Urban Outfitters slash Express, didn't help either. I began associating the lair-like looks of the bar with the movie "Hostel." Not a moment too soon, I pictured the burly attendants lacing me atop the pool table, snapping pool sticks over my knee caps and splintering darts from off the dartboard into my skull.

My paranoia – err, wuss ways, led me to dash before sampling the bar's $3 special, incomprehensible anyway as it was written in Polish on a paper poster. At least I survived my venture into Hades to come back and share my story.

Centerstage Reviewer: David-Anthony Gonzalez