Seattle’s Best Karaoke

This is a pretty cool place.
It’s not a swanky karaōke bar or anything like that. You have to make a reservation, but if you buy a banquet permit you can bring all your own food and booze. PARTAY!
And you pay about $ 5.50 per person per hour.
They have a laptop to pick the songs. They have a screen for lyrics. Our rooms have had two mics.
But… I would rate it higher except the sound system really wasn’t working well.
Also, the whole place is a little rundown these days. And the rooms are small.
Also, there is nothing to deter crazy drunks from barging into your party. Which happened to us. The one guy was actually pretty aggressive.
So, keep that in mind.
Also, the street it’s on is a little sketch.
So, for a big karaōke party on the cheap or for die-​hard karaōke lovers, this is perfect.

Shinji was extremely nice and set up everything. He made the experience great.

We came last night with family for my husbands birthday and had so much fun! Don’t let the other reviews about spartan décor scare you off, you are there for karaōke why does it matter how the room is decorated? The staff was super nice and we all had a great time. Really good pricing too we had 5 people for 2 hours and it was only $ 60. We will definitely be coming back again.

I don’t really understand this place. I guess it’s good for people who want to bring all their own booze and food and have a very, very casual karaōke experience. I am just used to Rock Box and this is not Rock Box.
You apply for a banquet permit for $ 11 and they can print it out for you there. Then, you can bring any food or drink that you want inside.
You can rent rooms here and that’s what you get. No level of service. The owners, however, are friendly.
There was virtually no ventilation in our room. Maybe some of the other rooms are different.
Be aware of your surroundings if you are hanging around outside in this area at night.

I went with a group of 12 when we were in town for a baseball game, and had the best time. It was so inexpensive, especially since you’re able to bring your own food and drinks with a banquet license. (It’s just $ 10, and you get it online. Easy!) We loaded up on beer and snacks from the grocery store and then piled into the room and started picking our songs.
It’s not a fancy space, for sure, but there was a disco light and two microphones, and that’s really all you need. Love the huge selection of songs, and we wound up dancing and doing singalongs until 2 a.m. Wish we had something similar in downtown Vancouver (I’ve always gone to Fantacity, but it’s so expensive and the song list is lacking).
Originally, I had wanted us to book with RockBox, but it was full… I’m so glad we got a chance to come here instead. This place is my first choice next time!

If there was a sixth star, I would award it. Our group had SO MUCH FUN! Unlike some of the other places around town, this place is super casual and super chill. With the banquet license, you can have a super good time with drinks and whatnot on the cheap. The prices are super reasonable, and the owner is super-​accommodating and nice. We will 100% be back!

I love this place. I’ve been here several times and have not been disappointed yet. The service is great and the equipment is user friendly. The pricing is also no frills and no BS fees. I’ve taken friends here and they always have a great time. The only thing that would make it better is to have nicer more comfy furniture. The current décor is all mismatched office furniture, so it’s not that pleasing to they eye

This is a peculiar place, I suppose mostly because of the name. I don’t know if I’ve ever been to a more spartan, minimalistic karaōke place than this. It’s room karaōke, but usually in the ID or UD I’m used to getting offered drinks or, I don’t know, chairs that match. But is that really what you go to karaōke for? (well, maybe)
My experience was for a birthday party with a pretty substantial number of people and we barely fit in one of the larger rooms, so chairs were a precious commodity. But we also were able to bring in our own food and alcohol, and we stayed pretty long. In the end it was remarkably cheap.
If you want swank and fancy then this is a 1 star. If you want cheap minimalistic karaōke and byob then this is your place!

No rae bang!
Korean style singing in private rooms. It is a no frills place but it gets the job done. There were some technical difficulties but they resolved themselves.

Not exactly the best place for karaōke hence the 2 star rating, but the service was quick and easy and the song selections were not bad! You can also bring in your own alcohol as long as you sign up for the banquet permit ($ 10) at the front. Groups of 11 or more can get a discounted rate. Why this is rated so low is because of the– ok I’ll say it– ghettoness of this place. It’s fashioned from an old clinic so the rooms are not well ventilated at all, they’re smelly, and I hope they at least disinfect the furniture from time to time. The karaōke itself too is old school– it’s a laptop that has easy enough instructions on how to use but you have to be careful of the cords to the mics because we all know that a dark room + drunk people + cords = falls on your face. It won’t be my first choice ever for karaōke but I’ll follow suit if it’s someone else’s suggestion…

In a very shady area off of Minor between downtown and Capitol Hill… it’s just a cheap place to go sing karaōke with your friends. Fluorescent lighting and a check-​in counter makes it feel like some sort of office. They let you bring in your own food and drinks, but to me it’s a bit of an awkward atmosphere for karaōke when you’re used to only doing it in dimly-​lit bars. It was cheap, but I would gladly pay a bit more and go to Rockbox.

My most recent visit was cut short due to a cold I was coming down with and a lack of tissues. :o (
However, I’ve been to SBK on several previous occasions, and have always had a blast. Their music selection is always current, and there’s plenty of space for your group.
If they could better soundproof the rooms so I don’t have to hear off-​key teens belting out «Wrecking Ball», it would definitely be a plus.

Ugh … My friend and I normally go to the Rock Box in Capitol Hill but we decided to try this place out since it was closer to my friend’s house.
First, I was afraid to wait for my friend outside, because it looked like I was about to get mugged. So as I waited in the lobby, which reminded me of some sort of a old dirty vet’s office, I couldn’t help buy notice all the signs trying to explain their pricing model.
When my friend arrived, we got into the room and we were presented with a bunch of chairs lined around a room that looks like it used to be some sort of a BDSM Dungeon. The Karaōke system was an ancient laptop hooked up to a 25 or 30″ Computer monitor with a stupidly cumbersome software application you’re told to use.
The music selection, while they had some songs Rock Box doesn’t have, was limited in our experience. My friend and I both struggled to find quality songs to sing but we managed.
And then as we were inputting our songs, the lady at the counter comes in and explains to us that on Fridays and Saturdays, the 5.00 per person price is not valid, but instead it’s a 20.00 per room/​hour cost.
So for 2 hours we paid 40.00 for ho-​hum songs, a terrible karaōke system, in a reformed dungeon, with no drinks/​food/​other services.
The only redeeming quality is that the place is right next to the interstate entrance.

We hired SBK for party we were throwing at Urban Light Studios (awesome venue BTW!). We turned one of their side rooms into a karaōke room and it was a HUGE hit.
The system is pretty bad ass, comes with a speaker, screen and laptop. They have a really big selection of songs, including current ones. The system was also pretty easy to use as I saw a lot of people in the karaōke room at different times that I knew weren’t ‘trained’ in how to use it, so they just figured it out.
And it was really reasonable. We had it from 7pm-​1a for a little over $ 200, AND they deliver, set it up, and pick up the system from the venue. SO SO SO worth it.
We communicated with Shinji who always responded to emails quickly and delivered and picked up the machine. So great.
Our guests LOVED the system and we were even thinking about renting it just for our house to throw a karaōke party it was that popular.
Definitely an awesome and reliable system if you want to throw a bad ass karaōke party, or if you want to make your party even that much more fun!

If I could base my review on the fine people I’ve kept company with, or the very kind-​faced owners here, then this would be a 5-​star review.
And to be fair, 2-​stars is exactly what it is: I’ve experienced better.
I used to live in this building when I first moved to Seattle, and I remember SBK opening right after I moved out. I went with some Viet friends some 11 years ago… and it looks exactly the same now as it did then.
Spartan is a good way to describe the furnishings; there’s a roomy clean bathroom for use… but the bringing-​in-​your-​own-​food part… You can bring your own food (and liquor, provided you purchase a banquet license) and that’s where I fall apart:
Every.time.I’
…somebody (not in my group) has brought a bathtub amount of the most nauseating-​smelling food in… and it permeates the entire narrow hallways leading to the karaōke rooms (that are reminiscent of hospital doors). It’s almost a joke for me now, because it happens every time.
The air circulation is poor, the technology is more of a home karaōke set-​up (you use a laptop to select songs, and the song selection has always been hit-​and-​miss.) On the up side, the rates are more than fair.
Parking is difficult in the area but doesn’t affect the rating. If BYOB and good rates are important to you, then this place is definitely worth checking out. Me, I’m afraid I’m going to have to pass from hereon.

Kate S. nailed it. I’d like to give them a 3.5 but I’m rounding up because the PROs are really awesome and pretty much outweigh the CONs.
The space is nothing much to write about — plain lobby, plain rooms, basic furniture. It’s definitely lacking the suaveness of Rock Box or even the funkiness of some of the local bars and restaurants that do karaōke. And the computer for inputting song choices quite frankly terrified me and I refused to touch it (thank goodness for tech-​savvy friends nice enough to do my programming for me).
On the plus side, this has got to be the best bargain for private room karaōke in the city, and being able to bring in your own food and drink just increases its (cheap) value. No need to wait for busy servers or spend next month’s rent on cocktails, just pick up a few bottles and bring em on in. For those of you with designated drivers, there’s a paid parking lot right around the corner. Two mics double the singing fun, And any place that has Hedwig songs in its book is OK in mine!

Seattle’s Best Karaōke… well isn’t the ~best~. Sorry, but Rock Box and it’s massive book trumps all. With that said however, SBK is still pretty damn rad. Let’s go over the pros and cons shall we?
PROS:
–Private Rooms — always a plus for me. Just you and your friends singing tunes. No need to share the mic with strangers.
–Decent prices — Our large group only topped out at something like $ 5 an hour. Not too shabby at all.
–BYOB — yup. That is right. Pay the $ 10 banquet fee and you can bring your own booze. This is a GIANT money saver in my book, and totally worth it.
–Bring your own food — well you need snacks with all the booze you brought in right?
–Super nice employees — from tolerating our large rowdy group, for splitting the check, to finding and saving a single shoe of mine (yes, it was that kind of night there), the people here are sweet.
Cons — the book is… WEIRD. Not bad mind you, we had plenty of great tunes to sing. But who needs 15+ Weird Al Yankovich songs?
Equipment — the system is a little archaic. And not 100% user friendly if you have your beer goggles on. But we got it figured out and had no issues when it came to song order, volume, etc.
Swank factor — you have some just basic bare bone rooms with basic Ikea furniture.
All in all I like it here. It’s a fun pit stop if you are already in the area, and oodles cheaper than what you would pay at Rock Box or even on drinks in places like Bush Garden.

SERIOUSLY Don’t forget the $ 10 banquet permit so you can… BYOB! and food!
my crew had a blast… no noise level restrictions JUST HOW I LIKE IT!
Yes its 15 ppl max per room and its $ 5 per person per hour which is AWESOME! and Yes you get what you pay for (a bland college dorm/​fraternity-​esk room…)
but honesty you make the experience your own. If you don’t/didn’t enjoy this place it’s because you didn’t pick the right group of people to sing your hearts out with… and maybe you didn’t bring enough food and boose! hahaha
The karaōke system is banging & the selection is doable, so no worries about that ppl! The website and management are pretty straight forward about the rules and pricing… One thing that’s not easily noticeable is… DO call in advance to reserve a room for a weekend night.
If you’re trying to flex your karaōke skills to the world… go out for a fancy night on the town or wine and dine your lovely lady (ies) or fella (s)…SBK isn’t for you!
BUT if you want to experience having a great time with your friends, who leave all their cares at the door, some may love karaōke and some may not be Karaōke Kings & Queen but because you guys have such an awesome time together they end up GOING HARD too… then SBK is the place to be!

Straight up, no frills, karaōke. What you get is a room lined with eggshell colored walls that are beat up/​scuffed up along with an older component audio system connected to a computer terminal that controls a nifty song software program. In fact, the equipment is so obsolete, even a cassette tape player feature is built into it.
Don’t let what I just said deter you from visiting SBK. Albeit not the latest and greatest modern design and technology like Rock Box, the setup functions for exactly what you need. The two microphones provide ample input with adjustable volume and echo while the software allows for a plethora of today’s and yesterday’s hits to choose from. The room even had air conditioning and we acquired a $ 10 liquor banquet license for Bringing Yo Own Booze. $ 5 per person per hour came out to an average of $ 20 per person for four hours of affordable entertainment.
If you are looking for a more swanky and upscale scene while you belt those tunes, check out Rock Box (
) and their rooms. For more flexibility with drinks and decent pricing but without all the bells and whistles, head to SBK.

Things I do like about SBK:
The song selection machine was so easy to use, you can find a song easily by typing in the song name, enter the singer’s name and it would go to the next song based on frequency of singing. This is perfect because I often time sing with microphone hogs!
Liquor license and you can bring your own drinks and food.
It’s an all ages karaōke places
Things that needs improvement:
This place is times-​up for a renovation! You can easily tell that the place has been round for a while, and the furniture is a bit old.
Includes more foreign language songs! The first time I was here I actually had to leave as soon as we sat down because they don’t have Korean or Chinese songs!
Overall though, I did enjoyed my experience here, and will probably return whenever rock box is fully booked on weekends.