Samir's place is the coolest! All the other reviews talking about how cool, hip, and totally GV it is are right. I was hesitant about going outside of my budget a bit being as we stayed for almost a week, but I'm so glad I did. It was worth it! My son just turned 22 on 9/11 and my birthday was a few days later, so we were in NY celebrating our b-days and seeing concerts we both wanted to see, and both of us were SO happy to have had Samir's super cool place to stay at, which really is in the heart of the East Village. My son kept expecting there to be roommates or something and I said "nope, its all ours!" He couldn't believe it because he's always rented rooms on Airbnb, and when in NYC, very tiny ones! Samir's place is big, open and roomy. My son plays guitar and piano and really appreciated the musician styling of the apt with electric guitars on the wall. and a beautiful black upright piano (that Samir graciously allowed us to play). The piano was a perfectly tuned German brand piano. We hadn't heard of it before but it sounded almost as good as a Steinway.
As for the noise in the bar down below...by the time we really noticed it and thought hmm..how long will it go on I wonder, it was about then that it stopped, so it was never much of an issue and we were there on a Sat night too. The apartment was pretty quiet considering its in the heart of the action. We loved our stay there and it really made our GV and entire NYC visit extra special and enjoyable!