I try to avoid all large banks, but the small local ones seem to get eaten up by larger ones.  My brother uses a credit union at work, and so he gets interest and has no charges.
I opened my first account in California at Hibernia Bank in San Francisco - the bank that Patty Hearst robbed.  I opened my account there because they were located at 18th and Castro and had the cutest customers waiting in line, and so I could cruise while I was at the bank.  They were then taken over by Rainer Bank in Seattle, which was then taken over by Security Pacific.  That was still okay, but then Security Pacific was taken over by Bank of America after I had moved to Los Angeles, and then I started having problems big time.  I went in to complain so many times that a B of A employee told me that it would be better for me to move my account to another bank.  He realized that once you start having problems with B of A, they spiral out of control.  So I moved my account to Union Bank because that was the bank that my employer used, and I felt that that would prevent holds being put on checks that I deposited.  B of A had been putting a week's hold on my payroll checks, which I thought was excessive, and they charged for everything.  Union Bank was not too bad - at least there were no holds on the checks, but they charged $9 a month for service charge.  
When I started my own business, I opened a business account at Marina Bank, a small neighborhood bank not far from my house.  The person in charge of my account was an extremely handsome man from Brazil who had dark brown hair and beautiful blue eyes.  He was also extremely friendly with me and was unmarried.  Once I had him translate a recipe that I had found on a bag of something from the Brazilian market from Portuguese to English.    When I bought the bag, I asked the woman at the market if she spoke Portuguese so that she could translate it for me, and she said yes, but as it turned out, she did not speak enough English to know the English equivalents.
After a while, I closed my account at Union Bank, and then Marina Bank was taken over by U.S. Bank, but I still get good service, although the Brazilian man is no longer there 

.  I have no service charge, and all I have to buy is checks.