504 Congress Street has been home to a lot of business in the past two decades, and unfortunately for a string of entrepreneurs, it hasn’t been any one of them for very long.
Rob Evon is the latest to take an active interest in this prime piece of downtown real estate, smack in the middle of Portland’s arts district, just around the corner from Monument Square. And he isn’t worried by the recent history.
“I think our music industry contacts will speak for themselves” he says, as delivery men unload the first boxes of liquor into his Port City Music Hall.
“Nobody’s gonna be able to touch what’s happening here.”
Finally, this weekend, the public has been able to enter the space that Evon snatched up last fall, in a high-profile sale that also peaked the interest of Todd Bernard, founder of nearby SPACE gallery, who likewise hoped to exploit its potential as a major music venue. He’s now looking elsewhere.
Not only is Port City rising out of the ashes of this beleaguered property; its aim is to fill a niche left wide open several years back with the closing of the historic State Theater – where an empty ticket booth still juts out onto the sidewalk a few blocks away.
The State Theatre was, for many years, Portland’s premier medium-sized arts venue. As Free Press columnist Jeff Beam lamented on these pages last April, it “wasn’t as big as the Civic Center, but bigger than any club or bar” – meaning intimacy for the music lover, and a private bathroom for the band.
“Portland didn’t need another bar where you can play live music.” Evon says. “Right now, Portland needs a music venue that can provide services and amenities that nationally touring, professional artists require.”
For the State, that meant the likes of Bob Dylan, Phish, John Fogerty, or Jimmy Eat World. The more modestly-sized Port City, with a capacity of about 660 bodies, still hopes it can attract the sort of acts who have bypassed Portland on their recent New England tours.
And so far, they have. Indie rockers OK Go, for instance, just penciled in a gig between shows at Boston’s Paradise Rock Club and San Diego’s House of Blues (March 13).
Jazz icon John Scofield stops by on April 2nd. A Feburary 6 performance by Derek Trucks Band is already sold out.
Not bad for a venue that has yet to secure its liquor license.
“Let’s get this damn water out of here!” jokes bartender Chris Lopez, pulling bottles of Dasani from the refrigerator to make room for bottles of beer.
Tonight’s show will be another attempt at the “soft open” originally planned and advertised for a week ago. The club’s opening had to be postponed when it became clear Port City wouldn’t be licensed to serve liquor as a Class I auditorium. This classification is something Evon has fought for rather than more easily-attainable bar or lounge clearances.
“We’re trying to set a new precedent in liquor law interpretation and enforcement,” Evon says. While he explicitly rules out hosting all-ages shows, he would like to welcome an 18+ college crowd from time to time.
For tonight, at least, he and his crew have nothing but praise for state senator Justin Alfond, who just helped them work out a last-minute solution: a one-night license to get the alcohol flowing for the show that begins in six hours. Early next week however, it’s back to city hall.
Beginning in 1988, 504 Congress was one of several former department stores to sit abandoned and boarded up until Portland’s downtown renaissance of the mid-1990s. In ’97, it re-opened as the trendy Keystone Theater, one of many “dinner and a movie” joints that were then predicted to be the future of cinema.
By 2003, the space had morphed into OZONE II, a short-lived, chem-free dance club for teenagers.
It was soon sold and converted to The Stadium sports bar, which despite plastering its title across the massive facade, eventually receded toward the Free Street half of the property. Its ownership then caused a splash in 2006 by announcing their intentions to use the extra space to open a Hooters franchise.
It would have been Maine’s first incarnation of the global restaurant chain, famous for its waitresses’ tight tank tops and short-shorts. The city council responded with a special ordinance to prevent it from opening.
The liquor license ordeal is indicative of Evon’s larger aims with his new establishment – his first music venue, having previously helped found both an on-location recording service and an organic food company.
If that means buying only all-new sound equipment for his deluxe floating stage, and having the acoustics tested and perfected by the same experts who normally work with Jay-Z and Steve Miller Band, so be it. He’s not going to let a little recession spoil his dream.
“We’re looking to cater to a higher-end clientele, higher-end demographic, people with disposable income.” he says. “I don’t like to do anything half-assed.”