St. Vitus Bar, the legendary Brooklyn heavy metal venue that has hosted countless up-and-coming bands as well as special club shows by Megadeth, Anthrax, Deafheaven, Killing Joke, Carcass, Against Me and, most famously, a “Nirvana reunion” that featured Joan Jett, Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon and St. Vincent and others playing with the band’s three surviving members, has permanently closed its longtime location in the borough’s Greenpoint neighborhood.
It appears the venue’s management will attempt to reopen in a new location, although that information was unconfirmed at the time of this article’s publication.
The announcement was officially made by the owners in a Saturday Instagram post that reads, “1120 Manhattan Ave. 2011-2024 — to be continued… Thank you to everyone who was a part of it. 🍻 Love and Hails, Arty, George, David” (its founding managers and bookers Arty Shepherd, George Souleidis and David Castillo). The venue was closed by the New York Department of buildings back in February — in the middle of a show — but has continued to present shows at other area venues.
City spokesperson Andrew Rudansky told Gothamist that the venue had been operating as an “illegal eating and drinking establishment” in a space that was only to be used “for a commercial store and for the storage of machinery.”
Despite the menacing nature of much of the music it hosted, the two-room venue had a warm, welcoming and inclusive vibe and, crucially, an awesome sense of humor. One of its most popular t-shirts reads “Satan is great / Whisky is super,” its logo is a one-eyed skull and crossbones and the venue was filled with hundreds of band stickers and upside-down crosses — we can remember one year it had a Christmas tree decorated with a giant, illuminated upside-down cross.
Along with thousands of concerts, the venue also hosted parties as well as dance nights, karaoke and book events for the likes of John Lydon and patron saint Black Sabbath’s Tony Iommi. Its first decade is commemorated in the book “Saint Vitus Bar: The First Ten Years, An Oral and Visual History.”
The venue was founded in 2011 after attorney Pete Jakab, a music fan and Deadhead of magnitude, inherited the building and received proposals from the club’s owners and a bagel bakery. He chose the former, and the result was the venue closest in spirit to the original CBGB that we’ve seen since that club’s glory days.
It was no accident that the surviving members of Nirvana chose St. Vitus Bar as the location for their special 2014 “reunion” club show after they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center just a few miles away. The after-show started after 2 a.m. — due to fellow inductees the E Street Band’s unspeakably arrogant decision to allow each of its approximately two dozen living members across 40 years to give a full acceptance speech, which took up more than 90 minutes of the already-long Hall of Fame show — and concluded at 4 a.m., with Jett, Gordon, St. Vincent, Dinosaur Jr.’s J Mascis and Deer Tick’s John McCauley (who leads a Nirvana tribute band called Deervana) playing a 19-song set.
While it remains unclear when or even whether the venue will reopen, the organizers continue to stage “St. Vitus Presents” concerts at other area venues, such as Knockdown Center and Elsewhere — head here for upcoming shows.
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