Bar/Club

Behold the once and future Moe's. When the much beloved Moe's Mo' Rockin' Cafe closed its doors in 1997, few could have imagined that the founders of Moe's would return to the space — after it had been unsuccessfully converted to a disco, a number of short-lived clubs and even a video arcade — and revive the popular music venue as Neumo's ("new Moe's").

If you were a regular at Moe's, Neumo's will feel like coming home (I am told), but even if you never stepped foot inside the original venue, it's a fine place to see a show. The club is laid out in such a manner that you can get an unobstructed view of the stage from nearly any corner of the room. And if you're one of those folks who thinks bands should be heard and not seen, the bar area is almost completely separate from the main floor. The sound system is top-shelf, but the air circulation less so; the main floor can get hotter than a steam bath. If you're checking out a sold-out show, you might want to leave the jacket in the car.

Come to that, you'll probably see a lot of sold-out shows at Neumo's — its bookings are among Seattle's most righteous and run the gamut from old-school punk to new-school power-pop with stops nearly everywhere in-inbetween.

Far from being an exercise in retro thinking, Neumo's is concrete proof of predestination. This space was always Moe's, always one of Seattle's best venues, even when the space itself didn't seem to know it.

By Geoff Carter
NWsource staff