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I've got some friends who are hitting the road in June/July for a Northwest Coast of the US swing of their tour, and they are looking for some good small to medium sized venues good for punk. My band is also considering doing a similar trip this summer if we can get enough shows lined up, so help out a bunch of Canadians and give us names of some venues to look at in Seattle, Portland, and all places in between!

(I found the "what to do in Portland" thread on here a little ways back and got lots of cool suggestions from there, so now looking for more Seattle ideas and other places/venues nearby these...like Bellingham?)

My friends: http://www.mobinagalore.com/

My band: http://www.thefoulenglish.com/

Thanks everyone!

Look up the Highline in Seattle - they're small but seem to have lots of loud punk/hardcore bands pretty regularly.

i was going to suggest the highline in seattle. another good one is the black lodge.

in portland you should hit up the know, it's a punk bar, so not all ages, but they're legit. another fantastic venue in portland that's fairly new is blackwater. it's a punk run bar/restaraunt/brewery that grew out of a former illegal/underground venue we had for a long time. it's days ran out and they decided to open an above ground legal venue. it's rad, has good sound, a decent crowd, and they treat bands really well. they have it arranged so that they can do all ages shows, as long as they end early enough, even though it's a bar. that's something that's really hard to pull off around here.

in bellingham, you should see if jinx art space is still around. there's also a bar that does punk/metal shows, but i can't remember the name of it right now.

Awesome suggestions so far guys, thanks! Lots of these are already being followed up on.

Any others, especially in Washington, would be much appreciated!

New Frontier in Tacoma is a good venue, as is The Valley. There's also a couple house venues in the area. 5th Dimension & The Bomb Shelter

From my seattle experience, all I can say is: For the sake of your fans please not Neumos.

What? Why not Neumo's? That's an excellent venue.

A couple of other Seattle suggestions would be The Admiral Benbow, Darrell's Tavern, Victory Lounge.

The bouncers were assholes and the sound system sucked worse than the show I saw in a warehouse.

I've seen some really good shows at neumo's that sounded great, but I'm sure there's a lot of factors at play there. It does have that "big-venue-shitty-bouncer" thing going on. But that place is big enough that unless you're a pretty big band, or opening for a big band, then you won't be worrying about playing there. It's like a 900 capacity venue. I wasn't under the impression that the op was looking into places like that.

Huh. I've never had issues with bouncers at Neumo's, but I usually am pretty cordial towards them so I dunno. The sound there does need some work, though. Last time I saw The Sword there the sound guy fucked up majorly and you could tell the band was obviously pissed off. Not to mention one or more of the PA speakers was fucked. Every time the drummer hit the kick drum it sounded like ass. Weird, because every other show I've seen there has been kick ass.

Great suggestions so far guys, following up on all of these!

LOCOPELAND wrote:Huh. I've never had issues with bouncers at Neumo's, but I usually am pretty cordial towards them so I dunno. The sound there does need some work, though. Last time I saw The Sword there the sound guy fucked up majorly and you could tell the band was obviously pissed off. Not to mention one or more of the PA speakers was fucked. Every time the drummer hit the kick drum it sounded like ass. Weird, because every other show I've seen there has been kick ass.

Are you sure you weren't just experiencing The Sword in their natural habitat?

Nah, I've seen them at that venue a couple times before and they were great. Must have been an off night. Disappointing, really.

For Tacoma, if you want small and decrepit, bobs java jive. I'd also recommend you hit up chuck from raptorctractor about local punk and house venues. Can find you contact info if you can't find them on fb.

spacelordmother wrote:Look up the Highline in Seattle - they're small but seem to have lots of loud punk/hardcore bands pretty regularly.

for seattle:
the highline rocks
same with chop suey
the black lodge is rad too
still love nuemo's
sad that the josephine is no more
the tractor has some good stuff from time to time
also the sunset tavern
and studio 7, even though I hate the layout of that place

portland:
the doug fir rocks
as does the crystal ballroom
haven't been to a ton of shows and can't remember the names of the smaller places...