3 new live music venues by Avram Hornik will energize Philly nightlife

Philadelphia is about to get not one, but three new independent music venues.

Avram Hornik, the nightlife impresario and restaurateur, is back in the live music business.

Hornik’s company FCM Hospitality’s ventures include Harper’s Garden in Center City, Lola’s Garden in Ardmore, and Morgan’s Pier and Liberty Point on the Delaware River, the latter of which is Philadelphia’s largest outdoor restaurant.

When music venues Union Transfer and Boot & Saddle opened in 2011 and 2013, Hornik was part owner, though he later sold his interest in both. (Boot & Saddle closed in 2020, due to the COVID-19 shutdown.)

Now, Hornik is reentering the live music space with venues in Center City, South Philly, and Fishtown.

The 500-capacity Concourse Live will begin presenting indie bands at its Market Street address next month. The 200-capacity dance club the Dolphin Tavern on South Broad Street has already added a steady stream of live acts to the DJ calendar. And a third venue on North Delaware Avenue that will hold 700 is targeting an early-2023 opening.

All will be produced by Philly Independent Productions, the new concert division of FCM.

Local and national bands are being booked by Marley McNamara, the Philly music scene veteran who’s an alum of Fishtown club Johnny Brenda’s and former manager of acts like Lititz, Pa. quartet The Districts.

The small- to medium-sized venue live music business is highly competitive, especially for independent venues like World Cafe Live, Johnny Brenda’s, MilkBoy Philly, Ardmore Music Hall, 118 North, The Fire, and Kung Fu Necktie which are not affiliated with deep-pocketed corporate concerns Live Nation and AEG Live.

So what makes Hornik want to get back into a business where profit margins are thin and touring artists are struggling to sell tickets to budget- and COVID-cautious fans?

“I like to say that I’m in the public space business,” says Hornik, 49, who started out operating the Quarry St. Cafe in Old City in the 1990s.

His succession of Philly bars, many with a DJ component, have included Lucy’s Hat Shop, Soma Lounge, Butter and Proto Lounge, and Bar Noir. His Parks on Tap beer garden partner is Philadelphia Parks & Recreation. This summer, Liberty Point has presented a Tuesday night Philly Grown: Food & Music series paring local chefs and bands.

“That’s what I really like: how people socialize together,” Hornik says, sitting at a high-top table with McNamara and Matt Schenck, the production manager and engineer in charge of sound at FCM venues.

“

I just think there is a pent-up demand for that. . People want to gather together, and there’s no better reason to than to hear live music.”

Here’s a look at the three new venues.

The FCM venue set to make the biggest splash soonest is Concourse Live, a spacious, subterranean 500-capacity room at 1635 Market Street that could hardly be more conveniently located for commuters. It has an entrance from the concourse at Suburban Station.

Concourse Live will open on Sept. 10 with the Philadelphia Tom Petty Appreciation Band, the local all-star ensemble fronted by Pat Finnerty that features members of Dr. Dog, The War on Drugs, and Strand of Oaks. On Oct. 9, the venue will host Philly buzz band Cosmic Guilt and Peter Bauer of The Walkmen at a kick-off party for the Philly Music Fest (PMF), which begins the next night at Ardmore Music Hall.

Rapper Chill Moody, brass band Snacktime Philly, indie rockers Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, soul band Arthur Thomas & the Funkitorium, and The Districts all have Concourse Live dates in the fall.

As a live music venue, Concourse Live is a new entity, but it’s not an entirely new venture for Hornik. As Concourse Dance Bar, the converted off track betting parlor has been open since 2018, pulling in a young crowd with DJs booked by Rylan Murphy, as well as a ball pit and an ice bar.

In 2018, The Inquirer’s Samantha Melamed called it a “hallucinogenic” experience in a “nostalgic playground.” That aspect of Concourse will continue, with DJs starting after the bands finish. Live shows on weekends will start at 7 and end by 10.

The Dolphin Tavern, the South Philly dive bar/dance club at 1539 S. Broad St., which is already in Hornik’s portfolio, has been an indie DJ haven since FCM took it over in 2013.

With the Boot & Saddle gone, the 200-capacity Dolphin will aim to be “that missing South Philly venue,” says McNamara, complete with the old B&S sound system, which Hornik bought when the club shut down.

The venue will keep the disco ball action going with DJs, but also add indie bands during the week. Among them: Queasy on Sept. 9, Grace Vonderkuhn on Sept. 29, and Tonstartssbandht on Nov. 6 .

(How long the Dolphin will have South Broad to itself is uncertain. In March, The Inquirer reported that Boot & Saddle had plans to reopen as a collaboration between South Philly bar Fountain Porter and avant jazz presenter Ars Nova Workshop, but a timetable has yet to be announced. )

A name hasn’t been settled on for the third venue in the Philly Independent Productions’ plan that will be built at Craft Hall, Hornik’s brewery and restaurant at 901 N. Delaware Ave.

“We’re going back and forth between ‘The Philly Independent’ and ‘The Independent Philly,’” McNamara says. The room will have a separate entrance from Craft Hall and will be larger than the Dolphin and Concourse Live. This will help bands move into larger venues, a concept called horizontal integration, Hornik explains.

“You want to be able to book a band in a 200-cap room, and then a 500-cap room, and then a 700-cap room. So you want to be able to move the bands up and have them realize that this is an independent alternative for the Philadelphia market.”

The pressure on the new live music rooms to succeed, Hornik says, will be less “because these venues already exist, and are profitable as is, so we have a lot more leeway to take care of the bands better and have more competitive ticket pricing and pay people more because we don’t have to worry about rent, or insurance or electricity.”

The entry of three new indie venues will increase competition, but also new opportunities. With the Dolphin, McNamara will be bidding for shows against similar-sized rooms, like Johnny Brenda’s, PhilaMOCA, and MilkBoy Philly.

The latter, however, is currently closed for repairs, and will likely stay shuttered into the fall, Tommy Joyner, MilkBoy’s co-owner (and leader of the band Pep Rally) said last week. Until it reopens, MilkBoy is shuffling shows to other venues. McNamara said she had been in discussion about potentially moving some of them — like South Philly songwriter Shamir’s Oct. 14 Philly Music Fest date — to the Dolphin.

“I think it’s terrific,” said PMF chief Greg Seltzer on the addition of the FCM venues. He teamed with McNamara, adding the kick-off event to the nonprofit fest, and plans to continue to partner with Philly Independent Productions.

“More independent venues means more places for venue staff to work, and more places for emerging bands to cut their teeth. And geographically, the venues make sense, with the Dolphin in South Philly and also the venue in that part of Center City,” because in terms of small rock venues, “nothing else is there.”

Concourse Live’s size puts it between World Cafe Live in West Philly, and City Winery Philadelphia, which hold 650 and 350 people, respectively. There aren’t that many concert spaces that size in Philadelphia, says Hornik.

While there are many venues with around a 2,000-seat capacity, including the Miller Theater (formerly the Merriam), Academy of Music, Verizon Hall, the Fillmore, Franlin Music Hall and the even larger The Met, that 500-person range is neglected, Hornik says.

“I feel like the rooms that are that size have their own niche. This is going to be a room for independent artists of all different genres,” McNamara says.

McNamara says she expects that once all three venues are up and running, there will be approximately 100 shows each year at both Concourse Live and the larger venue at Craft Hall, and closer to 150 at the Dolphin, because we’re going to do a lot more local shows there.”

“I don’t think we’re going to be taking market share from these other venues,” Hornik says. “I think there’s a gap in the market, and we’re going to make the whole pie larger.”

For information for all Philly Independent Productions shows, go to phillyindie.com.