Earlier this year we eulogised The Zoo. The 32-year-old live music venue was grungy, vital and welcoming, staking a fair claim for Brisbane’s friendliest bar staff (and dodgiest stairs). But as we mourned the loss, Crowbar’s Trad Nathan and Tyla Dombroski were making plans to buy the joint and keep it kicking – albeit as Crowbar Brisbane.

In a statement released last week the couple said, “This move marks a new chapter for both venues, ensuring The Zoo’s legacy continues while expanding Crowbar’s growing influence across Australia’s live music industry … with Crowbar stepping in, the beloved venue will continue as a cornerstone of Fortitude Valley’s live music scene.”

The two have a strong background in the industry, and with the venue itself. “As a former punter, band member, booker and promoter, playing The Zoo was a great achievement for aspiring bands. We’re excited to be able to keep music within its walls,” Nathan said. Dombroski is a board member of Sound NSW and the president of the recently formed Live Music Venues Alliance.

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The duo opened the first Crowbar in Brisbane in 2012 before expanding to Sydney in 2018. The second bar remains open, unlike the original, which buckled under the pressure of Covid.

“We’ve had to make the unfortunate decision to pull Crowbar out of Brisbane for the foreseeable future,” the duo said at the time. “These are trying times for the music and entertainment industries and the future is uncertain for a lot of us, but we hope to be back in Brisbane sometime with a very loud bang.”

Taking over one of Brisbane’s longest-running music venues certainly qualifies. But is the industry in a better place now than it was in 2020? Before closing in July this year, The Zoo had been running at a loss for over three years.

“I never bought The Zoo to make money, but I just can’t get to a point where we’re kicking the can down the road – which is kind of what we’re doing at the moment,” former owner Shane Chidgzey told Broadsheet in May. “The big issue is cost of living. It’s stretching everybody … This past last financial year, we only had maybe 60 per cent of the revenue from the previous year. That’s really, really hurt us.”

While the The Zoo’s closure was a loss for the Australian music industry at large, it’s not the only sign something is amiss. In an opinion piece written for Broadsheet Kimberley Wheeler, founding president of Musicians Australia, said, “Around half of Australia’s working musicians earned less than $6000 last year, which is a mere 15 per cent of the national minimum wage, forcing most to look for work elsewhere.”

Both Wheeler and Chidgzey also point to the return of big US-touring acts – and the monopoly of foreign-owned multinationals like Live Nation – as damaging to the local industry. Taylor Swift didn’t bring her Eras tour to Brisbane earlier this year, but so many Queenslanders bought tickets to see the US superstar play elsewhere that airlines scheduled 64 additional flights between Brisbane and Sydney and Melbourne.

Still, if Nathan and Dombroski are worried by any of this, they’re not showing it.

“No one has anything to worry about as far as I’m concerned,” Nathan says. “There definitely is [an industry-wide] downturn. There’s rising alcohol prices, for example, but it’s how you adapt to those things. You can’t just roll over – you have to do better deals.

“We have a full-time booking team. We’re still heavily involved in the music industry … I don’t think you can just buy a music venue and go, ‘Put some music in there and it’ll make money’. It doesn’t work like that.”

He’s alluding to how Crowbar Sydney weathered Covid in Sydney: by initiating collabs with winemakers and running as a popular American barbeque restaurant, Ultimate Pig, during the day. The duo is implementing the same formula here, flipping the space to serve a smaller, Americana-themed bar menu during gigs.

“Look, we do need people to stop spending $800 on a Pink ticket and come check out some awesome local live music,” Nathan says. “Brisbane has such a great history and heritage of these incredible bands. It’s all spawned from venues like The Zoo existing, and if we don’t have venues that are willing to support artists and be a part of that culture, then we’re not going to have these awesome bands coming out of our country doing amazing things.”

Crowbar Brisbane will open before the end of 2024 at 711 Ann Street, Fortitude Valley.

crowbarbrisbane.com