As someone who is passionate about music, I’ve been to a lot of music venues. Been lucky enough to travel & been on some tours which let me visit a lot of music venues around North America & the UK. I gotta say after the tour of the new House of Blues Anaheim, this might be the best music venue. I was a fan of the old House of Blues Anaheim. It was close to me and at Downtown Disney. However if you showed up late to a concert (hey I have kids) and couldn’t get in the downstairs area. You basically are stuck up stairs watching the concert from a TV monitor. This happened to my wife and I last time we were there seeing Owl City.
So when I heard HOB Anaheim would be closing and moving across the street to little used Garden Walk, I was excited. For one, the HOB Anaheim was missing one great thing about HOBs, a foundation room. The restaurant at Downtown Disney wasn’t that big and even when they had live music, the band didn’t even play on a stage.
The new HOB Anaheim (opening Feb 28th) is huge but still has its intimate feel as the old venue. Can hold up 2,000 people. The stage is wide and long so more people can be up front. There is more room on the balcony compared to the last venue and VIP seating is doubled. With brand new state of the art sound & lights. Its gonna be epic every time you see your favorite artist perform here. There is also a smaller room called The Parish that can fit 400 people and will feature a lot of local talent and smaller indie touring bands. You can see the photo of that room to the left.
Here is a list of bands that will be rocking the main music hall! Social Distortion (Feb 28 & March 1st) KoRn (March 5th & 6th) Thrice & Manchester Orchestra (March 7th) Andrew McManhon (March 12th) Billy Idol (March 13th) 311 (March 18th) Death Cab For Cutie (March 19th) Yellowcard (March 25th) Save Ferris (March 26th) Reel Big Fish (March 31st)
The Foundation Room will have the same beautiful ceiling from the iconic LA one. Many of the same artwork from that venue will also be displayed at along with new artwork from Audrey Kawasaki and Johnny ‘KMNDZ’ Rodriguez. The Foundation Room room is amazing but also has a cool entrance to it and to the music hall. It has its own VIP entrance to the music hall in the upper corner in it that you can notice in the tour video. Also there is a catwalk that goes above the restaurant that enters the Foundation Room.
Like I said early, the restaurant will actually have a stage in it. Local bands can show off their talent. There will also be open mic night for not just musicians but stand up comics to showcase their work. There you can enjoy great food like fried chicken sliders, smokehouse St Louis ribs, bourbon bread pudding, Nashville hot friend chicken salad, voodoo shrimp, and more. There is also plenty of great drinks to pick from like Kentucky bubble bath Makers Mark bourbon, fresh lemon juice, elder flower liqueur, blue curacao, topped with bubbles. El Viejo – Pisco Porton, crème de cacao, toasted pecan bitters, cigar smoke. Father Figure – Monkey Shoulder scotch, Cynar 70, coffee-infused Conzando, Green Chartreuse, bitters.
As you can tell of the photo of the main hall to the left, there is still a lot of construction left. However they are on pace to be done in time for the opening night concert. I plan on attending a bunch of concerts or just having dinner there after a family trip to Disneyland. For more info, full concert list, or to buy concert tickets visit http://www.houseofblues.com/anaheim Check out the full tour video above and more photos below. I look forward to running into you at HOB Anaheim in 2017. By @SteveSievers
