Paste Magazine

America's 40 Best Music Venues

By Paste Staff
on May 29, 2007 12:00 AM

Paste readers nominated more than 500 different venues at PasteMagazine.com—from hole-in-the-wall rock clubs to elegant theaters, legendary halls to brand new bars, quiet listening rooms to rock extravaganzas. We weighed history, setting, sound, character, comfort, atmosphere, vibrancy, uniqueness, and their roles in helping launch careers. These 40 venues rose above their peers. Our picks for the best music venues in America follow...

NORTHEAST
The Living Room - New York
The latest incarnation of this club has great lighting and a perfectly constructed stage, high enough to create a workspace, just low enough for artist/audience unity. And the audiences are ideal: quiet during subtle material, generous and rowdy after raunchy rave-ups. It’s the heart of the Lower East Side club scene its artists pioneered.