A Raleigh Institution Turns Twenty-Five

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Good morning, readers.

In 1999, musician Paul Siler, alongside Ben Barwick and Steve Popson, opened Kings, a rock club in a McDowell Street building in downtown Raleigh. The music room was the fist of its kind in the Triangle, predating The Pinhook in Durham and the Cat’s Cradle Back Room in Carrboro.

Kings closed in 2007, when the McDowell Street building was razed to make way for a parking garage. It relocated to its current upstairs space on Martin Street in 2010, and then closed for a few years during the pandemic. It reopened again in a much more competitive musical landscape, and Kings changed hands in 2023. 

The club, now owned by Herbie Abernethy of Triangle metal band Valient Thorr and three partners, is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. And there’s a lot to celebrate, even in a more challenging time.

During the last quarter century, Kings has offered “a breadth of style incorporated into its attentively booked programming, spanning various shades of indie rock, metal, hip-hop, and experimental music,” writes Jordan Lawrence for the INDY. 

It’s where owner Abernethy and other up-and-coming musicians found proof through the musical variety that they too might be able to make a go at making music.

Today, maintaining this variety and opportunities for aspiring musicians is still a focus, but tastes have changed. Bar sales, crucial to the club’s bottom line, are down and the draw of indie rock isn’t as reliable as it was in the past. The new owners are finding gains with jam-leaning bands and newer strains of hip-hop, out of their range of familiarity musically but key to preserving Kings’ role as a hub for exploring what’s fresh in the local and national underground scene. 

“I’m not booking the room for my ears anymore,” says Abernethy. “You gotta think about what the kids want to hear.”

Read about 25 years of Kings. And have a good Tuesday. 

—Jane

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Wake

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