Clearly, The Attic isn’t the first—and it’s certainly not the last—Halifax venue to shut down. The Halifax music scene is cyclical in nature and it’s quite possible that The Attic, an important part of that scene for almost a decade, became a casualty of one of its lulls.It was during one of those lulls that The Attic opened its doors, according to current manager and long-time staffer Lloyd Smith. “The Birdland had closed its doors, the Marquee hadn’t yet opened…lots of small rooms around but nowhere really filling the void for a medium-sized venue… The Attic opening gave a new place to play for a lot of bands coming up, as well as giving bands from the rest of the country a way to include Halifax.”
The Attic was host to bands as disparate as Bouncing Souls, The Hidden Cameras, Buried Inside and Gowan, who Smith describes as putting on a show “a thousand times more violent” than Three Inches of Blood.
“Before The Attic,” recalls Fabien O’Brien, who played in Dead Red, one of the many Halifax punk bands that found an audience at The Attic, “there was always the Seahorse, but I remember when The Attic became a viable venue…a really good sound system and lots of beer with a nice stage and an actual band room! We felt like rock stars when we played there!”
For its last night, The Attic has plans to pack as much music into its confines as possible.Smith likens the closure to a gang’s clubhouse being torn down. For Sean MacGillivray, the bar’s former soundperson and current singer for Great Plains, this means: “a tonne of awesome bands on two stages. I think I speak for everyone when I say that The Attic will not go out quietly.”
This article appears in Jan 17-23, 2008.
