Last month, Terry Vassalos, owner of the Anderson Brothers Building on the Corner that currently houses Plan 9 Music and Satellite Ballroom, would neither confirm nor deny rumors that a CVS pharmacy might replace the two music establishments when the space’s lease, currently held by Plan 9, expires at the end of May. “It’s nothing definite. It’s not done,” he told C-VILLE, though he did acknowledge that CVS was interested in the location.
Now, it seems, things have moved further along. “We’re pretty close to a deal,” Vassalos says. “But for me it will be a done deal when I see the sign of CVS on it.”
 If things go as Terry Vassalos plans, a CVS will soon occupy his Anderson Brothers Building on the Corner. |
Vassalos acknowledged that others had been interested in the lease, but says that, once the deal is completed, the pharmacy chain will take over the entire property, which currently houses Higher Grounds Coffee and Just Curry in addition to Satellite and Plan 9. “CVS will take the whole space,” he says.
Danny Shea, who books acts at Satellite Ballroom, echoes the likelihood that the music venue and event space that he helped start with Michael’s Bistro owner Chuck Adcock in 2004 will become homeless on June 1.
“It looks that way,” Shea says when asked if the Satellite will be closing. “The landlord doesn’t want to give us the lease. We’re in there and we want the property, and it’s basically the landlord’s call at that point.”
Live music fans shouldn’t panic too much, though. Shea says that the hunt for a new concert space is already on. “We’re looking into some places,” he said. “There is definitely some energy being put into finding an alternative place.”
“It would be some combination of what has been going on at the Ballroom,” Shea says of who would be involved in such a venture. Local music mogul Coran Capshaw became an investor in Satellite Ballroom in 2006 and took on a more active role in the venue after his Starr Hill Music Hall shut its doors last July.
Vassalos expects the deal with CVS to be completed in a couple months. “Let’s say when they start working on it, I will know it’s a done deal,” he says.
“We’re finally making it official,” says Plan 9 owner Jim Bland. “As rumor has it, we’re going to close. We’ll be out by the end of May,” he said of the chain’s Corner location. It will consolidate with Plan 9’s Albemarle Square location.
“We tried to work it out so that Satellite could stay, but that didn’t seem to be in the cards, with the landlord having the big fish on the line as he did,” says Bland. “It had just become less and less financially viable for us.”
Satellite Ballroom’s website currently lists the Punch Brothers rescheduled performance on May 16 as the last show on its schedule, though C-VILLE has heard that additional events may be in the works for later in the month.
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