New Orleans dive bar Check Point Charlie has closed | Music

Check Point Charlie, the 24-hour New Orleans dive bar, music venue and laundromat that raised a mighty racket at the corner of Esplanade Avenue and Decatur Street for decades, is no more.

The venue abruptly closed this week after owner Darren Brooks sold the building.

He was on-site Tuesday afternoon as employees under the red lights cleared out bottles of liquor and the bar’s hodgepodge décor, as if evacuating for a hurricane.

“It’s been a great place,” Brooks said. “But it’s time for a little bit of a change.”

Named for the Cold War’s most famous crossing point between West and East Berlin, Check Point Charlie was on the border of the French Quarter and Faubourg Marigny, where the Lower Decatur Street strip ended at the entrance to the Frenchmen Street entertainment district. Standing near the foot of Esplanade Avenue, it was the end of the line for anyone drifting south toward the Mississippi River.

The convergence of all those scenes, coupled with its open-all-night aesthetic, contributed to an anything-goes mentality. The pool table, chicken nuggets and burgers were part of the draw, as was the ability to do laundry while drinking or listening to music.

The late celebrity chef, author and travel correspondent Anthony Bourdain visited Check Point Charlie for a 2003 episode of his show “A Cook’s Tour.” A scene from the Julia Roberts/Denzel Washington thriller “The Pelican Brief” was reportedly shot there.

As news of the closing spread, patrons posted hundreds of farewell messages and memories online. One woman recalled “the time i was doing my laundry and couldn’t find my favorite gold miniskirt till i looked two barstools down and found a man wearing it as a tube top. He gave it back.”

Over the years, Check Point Charlie hosted all manner of bands on an elevated stage tucked in a corner of the high-ceilinged room near the washing machines. Open-mic nights gave up-and-coming musicians a place to play.

Back in the day, bands such as Irene & the Mikes and the late hoodoo bluesman Coco Robicheaux were regulars.

The New Orleans hard rock band Suplecs cut its teeth at Check Point Charlie. Starting in 2001, Suplecs played an annual gig at sundown on Mardi Gras, bringing the Carnival season to a raucous close. That tradition of Suplecs at Check Point Charlie on Fat Tuesday continued for 25 years.

Punk bands found a home there, as did more melodic bands. The Revivalists, the most successful rock band to break out of New Orleans in the past 20 years, played its very first gig at Check Point Charlie.

The band members recalled those early days in the video for the song “Good Old Days,” from the 2023 album “Pour It Out Into the Night.”

The video opens with footage of the band members walking onstage at the massive Bonnaroo festival in Tennessee, then cuts to an old clip of a Revivalists gig at Check Point Charlie in 2007, the year the band was founded.

“It’s a shame to see another independent live venue close in our city,” Revivalists bassist George Gekas said Tuesday, “especially one that always gave an opportunity to new and emerging artists. We can only hope the new owners bring a revitalized check Point Charlie back into the fold.”

Not all neighbors appreciated some of the scruffier patrons who congregated outside the bar and/or quasi-lived on the Esplanade Avenue neutral ground. It was not uncommon to find hypodermic needles on the sidewalk, one neighbor said Tuesday.

What is next for the former Check Point Charlie, as well as the apartments above it, was not clear Tuesday.

A farewell message on the Check Point Charlie Facebook page, which Brooks said was posted by an employee, lamented that the bar wasn’t able to hold a farewell blowout.

“We would love to have our regulars sit at the copper top and have their usual with us while The Unnaturals, Suplecs, RottenCores, Oh Dang Bruh Y?! and Ill Funeral played us out!,” the message read. “Wish all y’all were here sharing your most insane memories from this crossroads corner.”

“Thank you for the good times and the confusing ones. Thank you forever Lower D Fam. Thank you to the regulars and the irregulars.

“We never loved you, but we always loved how much you wanted us to!

“R.I.P. the good times.”