For the first time in 30 years, the Hideout has a new owner.
Teri O’Brien — a performing artist, independent festival producer and one-time employee of the West Town concert venue — is taking the reins from the husband-and-wife team of Tim and Katie Tuten and brothers Mike and Jim Hinchsliff, the venue announced Thursday, according to a post on its website.
The reasons behind the transition and the terms of the agreement were not disclosed, but O’Brien (who splits her time between Nashville and Chicago) said that conversations with the former owners started in February 2025. “I always dreamed of owning a music venue and I told [the Tutens] that in passing,” she told the Chicago Sun-Times. “They approached me last year … and this just felt like the right moment in my life.”
The Tutens and Hinchsliffs first purchased the converted century-old house along the North Branch of the Chicago River in 1996. Over the years, they’ve turned it into a cultural institution and community hub that was recognized as a “best” music venue by publications including Rolling Stone and USA Today and was a pit stop for figures like Anthony Bourdain.
The Hideout has hosted homegrown and national music acts including Andrew Bird, Wilco, Mavis Staples and the storied Hideout Block Party; comedy nights with Hannibal Buress and Ramy Youssef; political offerings including events with Politico and the ongoing panel event “Show Up Chicago”; and community events like the regularly scheduled Soup & Bread nights that aim to fight hunger in Chicago.
“The Hideout will stay the Hideout,” Tim Tuten said in a statement. “It will remain independent, creative and rooted in the community that built it. Teri knows our room, the people and our history, and she has the heart to carry it forward.”
“The Hideout works because of the people who gather in it. That doesn’t change with this transition, in fact it will grow,” Katie Tuten added in another statement. The Tutens were not available for additional comment.
Bird noted how important the venue has been to the local music community.
”The Hideout is one of only a few venues that exists because of and is a manifestation of the personalities of its owners, Tim and Katie Tuten,” the singer-songwriter, who hails from Lake Bluff, said in a statement. “The fact that it’s being passed to an employee is definitely encouraging that it will continue in its original spirit and not be acquiring flat screens behind the bar.”
“I feel like I’ve seen all sides of the music industry,” O’Brien said of the knowledge she brings as The Hideout’s new owner. She’s also a recording and touring artist performing under the stage name Brontë Fall. “I’ve spent the last decade touring and being a performing artist, booking my own shows. I feel like I know the ins and outs of what it takes to run the venue because I worked there. I know what it’s like to be a performer, so this was the perfect storm for me.”
Before assuming ownership of the Hideout, O’Brien worked at the venue from 2015-2018 in an artist hospitality position. Prior to that, she was part of the backstage operations team at Ravinia. O’Brien also acts as a producer of the annual Chicago indie music event Big Heart Fest, held at Chief O’Neill’s in Avondale every June; it was created as a tribute to her late father, John W. O’Brien who ran the financial brokerage firm R.J. O’Brien & Associates and “loved music and community,” O’Brien said.
The ownership switch at the Hideout comes at a critical juncture for Chicago’s independent music venues. As the Sun-Times previously reported, citing data from the Chicago Independent Venue League (CIVL), only 1 in 4 are currently profitable. The Hideout, notably, is also a founding member of CIVL, which grew out of the previous owners’ fight against Live Nation’s failed Lincoln Yards project.
“Fortunately, the Hideout is stable,” O’Brien said. “After touring for nearly a decade all over the country, I see it. I see that venues are hurting and asking for money to stay open. I know the industry is in flux.”
The new owner said she’s looking into building partnerships and alliances with the city and nonprofit organizations as well as working with the Hideout’s current 26-member staff and the community to gather ideas for sustainability of the venue. Some of them include adding nonalcoholic drinks and mocktails to the bar to cater to patrons’ changing preferences and possibly adding podcasting to the mix of entertainment booked at the club.
But much will stay the same as O’Brien looks to maintain the programming and offerings that make the Hideout unique.
“It’s so rare to see a music club that’s not just a music club. I want to continue with that legacy and build on the community and the vibe it’s always had,” she said. “I think there’s so many fun things we can do to continue bringing it into the 21st century.”
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.wbez.org ’
