TRAVERSE CITY — Union Street Station, a downtown Traverse City bar that has served as the beating heart of the region’s live music scene for decades, will host its final performances this weekend amid a dispute between the bar’s operators and the building’s owner over an alleged $50,000 in property damages.
The building’s owner claims the bar is responsible for the damages, a figure the bar’s operators have disputed. But for the dozens of musicians who have called the venue home, the legal battle is secondary to what’s being lost — the only late-night stage in town.
Chad Schrader, a local musician and show promoter who fronts the cover band the Timebombs, said Union Street was the sole venue in Traverse City with a dedicated stage, a professional sound system, and a sound engineer on staff. He described the bar as a proving ground where artists could develop their craft in front of a live audience.
“It’s not just a bar,” Schrader said. “Where is the counterculture get to go? Where is the space for everyone else? That’s our watering hole.”
The venue’s roots stretch back to the 1970s and ’80s, when it built a reputation as a blues destination that drew touring acts through northern Michigan. In more recent years, it became known as the place where Billy Strings played early sets and where guitarist Kenny Olson, who went on to tour with Kid Rock, honed his skills as a teenager. The stage still bears Olson’s name.
Schrader said the closure announcement came down on Feb. 2, leaving little time to react.
Through his promotion company, Sandbox Alliance, he scrambled to book nearly every remaining weekend in February with farewell performances, filling early and late slots on Thursdays through Saturdays and adding Wednesday and Sunday shows.
Many of the artists are playing for free. With no budget from the bar to fund the events, Schrader said Sandbox Alliance has been covering costs through merchandise sales on the Union Street Station website, with proceeds going directly to performers, the sound crew, and bar staff who are losing their jobs.
“Every dollar literally is going to line the pocket of an artist or a musician or a sound person or a barkeeper at Union Street,” he said.
The final day of live music is Saturday, with more than half a dozen acts performing in a 12-hour marathon beginning at 2 p.m. The lineup includes local acts Stone Travel B, the Ampersands and a reunion of 74 Marauder, with the Kenny Olson Cartel closing out the night. The venue’s PA system and sound equipment are scheduled to be removed on Sunday.
The building’s owner has indicated he would like the space to remain a music venue, but Schrader said no conversations have taken place with artists or promoters about what comes next. He said he fears that whatever replaces Union Street Station will lack the character that made it a gathering place for the city’s service workers, musicians, and late-night regulars.
“If we lose Union Street as a venue, the way it exists right now, it will never be that again,” Schrader said. “A place that you can still get a $4 beer on draft in downtown Traverse City, the community needs that.”
For Schrader, who started the Timebombs specifically so he could perform on the Union Street stage, the loss is still sinking in. He said he has been too busy organizing shows to grieve.
“There’s a visceral connection that you get at Union Street Station,” he said. “You get to pretend that you’re a rock star for four hours. There’s nowhere else that delivers that experience.”