Bottom of The Hill Forever: My 10 Favorite Shows at the Legendary Venue
Julien Baker, from her 2016 performance at Bottom of the Hill.
The Bottom of the Hill is my favorite music venue of all time and second place isn’t particularly close. From the moment I first stepped into the venerable punk bar in Potrero Hill, I knew I had found a home.
I love the creaky neon sign on the front of the venue. I love the graffiti covered bathroom. I love the smoking section out back, where you can hang out between acts. I love the fact that a beer and a shot won’t set you back $20. I love the calendar posters that deck the walls—evidence that the Strokes and Arcade Fire and the White Stripes all played at this intimate, tiny venue.
I love the immediacy of the experience—that when you first step through the doors, it’s only a few quick paces before you’re directly in front of the band. I love my secret listening spot—facing the right of the stage, next to the riser steps—which seemingly is always available for me and my friends.
Most of all, I love the amazing lineups hosted at the venue over the years. From local San Francisco acts to mid-level touring bands to pre-stardom arena-rock groups, Bottom of the Hill has always consistently featured music that I’ve loved and admired over the years.
All of this is why it was so devastating to hear the news that Bottom of the Hill would be closing at the end of 2026. In San Francisco, we have become inured to the idea of revered institutions shutting down, but this one fucking HURTS. I cannot think of a single music venue in the Bay Area—not the Fillmore, not the Fox, not anywhere else—as universally loved as Bottom of the Hill. This was our scrappy, scuzzy, no frills, beautiful punk bar (also, Thee Parkside must now be protected at all costs.)
The silver lining of this sad announcement is that the venue still has a full year of operations left before it finally closes its doors. I plan on making as many shows as possible. In the interim, I thought I’d honor Bottom of the Hill by listing my 10 favorite shows I saw at the venue. Here they are:
10.) Bear in Heaven / Cymbals Eat Guitars, March 25, 2010: A perfect example of the kind of bands you’d see at Bottom of the Hill during the heyday of the indie blogosphere. Cymbals Eat Guitars were loud, erudite Built to Spill clones and Bear In Heaven specialized in silky synthpop. A total contrast in styles, the bands made for the kind of dichotomic bills that are so fun to watch, and both acts were touring behind critically acclaimed albums. Now both disbanded, in a perfect world, Bear in Heaven and Cymbals Eat Guitars would have elevated to a new level of fame after this tour, but at least I got to see them at the peak of their powers in 2010.
9.) Times New Viking, October 29, 2009: For those unfamiliar with the term, shitgaze refers to bands whose sounds and production values don’t quite meet the basement-level standards of lo-fi. Times New Viking, a glorious trio out of Columbus, Ohio, were a progenitor of the genre and one of the best damn bands of this century (who apparently are reforming for their first show in a decade.) My memories of this show are as follows: it was incredibly loud (and fucking awesome); the opening band—aptly titled Psychedelic Horseshit—used an empty Budweiser case as their kick drum, and I drunkenly sang the lyrics of “Drop-Out” to vocalist/drummer Adam Elliott after the show and he somehow knew what I was talking about. In retrospect, that dude was an absolute saint—he acted like a complete gentleman, despite me approaching Punisher-type fan levels with him.
8.) Beach House, March 15, 2008: While Beach House might not have reached the ridiculous heights of other Bottom of the Hill bands (seriously, did you know that Imagine Dragons played at BOTH? I don’t know a single one of their songs, but I think they played at the Super Bowl?), this Baltimore dreampop duo went on to much, much bigger things after this Bottom of the Hill performance. This show was particularly special for me, as they were touring (mostly) behind their debut, self-titled album, a lo-fi effort that still stands out as my favorite record in the Beach House discography.
7.) Empath, August 31, 2019: My friend Josh from Club Night clued me into this noise-rock outfit from Philadelphia, and I interviewed them prior to the show for a story in the SF Examiner. Josh and I ended up going together to see them play, and they were loud, catchy and amazing (even overshadowing the headlining act, the great Mannequin Pussy.) I remember chatting with the band after the show, smoking cigarettes together outside the venue during an unseasonably warm August night in San Francisco.
6.) Magnolia Electric Company, August 4, 2006: This one is memorable for so many reasons—it was my first ever show at Bottom of the Hill and it was the only time I ever saw the late, great Jason Molina perform live. It was a packed house and I remember being in goddam awe of the place—freshly relocated from Maine and thinking, “holy shit, I love this city.”
5.) The Blow, October 25, 2013: I was a huge fan of The Blow—“Paper Television” remains one of my favorite albums of all time, but I got the distinct feeling that I was never going to see them live after their original incarnation—composed of Khaela Maricich and Jona Bechtolt—split ways. Thankfully, Maricich teamed up with her partner—visual artist Melissa Dyne—for a reimagined version of the outfit. This show was on a Friday night and I remember it starting very late in classic Bottom of the Hill fashion. By the time the electrifying Maricich took the stage, everyone was in a place of wonderfully blissful drunkenness.
4.) Smith Westerns / Yuck, February, 2011: I was already a huge fan of the Smith Westerns (if this band ever reunites, I will be the first person to buy tickets), and I was super excited to see them after they blew my mind opening for Girls at the Great American Music Hall the year earlier. They were great again, but the real treat was discovering Yuck, an amazing indie rock outfit from Britain. The cab driver who took us to the venue actually preached about Yuck prior to the show and he was totally on-point with his praise. Yuck went on to put out one of my favorite albums of all time (a theme you’ll notice a lot in this list) before their main songwriter, Daniel Blumberg embarked on a career as an Oscar-winning composer (!!) for this work on “The Brutalist.”
3.) Phoebe Bridgers, April 27, 2018: One of my more epic concert-going experiences, I actually caught TV on the Radio opening for LCD Soundsystem at the Greek Theater this same night, before ditching James Murphy and company early to Uber all the way over to Bottom of the Hill. I arrived just as Bridgers was taking the stage to play songs from “Stranger in the Alps,” (yep, another one of my all-time faves.) She sounded amazing, and was joined by the ever-grumpy Mark Kozelek of Red House Painters fame for a few songs. Perhaps a little tipsy from four hours of music shows, I belted out a song request to Kozelek and promptly got screamed at by him. My friend Marisa said she heard Bridgers repeat this story of my public scolding at two different later shows in the Bay Area. Thank you, Bottom of the Hill for making me infamous.
2.) Handsome Furs, April 15, 2008: Isn’t this Wolf Parade revival thing amazing? Thank you to the gay hockey show for introducing this band to a whole new audience, and thanks to Wolf Parade guitarist Dan Boeckner for fronting his wonderfully quirky and catchy synth-pop collective, Handsome Furs. This duo, made up of Boeckner and his then-wife Alexei Perry, played an absolutely banger of a show that night. I remember Perry dancing barefoot on stage and then when I went to give her a high-five after the show (standing in my secret spot near the stage steps), she kissed my hand. Pretty great. Sadly, the marriage didn’t last and Handsome Furs broke up in 2012, but I’ll never forget this show.
1.) Julien Baker, February 25, 2016: Because of Boygenius, Julien Baker is now legit famous, but long before that trio formed, she was touring behind her amazing debut album, “Sprained Ankle.” I remember her wending her way through the audience before this show, dutifully talking with everyone who stopped to say hi. Although she looked so diminutive upon the stage, she completely captivated the crowd from the onset, entrancing everyone there with her poignant, emotionally laden vocal delivery. The songs on “Sprained Ankle” are painfully candid, but Baker held nothing back that night, fearlessly brandishing her heart on her sleeve, opening herself up so completely to a crowd eager to embrace her into our collective arms. Her stirring rendition of “Rejoice,” was a damn-near religious experience for me, and I cannot think of a better place to hear that song than the Church of Bottom of the Hill.