The Empress Rules
The Age
Monday October 13, 2008
No pokies, no TVs, lots of live music: Fitzroy's Empress Hotel keeps the faith. Anna Kelsey-Sugg reports.
UNTIL the late 1950s North Fitzroy publicans had just one major regulation to contend with: no chicken coops against the back fence. Rules have become stricter since, but the Empress - among the oldest pubs in Melbourne and one of North Fitzroy's original Victorian buildings - soldiers on. The Empress of India Hotel (to give it its full name has stood fast against the waves of gentrification beyond its walls. Its stage has accommodated more than 10,000 performers over the past 20 years. Pete Murray calls it his favourite music venue. Named in honour of Queen Victoria, the pub on the corner of Nicholson and Scotchmer streets was opened in 1873 by John Bourke, in the midst of a building boom led by investors who had made good in the Victorian goldfields. For a while, its clientele consisted largely of workers from the nearby tram depot on Nicholson Street. "It was very much men's only, though there were a few lady tram conductors," says publican Sandra Eunson, who has been at the Empress since the late 1980s. "It was just a sea of green uniforms." Until the late '70s, Eunson says, Australian hotels were a very male domain. But the pub she runs today couldn't be more different. "The Empress has got a pretty strong feminine energy in it, probably because it's run by a woman with a female family," she says. "The mission statement of the hotel was created by my daughters, actually. They wanted a safe and comfortable environment for women."The Empress has another mission statement, too: no pokies; no television; lots of live music. In the 1980s, live music was booming in Melbourne, and the Empress quickly developed as a vital space for live performance. Fitzroy was a hive of student share-houses. North Fitzroy was full of performers and artists. They didn't complain about noise; they wanted to be part of it. But by the late '80s, gentrification had taken hold of the inner city. In the past two decades factories and warehouses have been turned into apartments and townhouses, and rental prices have climbed so high that many students and artists have been forced to move to more affordable suburbs, such as Brunswick and Northcote (where the same cycle has, inevitably, followed).The Empress has come under pressure from its new neighbours to pipe down. Around $40,000 has been spent on renovations and acoustic engineering to allow live music to continue. Management, staff and patrons at the Empress remain optimistic and dedicated to the local music scene. "Everything evolves," says Eunson. "The music at the Empress isn't as loud or as long as it used to be, but everyone adjusts.""It used to be my local," remembers Dan Luscombe, guitarist for the Drones. Luscombe says the Empress was, and has remained, unmatched in its showcasing of bands of "a certain style - bizarre, unique, out there, or simply fiercely independent. With the exception of the Tote, it was the only venue that you could use as a descriptive term for a band's sound: 'They're an Empress band'."Ask Eunson about her pub, and what she refers to as "the dream machine" (the Empress stage), and she speaks like a proud parent. "I suppose you have a vision of how you want a place to stay," she says. "I think there'd be an absolute hue and cry if I closed the Empress for six months and turned it into a really modern place with floorboards and chrome, white walls and downlights."Augie March bassist Edmondo Ammendola agrees. "I'd argue that smaller venues (like the Empress) are where bands forge their sound, playing off each other as the audience looks on less than a metre away."Having rolled with the punches, the Empress is keeping performers and patrons as happy as they've always been. Many still frequent the pub after 20 years, knowing the heart of the place hasn't changed and isn't going to. At least not while Eunson's name is on the door. "While I still run it I would assume it will stay pretty much in that vein of original music," she says. "You simply can't stop the music. That's it. People will always have a dream of playing music."
© 2008 The Age
Share This