The new downtown music venue opened to the public with an Aug. 20 performance by the Wallflowers.
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At some point during the inaugural ticketed show at the spanking new History Ottawa club, I gave up on trying to see most of the musicians in the Wallflowers. I had a tiny glimpse of frontman Jakob Dylan, and that was going to have to be enough.
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I decided it was too much of a struggle to elbow my way any further through the human fortress of tall people planted directly in front of the stage and managed to convince myself that I was content peering past the shoulders of dozens of burly fans in front of me.
After all, I reasoned, at least I wasn’t stuck under the overhang of the mezzanine, where the sound quality went to die and yakking took over.
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But, still, I expected a better experience for a venue that’s been designed from the ground up for live music.
The hoopla surrounding the game-changing potential of this new venue has been deafening. Like its sister venue in Toronto, History is the result of a partnership between Live Nation Canada and Canadian hip-hop star Drake, and it’s widely expected to revitalize not only the ByWard Market and Rideau Street, but also the local music industry, the tourism sector and the overall economy of Ottawa-Gatineau.