State House Says Goodbye

The closing of The State House has brought forth a wealth of emotions from the New Haven music community as it prepares for the end of the State Street venue’s five-year run as a Ninth Square powerhouse of productions, showcasing everything from heavy metal multiple band bills and R&B jam sessions to sequin-studded cabarets, puppet theater, and DJ-driven dance parties. With the last show currently scheduled for May 28, co-owner Carlos Wells hopes to concentrate on the next two weeks of shows that will take the venue to its end in a celebratory fashion.

First there is the matter of the building itself, which isn’t going anywhere, despite the business closing. 

“There’s a lot of misconceptions about that whole thing,” said Wells. ​“Everything is still going to be there.”

So, while The State House will no longer be in business, the building itself will remain intact, while apartments will be built in the parking lot in front of the building.

According to Wells the decision had been ​“kind of coming down the pipeline for a little bit” with their previous landlords. When Beacon — who Wells called ​“great landlords” — took over the property, they met in 2021 to talk about the reopening process after the pandemic lockdown and received a lease for another year. That lease ended in December 2022, but the business then received extensions from Beacon month by month until this May.

“We figured let’s end it in May before the summer hits, and then just kind of have as much fun in there as humanly possible,” said Wells. ​“Because it’s been a long ride over there and it’s been a ton of work, a ton of headaches, a ton of road blocks, and then a pandemic hit — of all the things, a pandemic hit that specifically targeted gathering places.” 

Wells noted that in March 2020, just as the pandemic happened, they were ​“finally starting to hit our stride” at the venue.

“Bills were getting hit just the right way, crowds finally know where we are … and then it grinded to halt,” he said. ​“Everyone kept asking when we were coming back.” 

During that time Wells got a realtor’s license, so when the venue reopened in October 2021 Wells ​“kind of leaned on my staff a little bit more to run the bar aspect, and I would scoop up a shift.” He ​“also leaned on the promoters that we worked with to fill the calendar more because with the future being uncertain, we couldn’t take the huge risk that we used to take.”

The venue slowly built itself back up as it had done when it first opened back in 2018 with a diverse array of shows, filling the calendar again throughout 2022 and then until May 2023 once the decision to close had been made. Wells and co-owner Slate Ballard held off on formally announcing the closing until recently.

“I said, ​‘let’s just keep doing what we do until we have something final, and then we’ll be able to talk about something,’” Wells said. Wells does not have any information about when the apartments will be built, in the space that is now the parking lot in front of the State House. Right now, he is concentrating on the next two weeks of shows that will send the venue off in style — a venue he and Ballard put their blood, sweat, tears, and backs into bringing to fruition.

“I remember they asked us to rebuild the front steps and porch, and that was me and Slate and a couple other guys building it ourselves,” he said. ​“I’m not really a carpenter, so if you look closely there’s some not-so-great cuts there, but we did it as fast and efficiently as possible so we could get the wheel rolling and get that thing happening.”

Wells noted that with any new project there is always an ​“idealized version of how you think things are going to go” and State House was no exception. ​“You shift, you pivot, and you do what you got to do to survive, and you hope it all takes shape, and then slowly start to weave your influence in there, into the original vision,” he said. 

In the end, he feels the State House met the goals he had for it. ​“I’m kind of an introvert and I’m pretty shy, but I will tell you 100 percent we did exactly what we set out to do there,” he said. ​“I’m super proud of the range, the inclusivity of the events.” 

He gave an example of that by running through the roster of last week’s events: a hardcore show on Wednesday, a new drummer vs. DJ event on Thursday, the Fake Four show on Friday, a multiple act metal show on Saturday, and an old-school hip-hop jam on Sunday. 

“I love how different it is from day to day,” he said. ​“I love seeing the room transform with each event.” 

Another diverse weekend of music is planned this weekend, with an EDM night tonight and a goth night on Saturday. Next Saturday brings the Sweat dance party that the State House has been doing regularly with an LGTBQ+ group. 

“It’s all positive,” Wells said. ​“Everybody feels comfortable, feels invited, they feel seen, and that’s what I really want. I just want people to feel comfortable and enjoy themselves, because that’s another hard lesson learned from the pandemic, that everything is so fragile and could all just disappear in a heartbeat.”

A rumor has been circulating that State House is going to open somewhere else, and according to Wells, ​“that is exactly what that is.”

“It is a rumor, but we’re still looking to try to do something past the point of our building. We’re not sure what. Nothing has presented itself yet.”

“Opening the State House was a lot about finding that room, and we fell in love with it,” Wells added. ​“We’re like, ​‘this is great, we’re going to have this room that’s wider than it is longer, so you can get more people around the stage,’ and the pitch of the ceiling was perfect in order to get it sounding really good. The building was from the 1800s so it’s notched out and soaks up sound beautifully. We spent a lot of time on the sound. I was so focused on making sure we had this beast that could pump out sound and make it amazing.” 

Wells said he and Ballard have ​“shopped a couple different ideas on how to do things” but also remain cautious about starting a whole new project. 

“The thought of trying to do it all over again from the start is, it’s a lot,” he said.

However, Wells has been directing some of his creative energy into another local venue, Best Video, where he became a board member at the beginning of this year, contributing ideas to their ever-changing roster of new events. He noted that he wants to ​“help them harness the vision and get back toward independent movies.”

“They have a great community and an unbelievable archive of films,” he said. ​“They also have performances there, which are awesome, but you know when you’re really small it’s important that you go unique, because some things you can’t compete with. There’s not another video rental store around. It’s a different feel than scrolling through what Netflix has to offer. They should tap into local film makers and independents and try to give them a screening room, a place to congregate and come up with ideas and get new people to work together.” This idea is already in motion with scheduled convenings of the participants in New Haven’s 48-Hour Film Project.

And while Wells is working on new projects with Best Video, he can’t help but wax nostalgic about his time at the State House, though he hesitates to name a favorite show or event because there was ​“way too much.”

“It kind of springs to mind at different times because it’s all so different,” he said. ​“It’s kind of hard to have something in the forefront. Memories always kind of spring up, something comes on the radio or someone talks about something else and I go, ​‘remember when we did that show?’ There are tons.”

He did note that he was ​“really proud” of when he was doing shows with Rick Omonte, who booked international touring acts under the moniker of Shaki Presents, and they would figure out ways of including other groups and tying them in as co-presenters for shows. He gave the example of Les Filles de Illighadad, the all-female Tuareg band, that they partnered with the local Nasty Women group for a show.

“A lot of people showed up for one thing or the other and got turned on to what else was going on that night,” he said. ​“We always tried to do as much as possible to include everybody in town. We had in our mission statement that we wanted to start a club that booked to the diversity of New Haven, and I think we nailed that. We wanted to be all inclusive.” 

Expressing how grateful he is to the music fans, his staff, and everyone who has booked and played shows at the venue over the past five years, Wells also added that he hopes New Haven comes out for the final two weeks of shows that will culminate with the final show on Sunday, May 28: The Jam.

“Everything that we have on the calendar right now is worth your time,” he added. ​“It’s all different. I encourage people to go, hang out with us, especially on the 28th, because that’s going to be the big final hurrah.”

The State House schedule of events for the rest of May, as well as tickets for those events, are available on their website.