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First Avenue

Built in 1937 for the Northland Greyhound company as a bus depot occupying the corner of First Avenue North and 7th Street North in downtown Minneapolis, when the firm was relocated to another site in 1968 the Art Deco building underwent conversion into a two-room live music venue named The Depot and hosted its inaugural show on 3 April 1970. Switching focus to the disco scene, in July 1972 the nightclub was renamed Uncle Sam’s and remodelled into a discotheque. During 1979 the venue’s name was shortened to Sam’s and on New Year’s Eve 1981 was once again renamed and became First Avenue and returned to booking live entertainment.

701 North First Avenue would become the concert venue most associated with Prince and is an iconic Minneapolis landmark as a result. Its facilities comprise of two concert rooms, the main room offering capacity for 1,500, and a smaller venue accessed on 7th Street and thereby named 7th St Entry, with capacity for 250. In 1981 the club’s talent booker Steve McClellan booked Prince to play Sam’s, securing the upcoming star with a fee of $2,500. Prince performed that show to a capacity audience on 9 March 1981, powering through a 95-min set as part of his Dirty Mind Tour.

Evidently impressed, Prince returned to Sam’s on 5 October 1981 to play a 45-minute warm-up show ahead of his two fateful stadium concerts as support act for the Rolling Stones. However, it was his fifth appearance at the venue, now renamed First Avenue, that would host the most legendary performances in Prince’s career. This 70-minute set was the public debut of his band The Revolution, staged on the night of 3 August 1983 to a capacity audience, paying $25 per ticket to raise finds for the Dance Theatre ($23,000 raised), which captured the live recording of three songs which were incorporated into his sixth album Purple Rain. Those songs were I Would Die 4 U, Baby, I’m A Star and the album’s title track. The recording was tracked using a mobile studio truck on hire from Record Plant Studios parked outside First Avenue, from which the sound engineer David Z Rivkin operated the mixing desk. This show was also filmed, and its footage is planned for release as part of a future Netflix documentary.

First Avenue became a regular haunt for Prince throughout the 1980s, staging a total of nine concerts at the venue, plus two guest appearances at the adjoining 7th St Entry. The main room became famous of course as the principal location for the movie Purple Rain, its filming taking place at the venue throughout November and December 1983. Prince’s management paid the club’s owners $100,000 and a new stage to hire the room during this time, however 7th St Entry remained open as usual. Some 500 extras appeared in the scenes shot inside the club, they were each paid $35 a day. The club’s stage and original 70’s interior is preserved to this day. The backstage scenes were shot at the Orpheum Theatre just a few blocks away. As a result of its appearance in the movie, First Avenue is firmly established on the tourist map of Minneapolis. Prince played First Avenue so regularly, to guaranteed sell-out audiences, he used his appearances there to test the reception of his latest music. Prince continued to play First Avenue sporadically in the 1980s, performing the warm-up shows there for his tours for Parade and Sign O’ The Times in 1986 and 1987, however, in 1990 Prince opened a nightclub of his own that he named Glam Slam to rival First Avenue as hottest live music venue in Minneapolis.

Bankruptcy forced First Avenue’s temporary closure on 2 November 2004, but the venue was reopened the following week under new management. Following his twenty-year absence from the club, Prince finally returned to First Avenue in 2007 for what would also be his final show at this venue which had become so synonymous with his name. The occasion was to mark the launch of his perfume range 3121, on 7-7-07. His third show that day, having previously played at Macy’s and then the Target Center, started so late into the early hours of the 8th, eight police arrived on horseback at First Avenue and the show was called to a halt for breaching the 2am local curfew. A resulting city resolution subsequently exempted Prince from the curfew when playing First Avenue. Sadly Prince never invoked it. But on marking the first anniversary of his death, on 21 April 2017 a dance party held in commemoration of Prince took place at First Avenue at 4am – the only occasion his special exception had been observed.

In honour of the vast array of talent who performed at First Avenue over the years, which in addition to Prince include U2 – playing the Boy Tour and writing part of October there in 1982, Ramones, Nirvana, Tina Turner, Run DMC, David Byrne and of course The Time, in 1990 a tradition was begun to paint silver stars roll-calling the names of visiting performers on First Avenue’s exterior walls. A total of 531 such stars have been so painted. Prince’s star, located in prime position on the right of the club’s main entrance, was mysteriously repainted gold during the night of 3 May 2016 in the wake of his death that April.

First Avenue celebrated its 50th anniversary on 3 April 2020 and remains one of the longest surviving independent live music establishments in America.

Shows and appearances

The full-blown concerts and other appearances Prince staged at First Avenue, performed in the Mainroom unless otherwise noted:

Date	Description
9 March 1981	Full concert for the Dirty Mind Tour
5 October 1981	45-min open rehearsal ahead of the two LA stadium concerts as support act for the Rolling Stones
8 March 1982	One-off concert with The Time as support, during which The Bird was recorded
16 May 1983	Brief guest appearance post Minnesota Music Awards performing one song during Jah Wobble’s main set
3 August 1983	Full one-off fundraising concert for the Minnesota Dance Theatre, and the public debut of The Revolution. Soundboard recorded and filmed – three of these recordings are later included in the LP Purple Rain
7 June 1984	Unannounced show with The Revolution in celebration of Prince’s twenty-sixth birthday, during which All Day, All Night was recorded and later overdubbed by Jill Jones
14 August 1984	Surprise one-off concert with The Revolution to preview Purple Rain Tour
25 October 1984	Brief guest appearance during the closing song of Sheila E’s main set
26 October 1984	Brief show with Bobby Z and Mark Brown at 7th St Entry in warm-up for the Purple Rain Tour
11 July 1985	10-min impromptu performance at 7th St Entry, with Sheila E
25 August 1985	First and only concert performed by The Family (no Prince)
3 March 1986	First concert for Hit N Run Tour and debuting the newly expanded 11-member lineup of The Revolution, filmed
21 March 1987	Warm up concert for Sign O’ The Times Tour. Live recording of Strange Relationship
8 July 2007	Aftershow with the NPG to mark the debut of his 3121 perfume on the date 7-7-2007 (the show actually began at 2:45am on the 8th and was curtailed by Police at 3:30am for breaching local curfew), guest appearances from Sheila E, Wendy Melvoin and Larry Graham

Albums recorded at First Avenue