Twelve years after The Elvis Room closed, owner Dawn-Marie Pierre reflects on the famed Portsmouth music club.

It’s a common refrain among Seacoast music fans: “Everything changed after The Elvis Room closed.” Locals still lament the loss of the iconic café that once served as Portsmouth’s all-ages hangout and punk-rock haven.

The Elvis Room has now been closed for twice as long as it was open. But locals harbor very real memories of the downtown Portsmouth venue, and many insist the Seacoast music scene has never been the same without it.

Co-founder Dawn-Marie Pierre recently visited Portsmouth and reminisced about the club she ran for six years. Other than a brief day trip eight years ago, it was the first time she had returned to the area since The Elvis Room closed in 1999. She was touched to find that so many people still talk about the venue.

“I’m totally always honored to have been a part of it,” she said. “It’s overwhelming. I don’t even have words for how it feels. It’s wild.”

A Detroit native, Pierre had long dreamed of opening a coffeehouse when she came to the Seacoast in the early ’90s. She realized that dream with the help of co-founders Lori Baker and Barbara Brecht, who together opened the doors of The Elvis Room at 142 Congress St. (the current site of Radici Restaurant) on May 27, 1993.

That coffeehouse rapidly became a hub of music, poetry and art for teenagers and adults, alike. One of the first big events to take place there, Pierre recalled, was a packed show with popular Seacoast band Thanks to Gravity. Michael Hart, of the band Toast, began booking shows at the club and put an ad in a musicians’ magazine.

“The Elvis Room then started getting like seven packages a day from bands that wanted to play there, and it just soared from there,” Pierre said.

They soon expanded into the adjacent space at 144 Congress St. and set up a stage, increasing the capacity to 150 people. Touring bands from around the country started playing The Elvis Room, as well as international acts like Tiger Lillies of London, Vanilla Muffin of Switzerland, and Atomic Fireball of Japan.

The club also hosted a wealth of local bands—The Queers, Scissorfight, Groovechild, Say Zuzu, Skinny Tim and the Hellions, and Humpmuscle, to name a few. Young punk bands found a rare public stage where they could play for a live audience.

“We had a hardcore matinee on Sundays where there were sometimes 11 or 12 bands, and just kids from everywhere would come,” Pierre said.

There were also poetry readings and monthly art exhibits. And, because it was an all-ages venue, it became a treasured sanctuary for area teens.

Things started to go wrong for The Elvis Room in the late ’90s. Baker had backed out of the business early on, but Brecht stayed onboard until a horrific incident in 1998, when she was stabbed repeatedly by a frequent customer. Alive but traumatized, she moved away after the attack.

Pierre forged ahead for another year, but she had fallen behind on bills and had no liability insurance—a growing concern at the raucous shows.

“We had mosh pits on concrete floors with brick walls, you know, and crowd-surfing off the stage. It was insane,” she said (miraculously, the only injury Pierre could recall during a show was a broken nose).

What’s more, Pierre’s heart was no longer in it. As the stress and financial woes piled up, she knew it was time to close the doors.

“The financial dump I was in, I wasn’t going to be able to pull out that easily. I might have been able to persevere another month or two, but I’d still be too stressed out. Everything was starting to fall apart within me. I couldn’t do it.”

The Elvis Room closed in the summer of 1999 and Pierre moved out of town. Now 51, she lives in Madeira Beach, Fla., with her 9-year-old daughter.

She returned to Portsmouth in late August to participate in a local music documentary being produced by Marc Dole and Michael Venn. During her five-day visit, she was delighted to come across many familiar faces. Some former customers still mourn The Elvis Room and bemoan the endemic gentrification that can make Portsmouth seem unfriendly to young artists. But Pierre says the city feels like it’s retained its creative spirit. 

“The feel is still here, as far as I’m concerned,” she said. “There have been so many tremendous changes with the stores and the buildings. They managed to keep the feel, though, somehow, it seems to me anyway.”

Of course, Pierre misses The Elvis Room, too. But she takes comfort in knowing that she gave it her best shot, and that hundreds of locals appreciate her efforts.

“It had a good frickin’ run, for flying by the seat of my pants,” she said. “And that’s the way to do things, really, by the seat of your pants.”