Penny Arcade

The Penny Arcade really is a Rochester institution. For those of you you may have stumbled upon this review not knowing what it is or found the building and was wondering why it was closed during the day, it’s because this isn’t an Arcade, its a Bar/​Music venue. the Penny is situated next to the Ontario Lake Beach which is great to go check out before/​after a show. I’ve seen some of the best rock shows here while I was in college. The beer is cheap enough, they have a couple pool tables, a couple dart boards, and plenty of rock to go around. It’s a tiny stage and a small place so you’re guaranteed a very intimate music experience when you go here to check out any band. I would say the best two shows I saw here was a Metallica tribute band called Battery who were spot on and a great deal of fun, and the farewell show for Rochester’s own Omniblank (Penny Arcades fullest shows on record and I was in front). Tickets are never too expensive in fact it’s usually a standard cover charge with no tickets necessary for most shows.

It’s a bona fide Rochester institution by now. Mock it if you will – and again, I certainly have – but this metal/​hard rock venue has been here for decades and has stuck to its guns while any number of hipper, trendier music clubs have come, gone, and been completely forgotten. The Penny Arcade is still serving up exactly what it always has – just the kind of heavy, grinding, blue-​collar white-​boy electric blues that has struck a resonant note with working-​class men and women of a certain temperament at least since Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath more or less created the form 35 years ago. If that’s your thing, there’s nowhere better in Rochester than this dark, booming space a short walk up from the beach in Charlotte (and next door to Abbott’s, if you’re in the mood to combine death metal with vanilla-​chocolate swirl… and who isn’t?). It’s got a powerful and clean sound system and they serve their niche well – that’s why they’re still around. If nothing else, I give them props for providing a place for locals to play so that they can say they rocked out on the same stage that once hosted Motorhead, and there’s nothing wrong with that.