Local musician Rudy Colombini has been developing Music City SF, a live music hub and incubator on Bush Street, for the past 20 years. The 29,000-square-foot space is now in default, and Colombini hopes to raise funds via a reality show filmed at the venue.
According to Music City’s website, Colombini, who grew up in North Beach, first purchased the existing hotel in Lower Nob Hill in 1988 and opened a basement rehearsal studio called Plug n Play in 2005. As KTVU reports, in 2008, Colombini began planning the all-in-one live music and entertainment complex with the aim of supporting and amplifying local and touring artists while bolstering the city's music scene. He officially rebranded the hotel and rehearsal space as Music City SF in 2017.
His plans for further renovation and construction were disrupted by the lockdown, and in December 2021, Colombini received a $10 million loan to finish the project. He also invested his own money from his work as a real estate developer.
As SF Business Times reports, he finished the project last year but defaulted on his debts. Colombini isn’t giving up yet, though. He’s still holding out hope that an investor will help secure Music City’s future in San Francisco due to the city’s deep rock and roll roots.
“We’re bringing the underground back — live, loud and global,” he told Modern Luxury. “Music City is designed to be a permanent home base for the next wave of talent. By offering paid-performance opportunities and access to an international audience through streaming, we create sustainability for artists.”
“And we’re doubling down on the grassroots: supporting open mics, experimental shows and local collectives,” he continued. “We want to be the spark that reignites that gritty, genre-bending, soul-stirring energy that made SF legendary.”
Colimbini told SF Business Times he’s been talking to some prominent Hollywood names about producing a competition reality show at Music City — fortunately the place is well equipped for that. SF Business Times says the venue has the capability of broadcasting from 26 different internal stations, allowing all of the rehearsal studios and small stages to be filmed.
“It could change the flow of San Francisco music to have as many as a dozen reality TV shows coming out of 29,000 square feet here we have all audiovisually recorded," Colombini told SF Business Times. “A reality TV show contract would be ‘monumental,’" he said.
SF Business Times reports that next month Music City will be hosting its fourth annual Songwriters Festival.
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