Venue - 9:30 Club

Washington, DC is home to one of the best nightclubs in the world, a place where Bob Dylan, has been known to play unannounced shows, where Bob Mould of Hüsker Dü fame occasionally spins records, the kind of joint that will warm up the night before the inauguration with a double bill of, get this, the Beastie Boys and Sheryl Crow. Moby does a D.J. set the night before, by the way. 9:30 Club is a bar with remarkable sound — you feel as if you’re sitting inside a good guitar — great sightlines and a reputation among all kinds of acts as a musician’s club.

It has been host to great local music — from Chuck Brown, the godfather of go-go music (a genre of funk with a martial back beat), to bands like Minor Threat and Fugazi that gave the Dischord label influence far beyond the District line. But all kinds of national acts have also found the club’s environs hospitable, including the Foo Fighters, Dolly Parton, Smashing Pumpkins, Justin Timberlake and the Arctic Monkeys.

The 9:30 Club has almost always been about rock. The Smashing Pumpkins did the opening honors when the club moved in 1996. Michael Stipe of R.E.M., in town for a bigger show, walked on the stage and sang a knockout a capella version of Fleetwood Mac’s “Landslide.” It’s a place that can accommodate the glorious busking of Mary Lou Lord and an unannounced set by Radiohead.

See the original article on NYtimes.com