How a Tiny Music Lounge Built a Cult Following
episodePreviously titled “Bunker Performance Lounge Founders Reveal How to Build a Thriving Music Community” — renamed by the publisher on Aug 2, 2026
Transcript
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What inspired the creation of the Bunker Performance Lounge?
We wanted to just provide a space for artists and musicians to be seen and heard that's different from just your standard bar or restaurant where someone's playing in the corner and you don't really pay attention to them anyway. You kind of know they're there, but you're involved in food and conversation. But we wanted to kind of change that around and make the artists the focus.
What's the priority there? Is it the service? Is it the acoustics? Is it the music? What takes the top three of your priorities when it comes to The Bunker?
When we rebranded to the Bunker Performance Lounge and Cafe, we did that on purpose because the performance comes first and then the lounge comes second. So what that means is it's a space meant like built by musicians for musicians.
What challenges are you facing now? I'm sure it's gotta be difficult to just be a brick and mortar of entertainment. Like how do you keep that momentum going? How do you keep acts fresh?
Figure out your brand, what is it you want to present to the public, but also read the public and what do they want to have presented to them, and finding that middle ground.
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Welcome back to another amazing episode of Living the Red Life for Insight Success. I am Ray Gutierrez. Today, we're going to talk about my two favorite things, music and music venues. Joining me today, I've got John, Jeremy, and Candice. Can you guess which one's which? You're Jeremy, clearly.
Yes, clearly.
I'm Candice.
People confuse it all the time.
First of all, elephant in the room, you are quite the trio.
How do the founders prioritize performance over other activities?
You're our first trio. So there's a couple of extra mics here because I want to make sure you all sound amazing, especially running a music venue. Let's talk about this. First of all, introduce yourselves and let's go down the line.
I'm Candace Crawford. I'm Candace.
John Crawford. And Jeremy Berg.
Right. And what do you all do?
Well... We are all co-owners at the Bunker Performance Lounge in Stratford. And I mean, I guess we all kind of have our various roles. I personally am, like I said, co-owner, I guess bar manager, head bartender, janitor, multiple roles. But yeah, they do too.
What challenges do music venues face in today's environment?
Here's the feet on the ground. Yeah. We do most of the behind the scenes stuff. So, uh, again, John, uh, co-owner, uh, I do all the booking, um, which, uh, we do a lot of booking. Uh, so you might say event coordinator cause there's, uh, yeah, there's, I mean, there's, there's music, there's standup comedy. There's, um, anybody who needs some stage space, we, we try and facilitate, um, also do, uh, things like, um, purchasing, pricing, um, uh, serving on the weekends.
Yeah. So I hear bunker. Is this legitimately a basement, a bunker? Talk about the establishment.
So the bunker, um, the name, the bunker has roots back in the nineties. Um, no longer related to what we do. Uh, but, um, yeah, so it was originally a space, um, that was underground. Um, yeah. And then that moved to above ground. Um, and then like ownership change, uh, like vision changes, the whole, the whole business changed. Uh, but we decided to keep the name, um, just because, uh, we thought it sounded good.
How has the Bunker adapted to post-COVID realities?
Yeah.
And we did like the roots, the past roots, too, because it was like the old bunker like in the 90s was there were some like bands that actually were formed at that place. So it did have like music roots. So we thought it was a cool connection. And we're actually located right around like the corner from where the old bunker was as well.
Yeah. Yeah. So why why get into a music venue? Like what what inspired you to the bunker? Let's do it. Like talk about the origin story.
Yeah. Do you want to start on that? I can try. Yeah, so I'm like one of the original owners. These guys came on just over a year later or so. And what started it was really there was nothing else around like us.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What inspired the creation of the Bunker Performance Lounge?
0:00–1:40
2
How do the founders prioritize performance over other activities?
1:40–2:24
3
What challenges do music venues face in today's environment?
2:24–3:29
4
How has the Bunker adapted to post-COVID realities?
3:29–4:53
5
What innovative programming keeps patrons engaged at the Bunker?
4:53–14:41
6
How do the founders ensure a diverse range of performances?
14:41–27:22
Speakers
5 identifiedMore from Living The Red Life
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