I still remember the first time I met Brooke Walsh. He was looking over the crowd on the dance floor of the Belmont. The place was packed, and there he was, a bearded redheaded man standing 6’7” tall, wearing his iconic cap and square glasses. He didn’t look like a bouncer, but you instinctively knew you didn’t want to mess with him. He simply had one of those auras that command respect. Our only interaction that night, and for a while after, was when he politely but firmly excused himself, as he shuffled past me through a mass of people. He looked busy.

 

Three years later, I know the Belmont’s manager is always busy. As he says, “When you rest, you rust.” Although if you put a drink in his hand, and get him to sit down with you in the club’s basement, he loves to tell his crazy stories. “You keep me going and I won’t shut up,” he jokes. So I asked him to tell me how he ended up where he is.

 

“Back in the days, when I was about 18 or 19 years old, the Montreal rave scene was much bigger than what you’d know now. Crews like 514 Productions would pack the Bell Center and we’d hang out at Club Sona, the first afterhours club in the country, which was so exclusive you had to get picked at the door to get in,” recalled Walsh, now in his mid-thirties. “Erikson Music and Jam Industries, the company I worked for, supplied Sona’s sound system, which gave me exclusive backstage access there. Seeing events from that perspective was just fascinating.”

 

 

Soon after tasting the rush of the club business for the first time, he followed his family to Arizona, with plans to go to college. Even so, the first thing he did after arriving in Phoenix was to secure a job in an after-hours establishment which was part of a chain called Crowbar. “I was a little punk ass kid. I walked in there and was like ‘give me a job!’ Turned out they’d fired the bouncer the night before, and although they asked me to look around before taking the job, I saw nothing wrong at first glance, accepted without hesitation and started bragging to my friends in Montreal,” explained Walsh. “During my first shift at the door, I noticed, ‘Wait a second, there’s only guys here… and they’re kissing!’ And that’s when I realized I worked in a gay Club!”

 

This was a stepping stone in his career. His boss, Steven Rogers, had been a part of the legendary Studio 54 in its glory days. “He taught me so much about the club scene. I always had my hands on the hottest house music and trends before anybody else since so much of it originated and still does, from the gay scene,” told Walsh.

 

Several connections and parties later, Walsh started managing Next, a club in Scottsdale, AZ. Anticipating the rising popularity of hip hop and crunk, he decided feature these musical genres prominently at his establishment. The strategy paid off. They attracted regular customers such as Michael Jordan, Mike Tyson, Charles Barkley and the singer Brandy, who once caught her husband cheating by monitoring their security cameras.

 

After six years working in the south-west club scene as an illegal immigrant, the death of Walsh’s mother brought him back to Montreal. Even as it seemed like the end of his amazing experience, it was the beginning of Walsh’s entrepreneurial independence. He opened a club called Coda with two partners. The bar rocked our city throughout its short run, presenting artists such as Justice, Steve Aoki and James Murphy. The Failures of his business would bring him to his lowest. “We got screwed by a real life con artist,” explained Brooke, who noticed that money kept going missing from the books and on account of his growing suspicions toward one of his partners, decided to walk away. “In the end, he stole my dream.” Walsh would not tell me which of his partners he suspected, wanting to keep the past in the past.

 

 

Rather than admitting defeat, Walsh got back in the game by mentoring start-up production companies such as I Love Neon, who introduced Walsh to Alessandro Arciero, owner of the Belmont, via a weekly night they would organize on Thursdays. “I used to walk in front of Belmont nightly and had no idea it was a venue. From the outside it looked like a shitty pool hall and I thought I’d never go in there,” said Walsh. After a meeting with Arciero, they decided Coda Nightlife Group — Walsh’s company — would help restore the Belmont to its former standing in the Montreal nightlife.

 

“I had two goals for Belmont. The first was to create an amazing venue that people can recognize coast to coast, and start a ripple effect to set a standard through different music scenes and genres,” said Walsh. “My selfish one was to get revenge on the sucker who ruined Coda. He was trying to work with major promotion groups and artists that I won’t name, but I was determined to stop him from doing what he’d done to us again. It felt good to rip him apart… I like to win!” Once again, without Walsh’s collaboration, it was impossible for me to track down his ex-partner so long after the club had closed its doors.

 

But win he definitely did, as the Belmont soon became one of the of the most happening spots in town and was consistently voted number one club in the city in Cult Magazine, for the past 3 years. For his part, Arciero is happy to see his venue celebrate its 30^th year running, next year. “You need a seismograph to measure Brooke’s ego! Working with him is intense,” he told. “The Belmont has renewed itself many times. I have clients whose parents used to come here also. Brooke is part of the next generation,” explained Arciero.

Adam Omassi, the sound technician at the club said he looks at Walsh as a mentor, “The Belmont is where I made the connections to get into sound engineering. Walsh brought a higher standard to the table I wasn’t accustomed to and that I’ve been striving to achieve.”

 

Pushing the boundaries of entertainment excellence is perhaps the most obvious remaining ongoing target that Walsh now continues to strive to hit. “If I can get a good reaction out of you, I’ve done my job,” told Walsh. “The light and visual effects as well as my staff, are just as much a part of your experience here as the music and artists we showcase.” His passion and vision, as well as this meticulous attention to detail is what will make your experience at the Belmont a memorable one.