Musicbox will close its doors in September. The club that marked cultural and nightlife on Rua Cor-de-Rosa, in Cais do Sodré, is coming to an end. The project and the team are moving to a new venue in Beato. Gonçalo Riscado, owner of Musicbox, says that “Lisbon bet too much on an illusory growth model”.
Musicbox is closing its doors. It was one of Lisbon's music venues for almost two decades. At number 24 Rua Nova do Carvalho, better known as Rua Cor-de-Rosa, there have been performances by new Portuguese bands and tours by emerging names in world music - there have been so many concerts that we've lost count. Musicbox is coming to an end, but some see it as an end, others see it as a growth: the team and the cultural project that has been established since 2006 in Cais do Sodré will now continue in a new space, Casa Capitão, which will reopen renovated in September in another part of the city, Beato.
What is certain is that Musicbox is the latest casualty of Rua Cor-de-Rosa, in Cais do Sodré - once one of the epicenters of Lisbon's nightlife and a meeting point for different styles of music. The transformation began in 2020, with the departure of Sabotage, continued in 2021 with the clubs Jamaica, Tokyo e Europe, and continued in September last year with the closure of the Lounge. Gradually, the old nightclub buildings were converted into hotels with cafés and daytime bars for the many tourists who pass through, at a time when tourism is a safer and more profitable business for landlords. Musicbox has escaped. Cultural Trend Lisbon (CTL), the venue's promoter, was also the owner.
Under the viaduct over which the busy Rua da Rosa passes, Musicbox has continued with the promise it inaugurated in December 2006: to offer the city of Lisbon a music club, with the best national and international artists who don't have a place in the big venues. “For 19 years, in Cais do Sodré, Musicbox has been an alternative and independent music programming club, sometimes less alternative but always independent”, writes Gonçalo Riscado, owner of CTL, in a farewell statement, published this Wednesday, August 20, on Musicbox's Instagram. “On average, we program more than 300 concerts and 500 DJ sets a year. Thousands of artists have been on our stage, and we'd like to thank them all for making Musicbox.”
“Lisbon has bet excessively on an illusory growth model”
The news of Musicbox's demise had been advanced first hand by NiT magazine on August 11, but only now has it been made official. “The hard news we wanted to give”, Gonçalo said in the same press release. The last day of Musicbox will be September 15; the concerts already scheduled for after that date - such as Hidden Cameras in December or Wavves in March - will move to Casa do Capitão in Beato, the venue that will continue the project started at Musicbox in 2006. “All of Musicbox's programming will move to Casa do Capitão, as will the entire team”, says the owner of CTL. “Until recently, we believed that it would be possible to maintain both projects, but that didn't happen. It probably wouldn't have made sense.”
Casa Capitão opened in 2020, just as Lisbon was beginning to emerge from the confinement of the Covid-19 pandemic and return to collective cultural activity. It then set up in a makeshift space in Beato - more specifically in the former Hub Criativo do Beato, now Unicorn Factory Beato - where it offered concerts, snacks and jola, a combination that the pandemic had left behind. After a four-year break, Casa Capitão is preparing to return to the same address, this time with a permanent home. The reopening is scheduled for September, following an investment of around four and a half million euros and the completion of the extensive refurbishment work that is currently underway.
When the return of Casa do Capitão was announced in July, we were far from sure that this project would be the continuation of Musicbox. “In 2006, we took a risk by opening Musicbox in Cais do Sodré. In 2025, we're risking everything at Casa Capitão in Beato. Being able to take risks like this is a privilege”, says Gonçalo Riscado. The owner of CTL doesn't spare any criticism of the policies of recent city council executives. “Lisbon has bet excessively on an illusory model of growth, based on tourism, real estate speculation and attracting temporary residents with high incomes, a path that is destroying the city's greatest asset: those who live in it and express themselves culturally”stresses. “Musicbox's figures mean little in the face of the disappearance of so many cultural associations and venues, and in the face of the gentrification process that is driving so many people away from Lisbon.”
Musicbox, whose space will be sold by CTL, began in December 2006 in the hands of Gonçalo Riscado and Alex Cortez, “in a then abandoned and marginalized neighborhood in the city center, which 19 years later preserves only one thing: the name”, recalls and criticizes Gonçalo in the same farewell statement, thanking the “hundreds of people” who have been part of the Musicbox team in the most diverse areas, from production to the bar, and the 100,000 spectators who have passed through on average each year. “Almost two million attendees in total, a lot less if we count the repeats, which fortunately there were many. To everyone, our enormous thanks for making Musicbox happen.”
You lose Pink Street, but you gain the city in another way. Jamaica, Tokyo and Europa have since moved to the riverside - to former warehouses next to the river terminal, given to them by Lisbon City Council. They joined B.Leza, which has been there since 2012, and Titanic Sur Mer, since 2015, making the area known as Cais do Gás more dynamic. Musicbox, on the other hand, will remain in Beato as Casa Capitão. The memories of number 24 Rua da Cor-de-Rosa will remain, which you can also remember here.
“Thank you, Musicbox,” says Lisbon City Council
In a statement sent to the press, the Lisbon City Council thanked Musicbox for its work, “a landmark space in Cais do Sodré, which for almost two decades has established itself as an essential part of the city's cultural and nightlife scene, giving stage to new talents and established national and international artists”writes the municipality. “Musicbox has made a decisive contribution to the vitality of the city and to the projection of Lisbon as a dynamic, creative cultural capital open to the world. A legacy built on a multitude of stories and experiences that are part of the city's identity”, adds the municipality.
Lisbon City Council highlights the start of a new cycle, Casa Capitão, “this time in partnership” with the municipality, in a “municipal space” and in a “of the city's emerging territories, which is increasingly asserting itself as a hub of innovation, culture and creativity”. “We believe that this change will also open up new opportunities and make better use of municipal spaces, reinforcing the decentralization of the cultural offer and bringing diverse audiences closer together. Lisbon will thus continue to have a unique space for musical programming, artistic experimentation and cultural experience”indicates.
The Lisbon Chamber “reaffirms its commitment to continuing to support the city's cultural agents and thanks Musicbox for the work it has done for so many years to promote music and culture in the city. We wish the promoters every success in this new chapter of their history with Casa Capitão”, This is the end of the note sent to newsrooms this Thursday.
