When word spread eight months ago that Vice Media was moving into a complex of warehouses on the Williamsburg waterfront in Brooklyn, supporters of two indie-music clubs being displaced accused the company of violating the very spirit of hipness and authenticity that it had seemingly built its brand upon.
Since then, Vice has revealed little about its future headquarters at Kent Avenue and South Second Street. But a recent examination of architectural plans and permit applications filed with the New York City Department of Buildings shows an extensive overhaul of the 70,000-square-foot space, with construction costs estimated at around $7 million.
The plans show offices, conference rooms and pantries. A third-floor room is marked “sales huddle”; another is designated “bear room,” where the company will perhaps place a stuffed grizzly that is in its current office. Parts of the property, including sections marked “open area,” are zoned to permit a bar and music space, although Vice has said it has no plans to open anything of the sort.
In some ways, the warehouse turnover is a familiar gentrification story, with scrappy cultural sites giving way to those with deeper pockets. But additional tensions arose because the departing clubs, Death by Audio and Glasslands, are being replaced by a company that once appeared eager to embrace them.
The music scene in Williamsburg is perennially evolving, with dozens of spots for musicians to perform, but few have been as admired or appreciated as Glasslands and Death by Audio, which helped define the neighborhood as a place to discover bands that would go on to gain broad acclaim. Vice insists that it played no role in the ousters. Hosi Simon, the company’s general manager, said that it has supported “DIY, underground and emerging cultures” for 20 years and was being unjustly framed as a scapegoat in a landlord-tenant dispute.
“It was the landlord’s decision to not renew their leases,” he said. “And it was the tenants’ decision to take buyouts.”
Matt Conboy, a founder of Death by Audio, said, “We never received money from our landlords,” and maintained that there was “a direct connection” between the club’s departure and the arrival of Vice. He said the company had at one point been supportive of underground ventures but now was “building up their brand by selling the idea that they are connected to new, exciting cultures.”
Beginning as a free magazine in Montreal, then moving to Williamsburg in 2001, Vice has become known for brash multimedia content. That has included a report on human excrement, tales of a “flesh-eating Russian street drug” and a 42-minute video documentary on the extremist Islamic State. The documentary recently won an award from the Frontline Club in London.
The company, which is valued at $2.5 billion, has also been profitable. It has formed partnerships with HBO and 21st Century Fox, among others, and created lucrative “sponsored content,” including documentary-style videos that promote commercial products.
The music clubs achieved critical recognition after opening nearly a decade ago. Death by Audio booked shows by Future Islands, Thurston Moore and the Thee Oh Sees. Shows at Glasslands featured acts like TV on the Radio, Tame Impala and Alt-J. Both became influential incubators of talent, drawing crowds that lined up just yards from industrial ruins along the East River.
But with a shortage of commercial space in Williamsburg, even that desolate stretch began attracting new attention, including a visit by people from Vice in April, said Seth Schiesel, a co-founder of a technology start-up two floors above Death by Audio and a former New York Times staff writer and critic. Brokers working with the landlord approached him around the same time to ask about ending his lease early, which he did soon after.
Death by Audio organizers signed what they believed was a two-year lease in the summer of 2013, Mr. Conboy said, but lost their copy and were informed in July 2014 by their landlords, Sol and Leo Markowitz, that the lease ended after 17 months. Mr. Conboy said that the club agreed to leave by the end of November in return for a waiver of its last four months of rent, totaling $52,000.
A lawyer for the landlords, Ian Lester, said that his clients had waived more than $55,000 in rent payments “in an effort to amicably part ways.” He added that Glasslands had moved out at the end of December, before its lease was up. Glasslands’ owners did not respond to a request for comment.
Before the departures, the clubs and the media company had appeared to share a sensibility. Last year Vice’s music blog, Noisey, offered a $235 spring season pass to Glasslands as a contest prize, writing, “Nothing pleases us more than getting sweaty and dancing around at Glasslands.” In 2013 Noisey described Death by Audio as “pretty much the best and weirdest DIY venue in Brooklyn.”
“When I first heard that they were the ones moving in, I naïvely rejoiced,” Mr. Conboy said. But as contractors for Vice began working loudly in parts of the building, and patrons argued about reasons for the club’s demise, Mr. Conboy said he felt as if the company were “driving a wedge inside parts of my life, my community, my friends.”
During Death by Audio’s final night, on Nov. 22, patrons shredded copies of Vice magazine. A month later, as Glasslands arranged its last shows, people scrawled pointed bits of graffiti on walls there. One read “Vice dos and don’ts” — a reference to an enduring Vice magazine feature — followed by “#1 Don’t kill the culture that made you.”
On one of those final nights at Glasslands, a mosh pit roiled near the stage as visitors discussed Vice’s impending takeover. Some said they would welcome the company. Others disagreed. “They’re selling this artsy hipster image all over the world,” said Daniel Patterson, 29. “And they’re destroying the music scene in Williamsburg.”
Death by Audio and Glasslands offered something increasingly unusual in an ever more expensive city, supporters said, adding that the clubs provided a platform to bands without an established following and treated patrons and musicians like members of an extended family.
Underground and DIY clubs still thrive in New York City, said Michael Azerrad, the author of “Our Band Could Be Your Life: Scenes from the American Indie Underground, 1981-1991.” But he added that rising rents in Williamsburg made it unlikely that new music clubs would book the sort of noncommercial or avant-garde shows that Glasslands and Death by Audio had been known for.
“Those places were not driven by a love for filthy lucre,” he said. “It was more about the love of the music and the community it comes out of.”
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