Live Nation Plans To Ugly Up Another Musical Landmark

After turning New York City’s Irving Plaza into a gaudy-awful yup-hub, concert giant Live Nation is setting its on sites on L.A.’s Hollywood Palladium:

…the 66-year-old Art Deco palace on Sunset Boulevard that has hosted legends from Frank Sinatra to the Grateful Dead, will get a top-to-bottom renovation by a new operator and reopen next year. Live Nation, the Los Angeles-based live music company, said Wednesday it plans to invest “millions” in a more than yearlong renovation as it enters a 20-year lease on the concert hall…

The theater opened Sept. 23, 1940, with performances by the Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and Frank Sinatra. Over the years, it has played host to the Emmy Awards, the Grammy Awards, the Rolling Stones, James Brown, Led Zeppelin, Madonna, Barbra Streisand and hundreds of others.

Live Nation said it would renovate the 4,000-capacity live music venue and reopen it in September 2008. It plans a major upgrade to the stage infrastructure to accommodate larger productions and an overhaul of interior and exterior areas to bring the hall up to date while preserving its “original aesthetic integrity.”

Other improvements include doubling restroom facilities and putting them in more easily accessible locations, modifying the auditorium to provide better views from all areas, doubling the amount of back-of-house space, and increasing the number of beverage sale counters.

We haven’t been to to the Palladium in years, so maybe some our of West Coast readers can let us know what shape the venue is in these days. But we can’t remember the last time we stood in the back of a concert hall and thought, “Band’s great and all, but boy, I’d love me some extra beverage sale counters.”

New operator plans to renovate Palladium [LA Times] Earlier: The Fillmore New York Sign: It Sure Is Bright, Isn’t It?