Remaking the scene

When the Celtic punk band the Dropkick Murphys spits out the scathing final chords of "Skinhead on the MBTA" at Avalon Sunday, it will be a signature sendoff for the popular Boston nightspot.

By turns an explosive rock club and a glamorous disco, Avalon has been the jewel of Lansdowne Street since opening as the psychedelic hot spot the Ark in 1969. Now the nightclub, along with its adjacent sister club, Axis, is closing for a seven- to nine-month renovation that will transform the building into a modern multiuse entertainment complex to be called Lansdowne Street Music Hall.

The changes on Lansdowne Street, which borders Fenway Park and is a longtime destination for music fans and the dance crowd, mirror a shift in Boston's live music scene. In recent months, the city has seen some established clubs close their doors and give way to a rash of upscale venues that cater to older, more affluent patrons - among them the Beehive in the South End and music spaces geared to mature audiences at the Institute of Contemporary Art and the Museum of Fine Arts.

"We've always torn down and rebuilt," said Patrick Lyons, who owns Avalon and Axis and who has renovated several times since buying the building in 1980. "That's been our operating philosophy since we began."

Uncertainty about the future of Fenway Park was the reason for a nearly decadelong wait between improvement projects. The Red Sox's decision to stay in its current location has spurred investment and development throughout the area, with restaurants, retail, and the high-end Hotel Commonwealth opening in Kenmore Square and surrounding blocks.

And so Lyons's incentive to renovate is twofold: increase the venue's capacity to lure bigger music acts to the club, and enhance the property with a new look and expanded services to keep pace with the neighborhood's gentrification.

Lyons, who also owns most of the other buildings and businesses on Lansdowne Street, anticipates that his shiny new complex will draw to the area an audience beyond the usual nightclub denizens.

"There's always been something of the forbidden fruit about [Lansdowne Street], the late-night experience, and that will always be part of the repertoire. But we're trying to make it work for a variety of uses and people," said Lyons, whose plans for the new 35,000-square-foot complex include a restaurant, lounge, and function hall for corporate events, in addition to the 2,500-capacity nightclub in the combined Avalon/Axis space. Lyons has already opened two restaurants on Lansdowne Street, Game On and La Verdad Taqueria, and plans to turn two of his other clubs, the Modern and Embassy, into eateries. "We're trying to tie it all together."

Even though Avalon is currently the largest club in Boston, when the Lansdowne Street Music Hall opens in mid- to late 2008, it will accommodate top-tier music acts that, according to Lyons, want to play in larger, general admission rooms along the lines of New York's Roseland Ballroom and the Electric Factory in Philadelphia. The new club will boast a moveable stage, a variety of seating areas, and flexible wall configurations, as well as improved acoustics and sight lines.

That transformation is music to the ears of concertgoer Keith Tomlinson, who saw many shows at the club and always felt like Avalon was geared more toward dancers than music fans.

"It's a got a very different architectural feel from your normal club," Tomlinson said during a break at the Rilo Kiley show last week. "It's got that defined pit. There's only one way in and one way out to the bathroom."

But Tomlinson expressed concern that the changes would mean the new music hall would not be able to attract the same type of acts.

The closing of the two clubs will have a significant short-term impact on the local options available to midsize national touring acts. Bands that normally would be booked into Axis, a 1,100-capacity room, and Avalon, a general admission space that holds 2,000, will have to choose between upgrading to a larger venue or booking their shows in a smaller space. State Radio, Paolo Nutini, and Queens of the Stone Age, bands that probably would have performed at Avalon, are moving to the 2,800-seat Orpheum, but the theater's higher costs and fixed seating present obstacles for many rock bands.

The venue that looks to enjoy the biggest bump from the Avalon/Axis closings is the Roxy, a Theater District club that features live music and late-night dance parties. The Roxy's concert bookings have more than doubled this fall, with 50 additional shows scheduled. But a number of those shows are in danger of being canceled now that the city has reduced the Roxy's capacity from 1,300 to 775 following several violent dance-night incidents. And others, who don't have the option of canceling, wish they could - like the Austin rock band Spoon, which has played Avalon in the past and is scheduled to perform at the Roxy Oct. 17.

"With Avalon out of the picture, the Roxy, at 1,300, was our second choice," said Ben Dickey, Spoon's manager, who also works as a booking agent. "Going to 750 or 800 is a huge blow. If I were booking this show today, I wouldn't."

Gary Bongiovanni, editor of the concert-industry trade publication Pollstar, said he believes artists will surmount those obstacles.

"The truth is, Boston is too important of a market for artists not to play just because there isn't a 1,500- to 2,000-seat building," Bongiovanni said. "They'll either step up or they'll move down, but they won't skip the market entirely."

Not so, said Dickie.

"I'd like to route Explosions in the Sky through Boston on a proper headlining tour this spring, but with Avalon closed and the Roxy at low capacity, I'm just not going to send them to Boston. I'm talking to Northampton, Providence, even Connecticut."

The Palladium in Worcester is nearly identical in capacity and configuration to Avalon, but concert promoter John Peters, president of MassConcerts and the Palladium's owner, said only a handful of the acts that probably would have played at Avalon this season have booked a show there: the Roots, Common, the Academy Is, and Motion City Soundtrack.

The displaced dance crowd is likely to be less affected by the Lansdowne Street club closings than concertgoers. Even though visiting superstar DJs still fill the dance floor, Avalon's four-night-a-week dance parties and Axis's weekend DJ events - along with the disco scene as a whole - have had a diminished draw in recent years, according to DJ Manolo, who held a decadelong residency at the club that ended in 2004.

"It's still a great room, but everything changes; there are peaks and valleys," said Manolo.

Longtime Sunday night devotee Richard Wagner said there have been more valleys than peaks in recent years and looks forward to the "tired" club spiffing up.

"I think it's fantastic," Wagner said. "It's new, it's fresh, just like Madonna's face for her new record."

Lyons would agree. He describes the revamping of Lansdowne Street as part of a time-honored tradition that stretches back nearly three decades.

"We could have gone the development route and sold out to a drugstore chain," Lyons said, "but we're ensuring that Lansdowne Street is maintained as an entertainment and cultural center in Boston."

Joan Anderman can be reached at anderman@globe.com. Sarah Rodman can be reached at srodman@globe.com. For more on music, visit boston.com/ae/music /blog.