Gabe's

History

Gabe's, at 330 E. Washington St. in downtown Iowa City, is the long-running rock room in a two-story brick building that had housed ACT, Inc. offices. Little Village traces the bar to the Pub in 1970; by 1974 it was Fox and Sam's, then Gabe & Walker's (named in a patron vote for fictional Falstaff spokesmen), later shortened to Gabe's, with the upstairs room advertised as Gabe's Oasis by the mid-1980s. It was renamed the Picador in 2006 and Gabe's again in 2010. The Daily Iowan marks about 50 years as a live-music room from 1974. Pre-fame Nirvana (1989) and Smashing Pumpkins (1993) played it, as did the Black Keys, Flaming Lips, Chance the Rapper, and Macklemore. Shows run downstairs, in the beer garden, and in the upstairs room. (Little Village, July 31, 2019; The Daily Iowan, Jan. 28, 2025; KHAK)