FONO's hi-fi listening lounge channels Ottawa's lost music venues

FONO, a new hi-fi listening lounge in a 100-year-old building on Bronson Avenue, arrived in April with ambitions beyond the typical nightlife scene. The space trades volume for intimacy — you can actually hold a conversation while the music plays, a radical proposition in a city accustomed to shouting over noise.

What sets the vibe apart is the cocktail menu. Drink names read like an homage to Ottawa's music scene of decades past: The Rotters Club, Zaphod, One Step Beyond, Paradise Room. For anyone who spent nights at those legendary venues, the menu is a time capsule.

The Rotters Club on Bank Street was the late-1970s punk epicenter. One Step Beyond opened a decade later as a rare all-ages venue that welcomed young local acts. Zaphod, the legendary bar on York Street in the ByWard Market, closed years ago but remains burned into the memory of anyone who saw early gigs by Our Lady Peace, Nickelback, Headstones, I Mother Earth, and dozens of other Canadian rock bands.

Also memorialized is Cinqhole, the unique DIY establishment run by a team that included Matias Munoz, one of FONO's partners. Cinqhole shut down during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The beer on tap is Sunsplit, a 6.5 per cent IPA from Dominion City, a renowned local brewery. The space itself is sleek: a front room dominated by a bar counter and flanked by low chairs and tables. If you're booking a private lounge, you get low-slung seats in a corner perfect for observing the crowd.

FONO wasn't designed to be a hipster magnet, but it has attracted plenty of influencers posting glam shots since opening. Beyond the aesthetics, the real draw is the sound quality and the ability to hear what the person across from you is saying. In a city that lost so many venues over the years, that's worth the trip.