Seattle music venue The Crocodile has a new owner

After a roughly six-month sale process, one of Seattle's most renowned music venues has a new owner.

The Crocodile has been sold to an out-of-state group led by talent manager Jimmy Miller and Mike McAvoy, the former CEO of The Onion. The group's Comedy Tent umbrella company also owns the famed Upright Citizens Brigade (which has theaters in New York and Los Angeles), film and TV company Abso Lutely Productions and Bottlerocket Social Hall - a Pittsburgh comedy/music venue.

The new ownership group looks to bring financial stability to the Belltown club, which had accrued more than $1.6 million in debt since moving into its expanded First Avenue location in late 2021. At the end of last year, the Crocodile closed its smaller downstairs venues Madame Lou's and comedy room Here-After, citing financial problems. The sale was conducted through a process known as receivership, which is often used as an alternative to filing bankruptcy.

"I first met Jimmy Miller in 1996, when his client Jim Carrey hosted ‘SNL's' season finale and requested Soundgarden as the musical guest," said Susan Silver, longtime manager of Soundgarden and Alice in Chains and Crocodile investor, in a news release. "I came prepared for a difficult conversation about what my clients needed, but Jimmy listened and responded with complete confidence and generosity. … That moment revealed the qualities I have admired in Jimmy for nearly three decades: his respect for artists, his instinct for creative talent and his ability to build trust. As I step away from The Crocodile, I am confident Jimmy and his team will honor its legacy while bringing fresh vision, energy and opportunity to its next chapter."

The Crocodile's management team - minus former creative director and talent buyer Hunter Motto, who departed before the sale - and staff of roughly 100 will continue running the club's operations with support from the Bottlerocket Social Hall crew. Several Bottlerocket staffers will take new roles in Seattle, joining a Crocodile team that has been stretched very thin," said Chris Copen, Bottlerocket founder and the Comedy Tent's managing director of independent venues.

Copen, who sold a stake in his small, community-oriented club to the Comedy Tent in 2025, plans to be "very hands on" with the Crocodile, including its comedy booking.

"There's always been a very natural marriage between comedy - especially alternative comedy, which is what UCB and Bottlerocket are really passionate about - and music," Copen said. "They've always kind of gone hand in hand."

Indeed, the new owners' comedy background would seem to come in handy as the Crocodile redevelops its struggling downstairs venues into "an exciting new venue experience," with details coming later this year.

"Being friends with the legendary Susan Silver for many years, I have long known about the Crocodile and its special place in the fabric of one of the greatest music cities in the world," Miller said in the release. "When the opportunity arose to help, we were thrilled to become the stewards of such an important institution and to provide the stability and infrastructure it has long been hoping for as an organization. Like our other venues, the Crocodile will continue to operate the way that it always has; independently, musician driven, and as a beacon of Seattle's creative community. The Crocodile will continue as its own brand and operation alongside UCB and Abso, not under them."

In the meantime, all Crocodile shows are continuing as planned and the hotel above the venue remains open.

Keeping the Crocodile an independent music venue, as it has been for 35 years, was important to the outgoing ownership group and staff. The sale was announced Monday as the National Independent Venue Association had its annual conference in Minneapolis.

The only other publicly known offer came from a group led by Marcus Charles - a Seattle music and hospitality veteran and (before the sale) one of the Crocodile's largest stakeholders. A former partner in Neumos and Capitol Hill Block Party, Charles became the lead investor in the Crocodile's 2009 rebirth when the club reopened in its original Second Avenue home following a 15-month closure. Charles' Cascade Music Group runs the summer concert series at Marymoor Park.

While Charles' group and the Comedy Tent were the two parties in the running, the latter came in with the highest offer, said Dominique Scalia, the attorney handling the sale.

"Ultimately, it comes down to dollars and cents," Scalia said. "But they were also able to enter into a new lease with the landlord and reach an agreement with the hotel management company, and all of that just makes the path a lot smoother."

Although the relationship between industry pals Silver and Miller was a "big factor" in the deal coming together, Copen said, talks initially began last fall when he learned a Seattle friend had lost their booking job with Here-After and Madame Lou's closing. Copen and the Comedy Tent team had already been scouting various cities for new locations of Bottlerocket, a 200-capacity club he describes as a neighborhood bar and community space first and foremost.

While the Crocodile complex is a considerable step up in size - with its 750 capacity main room, plus another 400 between the downstairs spaces - Copen hopes to bring some of what's worked at the Bottlerocket to Seattle. That includes a variety of original programming, with events such as Mario Kart tournaments, a monthly lecture series and local music showcases with $1 beers.

"We hear so much about how the industry is struggling and how hard it is," Copen said. "That's certainly true, but we've found really great results in Pittsburgh. We have a really unique recipe for how venues can evolve.

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This story was originally published June 8, 2026 at 9:38 AM.