History Lesson: The Other Boston Tea Party

This isn’t about a bunch of Colonial revolutionaries dumping tea into the harbor; this is far more significant. It’s about the hallowed grounds of 53 Berkeley Street (also know as 9 Appleton Street).

53 Berkeley Street once housed a Unitarian church, but in 1967, a couple of guys turned it into the Boston Tea Party, creating one of the most important music halls in Rock and Roll history. Based on Boston’s proximity to England, most British Invasion bands played their earliest American gigs at the Tea Party. A good show meant the band could see the rest of America; a bad show sent the boys back to England.

Almost everyone played the legendary hall, including Led Zeppelin, Jeff Beck, and Fleetwood Mac (back when they were British!) The massively-influential Velvet Underground shot an album cover in front of the marquee, and the equally-influential, but long-forgotten MC5 tore the place up.

In 1969, the club moved to Lansdowne Street, where Avalon made its home. The empty space on Berkeley was converted into apartments, and later sold as condos. Only a small plaque on the side of 7-Eleven hints at the building’s former greatness.

9 Appleton Street, #M-2
$459,000
Beds: 1/Baths: 1
SQ. FT.: 830
$/SQ. FT.: 553