The Orange Peel’s First 25 Years Put Asheville on the Map. Now, Staffers Hope to Buy It

For two weeks in 2007, Billy Corgan wandered the streets of Asheville, N.C. He was handing out concert tickets to unsuspecting residents and teens for one of two Smashing Pumpkins residencies that summer. Corgan and his bandmates chose San Francisco’s nearly 100-year old Fillmore and one of the coolest new indie venues in the country, Asheville’s The Orange Peel.  

The Orange Peel – as it is now – had only opened its doors five years earlier in 2002, even though a venue of the same name had occupied the space in downtown Asheville 25 years earlier. The 1,100-capacity, standing room only venue was slowly building a name for itself in the tertiary market that served as an easy stop over for acts working their way through Nashville or headed either way across the country.

Despite being in a city of just 100,000 residents, The Peel was picking up more and more big acts as it regularly sold out shows.  

“Asheville has always outkicked its coverage for the kind of acts it attracts. That was true, even prior to the Orange Peel,” the venue’s marketing director and managing partner Liz Tallent says. “Asheville has always been this very artsy, very quirky, very creative, very authentic, very come as you are, kind of culture.” 

The venue already brought names like Tegan and Sara, Modest Mouse and Bob Dylan by the time the Smashing Pumpkins landed on the college town to perform nine shows over two weeks. The Pumpkins residency served as a platform for the band to play beloved hits, as well as test out new material. According to Tallent, who was roughly a year into her now nearly 20 years at the Peel, tickets were only $20 and, to avoid resellers, fans had to come each night to with an ID to pick up passes.  

“My role those nights would be to sit at the press table, which was also the Billy Corgan guestlist table,” Tallent says. “These skater kids would come up and be like, ‘Oh, Billy put me on the list and I’d be like, ‘I’ve got your name right here.’ Some of them would just go by a street name and I’d be like, ‘Yup, you’re supposed to come in…Rabbit or whatever.’ It was really amazing.”

Two years later, The Orange Peel would welcome the Beastie Boys for one of their last club shows. The New York group was also in town to cut the ribbon for the opening of the Moogseum and their one-night stop at the indie venue was a major underplay.

“We had people trying to climb in our front windows that really wanted to get into the show so badly,” says Orange Peel manager Jeff Santiago. “That started adding to things that were really special about the club on a major level.”

From the outside alone, the venue is a showstopper – first built from bricks in the 1950s when the doors opened as the Skateland Rollerdome. Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, it became various clubs before adopting the moniker of The Orange Peel and leaning heavily into R&B and soul music with guests like The Commodores and The Bar-Kays. It hosted dance nights with DJs from one of the few black owned radio stations in the country, WBMU-FM. 

The club went vacant for years before local philanthropist Julian Price’s downtown redevelopment company, Public Interest Projects, purchased the building in an effort to help revitalize Asheville’s downtown neighborhood. The current iteration of the club opened in October 2002 and expanded its footprint to become the 1,100-cap space with an 80-person downstairs space called Pulp in 2009. The entry way features a gallery of memorabilia and images of those who have played the club in the past 20 plus years. The venue’s roster includes Dylan, Flaming Lips, Jack White, Joan Jett, Ice Cube, Redman and Method Man, Arcade Fire, Sharon Jones, Swell Season, Ms. Lauryn Hill, The Killers, Sonic Youth, Blondie and Post Malone.  

Public Interest Project invested in the space to create a sense of community in downtown Asheville and the community has responded in kind. The majority of the leadership staff at the venue has been there for more than 18 years each and are constantly greeted by regulars. When the venue launched a membership program shortly before the pandemic hit, locals sold it out. The Peel Insiders Club gives members early access to tickets, complimentary reserved seating, free drinks, occasional free tickets and an exclusive keychain that can be flashed at the entrance to skip lines at the door for just $99.

“When someone joins, they almost always renew,” Tallent says of the program that creates a stabilizing source of revenue for the club. “The value of the membership is probably 10 times what you [paid] if you come to shows often. We really appreciate those folks who [come] 20 times a year to all different shows and want to make sure they are loved in the same way that they love the club.” 

That love was also reciprocated last year when the city of Asheville was devastated by Hurricane Helene at the end of September. While The Orange Peel was spared any significant damage, many folks in North Carolina were without power and water and had lost their homes.  

“Asheville as a city did not have running water for three weeks. I can’t articulate how crazy that was,” Tallent says, explaining that families had to travel down to the creek to fill buckets with water so they could flush their toilets for weeks. “It was indescribable.” 

The Orange Peel was slated to have one of their busiest months that October and instead pivoted to supporting the community. As a well-known beacon in the city, the main room of the venue became a space for nursing mothers, while the staff and volunteers passed out supplies from the basement. The Orange Peel was handing out food (including pet food), PPE (personal protective equipment), cleaning supplies, flashlights and anything else they could.  

“We’re fortunate that we know a lot of people through the venue and so we became a point for people either looking for resources or wanting to know where to send resources,” says Santiago. 

The venue repurposed the vans they used to pick up bands to bring food from World Central Kitchen to neighbors further out. The staff packed the vehicles with diapers and bottled water and drove it out to immigrant communities that did not feel comfortable or were unable to make it to Asheville.  

“We were like, ‘What can we do?’ We’ve got a team. Let’s give our staff a way to make money while everything is closed,” says Tallent. “Here’s a way that we can come together as our Orange Peel family and strengthen our connections with each other and live by the values that we hold dear and hope that people see us that way.” 

The leadership team that spearheaded the aid efforts are now doubling down on their commitment to Asheville and in process of purchasing The Orange Peel. The group of seven investors (six of whom have worked at the venue for 18-20 years) are expected to close the deal for the business by the end of the year. The property is owned by Public Interest Project with a long-term lease and the owners will have first right of refusal to purchase the building before it ever changes hands. 

“Our team is what makes us special. Both the people in terms of fans and regulars and the people who work here,” says Tallent. “That’s what gives this place its soul and has helped us survive through all kinds of challenges. It’s been a rough five years – disaster after disaster, but we’re very resilient and that is because our team is so strong.” 

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