WALNUT STREET TAP

Last month, when senior Marty Spellman went to Axis Night Club, located at 419 N. Walnut St., he found himself in one large dark room with cheap drinks. \nSaturday night, when Spellman went to the same club, now called The Walnut Street Tap, he found himself in a cozy, tavern-like bar that still has cheap drinks.\nWith the start of the new year came the opening of The Walnut Street Tap. Owner Dave Kubiak says he wanted the bar to be more hang-out friendly. So during IU's finals week last December, Kubiak shut down the club and began renovations.\n"(There used to be) a lot of blue," he says, "and diamond plate around the wall. (We wanted) to make the wall look brick."\nBefore the renovation, the club was large and dark. Kubiak says he wanted to give the place a coziness that it had been lacking because of its size. \nHe began by splitting the room in two. The back room is still a dark dance room with a stage, but the front room is now a comfortable sports bar with plenty of tables and space for patrons to hang out with their friends.\nKubiak says the changes brighten up the room, giving it a "warm feeling."\nNow, delicate, honey-colored wood covers the waistcoat of the walls where diamond-plates used to stand and red paint coats the brick walls. A light mustard-yellow color covers the remaining walls.\nWhile the bar itself opens at 9 p.m. Wednesday, Thursday and Saturday and at 5 p.m. Friday for Happy Hour (the bar opens an hour before tip-off on game nights), Kubiak says the dance floor in back doesn't open until midnight. \nSpellman says he likes the new look, and his friend, senior Eric Davis, agrees.\n"It's more laid back," Davis says. "It's more a sports bar than a dance club."\nSpellman says he wanted to go to The Tap after seeing an advertisement for it, and now that he's been there, he says he'll go back.\n"You have to give it a chance for more people and bands," Spellman says. "There's potential."\nOne thing he says he'd like to see more of though, is TVs.\nLucky for Spellman, Kubiak says he plans to add more TVs, and a juke box. Stacie Walker, Bloomington resident and Walnut Street Tap patron, says she also likes the new atmosphere.\n"I feel like it's open and airy and outside, but I'm in," she says. "Axis was a lot darker and crowded."\nRight now, Kubiak says the bar brings in huge crowds during the week, but smaller crowds on weekends. The back room can also be closed off and rented out for private parties such as birthday parties or fraternity and sorority functions.\nWith a mix of college students and young professionals visiting The Walnut Street Tap, Kubiak says he's achieving what he's desired for the new bar.\n"If you can get a diverse crowd, a nice healthy mix of people you can meet different types of people," Kubiak says.