Coogee Bay Hotel’s legendary live music club Selina’s to be demolished for $111m development

The legendary club, which hosted INXS, Mental As Anything, Hoodoo Gurus and even Nirvana, is likely to be torn down as part of an ambitious new $111m development.

It is one of Sydney’s most iconic live music venues where a generation moshed and jived to everyone from Elton John to Nirvana, but Selina’s nightclub at the ­Coogee Bay Hotel is destined for the bulldozer.

The club will be demolished — along with much of the famed beachfront pub — if plans for a $111m makeover receive their final council ­approvals.

Hoodoo Gurus front man Dave Faulkner recalls the heaving crowds he played to at Selina’s, which was a mainstay for Australian rock in the 1980s and 90s.

Dave Faulkner of the Hoodoo Gurus.

“We played there a lot … we thought it was a bit like home base for us in Sydney,” Faulkner said.

“And I’ll never forget the sight of the heaving crowd, you know, slam dancing across the whole floor of that giant room there, the whole crowd heaving and sweating.

“It was just incredible. Just the whole memory of it all is amazing to me still.”

He said the demolition of the venue was sad for Australian musicians because it had provided a much-needed middle ground between small pubs and large arenas.

Crowds watching Mental As Anything during a benefit concert for Marc Hunter at Selinas at the Coogee Bay Hotel in the 1990s.

“Between concert halls and small clubs there was that whole middle tier of large rooms you could play and, you know, bands including the Oils and the Gurus were the places that we used to ­really promote ourselves and people used to come and see us,” Faulkner said.

He remembers seeing acts such as Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and Jimmy Cliff — but missing out on Nirvana’s gig at Selina’s still haunts him.

“That one, unfortunately, is a big regret of my life right before Smells Like Teen Spirit became a smash and you had to see them in giant arenas,” he said.

Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain graced the stage at Selina’s shortly before the legendary grunge band rocketed to rock stardom.

Graffiti left by INXS band members backstage at Selinas.

INXS were regular performers at Selina’s — a spray paint tag reading, “INXS was here 2/5/93” still exists on a wall of the hotel’s loading dock — as were Cold Chisel and Midnight Oil.

The hotel’s owner, Chris Cheung, said “anyone who is 45-plus would know Selina’s”.

“It’s renowned worldwide as a venue for rock musicians all the way from David Bowie quoting it as the best live venue in the world,’’ he said.

“But having said that, times have changed with a lot of legislations like alcohol harm minimisation – it just didn’t allow for large venues so everything got smaller.”

Mr Cheung said Selina’s had not been a regular concert venue since 2009.

“Peter Garret reached out to me in 2019 to launch their Midnight Oil tour and we reappeared for the launch for an intimate concert, so we have had some shows there, but in my plans moving forward, there is no room for Selina’s, and even reducing Selina’s capacity wasn’t going to work for the venue.

An artist’s impression of the proposed development at the Coogee Bay Hotel.

“Unfortunately it’s coming to an end but I’m sure there’ll be another take on Selina’s down the track.

“Presently, Selina’s doesn’t have a place in the new development. We just need to move with the times and new legislations.”

The new six-storey development will feature 60 residential units above commercial premises and a supermarket, hotel accommodation with 29 rooms, three levels of basement parking and an “eat street” laneway with new restaurants.