Moontower Saloon

Moontower Saloon is a South Austin live-music bar with an unlisted concert capacity and an unusually broad, 11-acre outdoor footprint. The show experience centers on a small outdoor stage amid oak shade, patios, food trailers, and three sand-volleyball courts, giving gigs the feel of a spread-out yard gathering instead of a sealed club room. Its stated live menu runs from country, rock & roll, blues, and 1980s covers to original music by local bands.

A ranch house built into a hangout

The idea surfaced publicly in July 2011 as a proposed three-acre South Austin bar and food-trailer project: the bar would occupy a renovated mid-century house on a wooded lot. Josh Bumb and Richard Veregge, friends from the San Marcos bar trade, made that conversion themselves, rebuilding the worn ranch house with new walls and ceiling sections, plus salvaged-looking fixtures and beams repurposed for the outdoor bar. An October 2012 report placed the venue under construction and preparing to open after Halloween.

Its first major growth move followed quickly. In January 2014, Bumb and Veregge had bought an additional seven-plus acres behind the original property, chiefly to relieve parking pressure; that acquisition set the groundwork for the roomy 11-acre site visitors encounter now. The distinguishing fact here is scale: Moontower began as a house-and-trailer concept, then expanded into an outdoor complex whose stage sits within a social landscape of patios, games, food, and trees.

The room today

Moontower books live music Friday through Sunday as part of a bar program built around covers and local originals, with country, rock & roll, blues, and 1980s material prominent in its own description. For a show, expect an outdoor-first layout: oak-shaded decks and patios, a small stage, food trailers, picnic-style space, and a bar serving both indoor and covered-patio areas. Families can use the grounds through early evening; the venue shifts to 21-plus after 7 p.m.