Wax Music Lounge

Wax Music Lounge is a 175-capacity basement venue in Melbourne, built by the team behind Wax Museum Records. Its defining feature is a bespoke Pitt & Giblin sound system inside a compact, red-lit room designed for close-range sets: DJs, live bands, listening sessions and party crews share the same floor. The result suits listeners who want a bar setting with the focus held firmly on the music.

From Campbell Arcade to the basement

The lounge grew from Wax Museum Records, founded in 2006 in Campbell Arcade beneath Flinders Street Station. Metro Tunnel works upended that base: the arcade closed in 2022 for the new pedestrian link, and Wax Museum relocated to a basement at 250 Flinders Street. Guy Roseby and Tim Bartold developed the adjacent venue after years of putting on events around permit and infrastructure limits; an earlier lease plan paused when COVID arrived. Wax Music Lounge opened on December 10, 2023. Before that public debut, the space had already hosted improvisational jazz and an appearance by Japanese producer Grooveman Spot, while the Pitt & Giblin system received an upgrade in the preceding week. That sequence explains the room’s purpose: a purpose-built live extension of a record shop, conceived after a forced move and fitted around sound first.

What the room offers now

The booking approach spans music and arts projects, private events, functions and activations, alongside a regular public program. Expect hip-hop, electronic music, jazz, R&B, pop and Latin-leaning bills, with DJs and live performers sharing the calendar. Concrete walls and floors, rugs, wooden tables and long leather benches give the room an industrial lounge feel; seats near the stage suit focused listening, while a pool table at the rear creates space for a more social night. The bar pours Australian natural wines, craft beers and spirits.