First Look: San Antonio is about to get a sexy new vinyl bar

Volta’s wall is lined with more than 7,000 records, and bartenders select the tracks. Credit: Stephanie Koithan

The needle is about to hit the groove for a new vinyl “listening room” in San Antonio’s Government Hill neighborhood.

Poised to be a paradise for local crate diggers and vinyl junkies — not to mention, others simply looking for a classy and curated night out — Volta is nearly ready to make its big debut.

Volta has already held its soft launch in the space once occupied by Gen Z haunt Snake Hill. Over Thanksgiving weekend, the fledgling nightspot played host to a full roster of DJs spinning tunes ranging from ’60s and’ 70s psych and garage rock to cumbia, soul, blues, jazz and hip-hop.

“Basically anything that’s on vinyl, you can spin here,” co-owner Danny Delgado said.

Volta is the latest brainchild by the group behind the Lonesome Rose, Holy Diver, Palomino and ’70s-sleaze biker bar Slow Ride, which inhabits the spot next door.

Between crafting artisanal cocktails, bartenders will select tracks from a collection of more than 7,000 records on the wall behind them. However, only some of the records are meant to be played, according to Delgado.

DJ Catdaddy and Rae Cabello from Pecos Records and Número Grupo christen the turntables during the soft open on Thanksgiving Eve. Credit: Stephanie Koithan

“Brainwaves Records hooked us up,” the co-owner said about the sweetheart deal that enabled the club to amass its collection in one fell swoop.

Other nights, local DJs will bring their own collections to spin.

Listening rooms have become an international craze over the past few years, with the classy vinyl bars popping up in London, Tokyo, Seoul, Mexico City and other hip urban centers.

For San Antonio — a fast-growing hotbed of vinyl enthusiasts — Delgado reasons that it was only a matter of time.

“We had to do it before someone else did,” he explained at the soft open.

While Volta hasn’t yet officially announced its grand opening, Delgado told the Current it will likely be on the weekend of Dec. 19.

For now, the new spot has been christened by toasts between friends of the bar, who float back and forth between Slow Ride next door. This intermingling could provide a preview of what the duo of hip bars could do to revitalize the strip across from Fort Sam Houston as its own nightlife destination.

And to get ahead of the avalanche of inquiries, no, the bar isn’t named after experimental rock band The Mars Volta.

Like many of the details at Volta, the name is an homage to something much older.

“Volta” comes from Volta Laboratories, where Alexander Graham Bell invented the first phonograph, later called the gramophone, record player and — more recently — the turntable. Two such phonographs are also on display on the record wall behind the bar. A set of Technics turntables is also embedded in the bar itself behind a set of green banker’s lamps.

Vintage paintings adorn the walls of the stylish but unpretentious space. Credit: Stephanie Koithan

Every inch of the cocktail and listening lounge is decorated in vintage paintings, thrifted all over the state by Delgado, along with chíc metallic-striped wallpaper and other design touches to convey the feeling of a highly curated — yet somehow unpretentious — environment.

It’s the kind of place where guests should feel comfortable imbibing in anything from a dirty gin martini to a High Life and shot.

Delgado says a specialty cocktail menu is also on the way, along with a food menu. Those details should take shape in about a week, when we’ll know more about the grand opening as well.

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First Look: San Antonio is about to get a sexy new vinyl bar

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