Entry No. 49 — the Portland file — filed under: dj-night
The Goodfoot Lounge
The Goodfoot is two venues stacked on one address: an upstairs pub with pool tables and pinball, and a downstairs lounge where the ceiling is low, the floor is a dance floor whether you planned on it or not, and the band is about four feet away. Friday belongs to Soul Stew, billed as Portland's longest-running DJ dance night, where DJ Aquaman and rotating guests play funk, soul, disco and break beats strictly off vinyl 45s. The rest of the week fills in with jam and funk bands, Saturday DJ nights, Sunday trivia upstairs at $5 a team, and stand-up comedy in the basement on Mondays. Covers sit in the $8–$13 range, doors around 8pm on weeknights and 9pm on weekends, and there's a real food menu so you can arrive hungry. The room opened in 2001 and is currently marking its 25th anniversary, which in Portland bar years is geological.
→ Three more underground music & performance in Portland — never the same twice
The story
The Goodfoot opened in early 2001 on what its own history page calls "once quiet Stark Street," and the founding gestures were small and pointed: no plastic cups, local organic ales on tap, a new art show hung every month. Within a year the upstairs pub had been rebuilt around pool tables and pinball, and the basement underneath had settled into its job as the room where the music happens. Twenty-five years later the two halves still run as one address hosting two completely different evenings in parallel.
Physically it is a stack. Street level is a pub with booths, a kitchen turning out burgers, nachos and mac and cheese, and a free door — you can drink and shoot pool there every night of the year without paying anybody. Down the stairs is a low, dark lounge with a stage at one end and a floor that functions as a dance floor whether or not you arrived planning to use it. Covers run roughly $8 to $13, doors are about 8pm on weeknights and 9pm on weekends, and the whole building keeps the same hours daily, 5pm to 2am.
The anchor is Soul Stew, which takes Fridays at 9 and which the venue bills as Portland's longest-running DJ dance night: DJ Aquaman and rotating guests playing funk, soul, disco and break beats strictly off vinyl 45s, $10 at the stairs. The rest of the week fills in with month-long band residencies holding down a weeknight, Saturday DJ nights, the Laugh Basement stand-up showcase on Mondays, Shanrock's Triviology upstairs on Sundays at $5 a team, and a Dyke Pool 8-ball tournament on alternate Mondays. Last Thursday still brings a free art show upstairs, which is the one thing that hasn't changed since 2001.
What it's like
You arrive upstairs; there is no separate box office. The pub is where you land — booths, pool, pinball, a kitchen open late enough to matter — and nobody asks you for money to be there. When you want the basement, you pay at the top of the stairs and walk down into a much smaller, hotter, louder room. There's no green room and barely a stage lip, so the band or the DJ is a few feet off the front of the crowd and the crowd behaves accordingly: people dance, and standing still in the middle of the floor at midnight reads as a decision. Dress for a basement rather than a patio, because the room heats up fast and coat check is not a thing. Tip the bar, tip the DJ, and if you're on a pool table upstairs, put your quarters on the rail and wait your turn like everyone else.
The move: Get there Friday around 8, claim a pool table upstairs and play until the basement fills, then pay the $10 at the stairs for Soul Stew at 9 and stay on the floor through the 45s — the run of soul into disco somewhere past 11 is the part people come back for.
📍 Before you go Open daily 5pm–2am. 21+. Cover is typically $10–$13 at the door for downstairs shows, $8 for some DJ nights, and the upstairs pub is free to enter — you can drink and shoot pool all night without paying anything. Doors are roughly 8pm weekdays, 9pm weekends. The downstairs room gets hot and loud fast; dress for a basement, not for a patio. Trivia (Sundays, 5pm, $5/team) is upstairs and won't get you into the music room.
- 📍 Portland
- 💸 $
- ⚡ Big night
- 🌗 Indoors
Where: 2845 SE Stark St, Portland, OR 97214
Hours: Added 2026-08-26 — confirm current hours before you go.
⚠ Seasonal or scheduled — always check before you go.
Pair it with
- Lone Fir Cemetery — Block 14 — About a third of a mile west on SE Morrison, and an hour among 132 unmarked graves and a paved-over mass burial is the correct counterweight to spend before a basement dance floor.
- Laurelthirst Public House — Half a mile north on NE Glisan, where the early set starts around 6 and is usually free — take the string band there, then walk over for the 9pm door on Stark.
- Clinton Street Record & Stereo — Robert Jared White runs the Clinton Street bins and DJs as Maxx Bass, whose Keep It Cool night lands in the Goodfoot basement — buy the record at 4, hear its neighbors at 9, a bit over a mile apart.
More weird in Portland
Good to know
Do I need to buy a ticket in advance?
Usually not. Most downstairs shows are door-only in the $8–$13 range, and only some list a presale a couple of dollars under the door price. Soul Stew is a flat $10 at the stairs every Friday, with no list and no advance sale.
Can I go and not pay a cover at all?
Yes. The upstairs pub is free every night, 5pm to 2am, with pool tables, pinball and the kitchen. Sunday trivia (5pm, $5 a team) and the alternating-Monday Dyke Pool 8-ball tournament both happen up there too — and neither one gets you into the music room downstairs.
Is it 21+?
Yes, both floors, all night. The building is open daily 5pm to 2am.
How accessible is the music room?
The lounge is a basement reached by a staircase, so the show itself involves stairs. Everything on the entry level — bar, booths, pool, pinball, the food menu, Sunday trivia, the Last Thursday art show — does not.
What's the cheapest way to see the basement?
Monday. The Laugh Basement stand-up showcase runs downstairs roughly 7 to 10 for $10 — the same room, seated, with nobody dancing at you.
Plan a visit & invite your people →
Further reading: Official site
last checked: 2026-08-26