Singing the Blues Over Sunset Pub’s Closing : Music: The small barroom, ‘the epitome of a club gig’ for many musicians, will close Dec. 17. The owner has decided not to renew the lease.

The Sunset Pub, a sweaty little barroom that has been one of Orange County’s steadiest and most active venues for live blues, rock and reggae music, is scheduled to close Dec. 17 when its lease runs out.

The Pub’s manager, Gabe Tellez, said Wednesday that the building’s owner has decided not to renew the nightclub’s lease, and will instead develop a new restaurant on the property. Property owner Anthony Plascencia could not be reached for comment.

Tellez said that he and Clint Oberholzer, the club’s proprietor, are trying to find a new location to re-establish the Pub. The down-home, wooden-floored roadhouse at 16655 Pacific Coast Highway has been presenting live music for the past eight years, Tellez said.

“Even the band members are all looking, because they’re all bummed out” about the Pub’s imminent closing, Tellez said.

The Pub’s operators hope to find a new building somewhere between Costa Mesa and Long Beach, where they can try to recapture some of the flavor of the 92-capacity bar that specialized in earthy music played in close surroundings on portable sound systems brought in by the acts themselves.

Blues guitarist Coco Montoya, who has performed at major international music festivals as a member of John Mayall’s Bluesbreakers, is among Southern California musicians with a fond spot for the cozy Pub.

“That was the epitome of the club gig,” said Montoya, who performed monthly at the Sunset Pub when not touring with Mayall. “It had no stage, no PA, just a carpet on the floor and a big post right in the way. You’d have a pile of people dancing, knocking microphones over, but everybody was having a good time. It was a good place to get in front of a crowd that was always behind you. I hope they find another place, but I don’t think they’ll find one like that. It was magic, and I hate to see it go.”

Tellez said that musicians who have played at the Pub over the years have been lobbying for spots on its closing-night bill.

“Everybody and their mother’s been calling and saying ‘We want to be there to play the last night at the Pub,” he said. “We may have to have 25 last nights to accommodate everybody.”

Elsewhere on the club scene, activity has been sporadic, at best, for the independent promoters whose once-a-week concerts had for a time formed the backbone of the underground, alternative-rock scene in Orange County.

The Rat Trap, which had presented bands every Friday night at Sargenti’s in Costa Mesa, went on an indefinite leave of absence over the summer. Craig McGahey, who ran the Rat Trap with partner Steve Wagoner, said that attendance had slackened for the weekly shows, and that he and Wagoner became too involved with other business and career pursuits to keep the Rat Trap going.

“The novelty wears off and the clubs die down. Attendance was dragging a little bit,” McGahey said. He held out the possibility that he and Wagoner might resume the Rat Trap some time in the future, or promote occasional shows with bigger names than the grass-roots local bands that were featured at the Rat Trap.

Another weekly alternative-rock club, Club Tangent, has been out of commission since the summer, when promoters Kitty Bash and Oct Rock lost venues at the Marquee in Westminster and the Pink Cadillac in Anaheim. Tangent resurfaces for one night tonight at the Marquee, with a Halloween party featuring Tender Fury, Big Drill Car and Johnny Monster & the Nightmares. The promoters, however, have no immediate plans to resume regular shows.

Another weekly alternative-rock soiree, Club Cannibal, will return to action next month with a series of Saturday night concerts at the Meadowlark Country Club in Huntington Beach. Promoter J.P. Boquette said that Cannibal shut down for about two months because of business differences with the Meadowlark’s operators, as well as declining interest in the club, which he attributed to the nightclub audience’s craving for new venues.

“Basically, the club burned itself out. We all take turns--everyone has their time. For a while the Meadowlark did (well). Now Night Moves is doing well. It’s a big circle. (The fans) keep hopping around because they get bored. They need the change of atmosphere,” Boquette said.

Cannibal will resume with a Nov. 3 concert by Rikk Agnew’s Yard Sale (Agnew, former guitarist of the Adolescents and DI, has just released a solo album on Triple X Records), Shattered Faith and Mother Fist. Also booked are a Nov. 10 show with Medicine Rattle, Joyride and Root Doctors, and a Nov. 17 show with Trashcan School, Henchmen and Dead, White & Blue. Boquette said he plans to shut Club Cannibal again for the holiday season, then resume shows in January.