Mercury Room

Edmonton music aficionados know Steve Derpack’s name well. He’s been playing in bands and booking shows forever, it seems. From the Powerplant at the U of A to The Rev, The Haven Social Club, Avenue Theatre – over the years, he’s been involved in running Edmonton’s live music venues since the 1990s. Now, he’s a partner at The Mercury Room, a multi-purpose room for music and food located in the swiftly developing area between Oliver Square and MacEwan University.

It’s a job he kind of just stumbled into: he played in a great pop band called Mollys Reach in the ‘90s, where he was the drummer and the guy who set up tours for the band. When he returned from his last tour, he struggled to find a job and he ended up at The Rev (now the Starlite Room), supervising the bar and booking local bands. Bright young man that he was, he learned as much as he could from the old vets like the late Kirby (just Kirby - she was legendary in Edmonton as a booker, writer, manager, publicist and advocate of the local scene), and found himself booking and promoting concerts around the city.

In the planning stages, a mutual friend introduced the other two partners to Steve, and he found himself at the table, discussing the potential for a venue like The Mercury Room.

“All of my experiences from all the other places have contributed to this. What to do, what not to do, how to act, what to focus on, what to leave alone. The new aspect to this is I’m now a co-owner of a bar,” he says. It’s a venture he’s undertaking with two
partners, Trevor Belsher, who comes from the bar and restaurant industry, and Rylan
Krause, who is a vegan chef.

“It’s nice to have complementary skill sets and more hands. We’re all working together to do a good job,” says Steve. “That’s what a band is, a group of musicians who come together and make something unique, and that’s how the three of us want to work. To create something that hopefully lots to offer, and that includes good sound, safe environment, great decor, good food, good drink selection.”