The sun is setting as a man walks into a bar in downtown Colorado Springs, in one of the latest additions to the ever-evolving South Tejon Street.

“Ain’t nobody here,” the man mutters to his partner.

Nobody yet, anyway.

The night is still young at Louie Louie’s Piano Bar.

Soon, dozens filter in before a stage of two pianos. Brandon Brunworth takes a seat at one, Flip Sais at the other.

“What’s up, guys?” Brunworth says to a muffled cheer.

Sais eyes a man in the growing audience. “Dude, is that a cat eating pizza on your shirt?”

There is more chatter and laughter, and then the dueling pianists are off.

Their fingers fly across the keys. “Here comes the sun,” Sais begins, joined by Brunworth in harmony: “Doo, dun, doo, doo …”

The drinks are flowing, and the crowd is swaying. “All together!” Brunworth commands. And they all together sing: “Here comes the sun, doo, dun, doo, doo …”

Multi-colored lights swirl about the room while people jot down requests on cocktail napkins. “Brown Eyed Girl” is followed by another classic that gets everybody on their feet.

“Sweeeeet Caroline, bah bah baaah! Good tiiimes never seemed so good!”

The good times are on at Louie Louie’s, which this summer celebrated one year in town.

The venue comes amid something of a live music revolution in the Springs. In 2021, Weidner Field opened new possibilities for big-name, touring artists. Even greater possibilities arrived a few years later. On the city’s north side, Ford Amphitheater represented an outdoor venue of a scale the Springs had never seen.

Louie Louie’s represents something, too — at a much more intimate scale. It’s new and old at the same time: a two-level, 400-person venue with a modern twist on the swingy scene that swept America’s bars more than a century ago.

At Louie Louie’s, think less jazz and more pop, more of those sing-along hits. And think less of a concert and more of an interactive experience, where the goal is indeed to get you and your friends and strangers singing along to the song you requested on a cocktail napkin. Out of thanks or coercion, shots appear on the pianos.

It’s not just pianos. The opening, dueling act is joined by guitar, bass and drums.

“It’s not just one thing; it’s so versatile,” guitarist Luke Ingels says.

He’s been joined on stage by another young Colorado Springs native, Corey Applegarth. He, too, had been waiting for something like Louie Louie’s in his hometown.

“It completely changes the game,” Applegarth says. “I don’t want to say we don’t have a music scene, but there’s not a super pronounced music scene. … For people here to not have to go up an hour (to Denver), I think it’s really important.”

More than important, it’s a dream come true for Ron Wilson.

The lifelong musician from Texas opened the first Louie Louie’s in Lubbock in 2008. The concept later took off in Dallas. But all along, Wilson kept his eyes west.

“Man, I always wanted to be in Colorado Springs,” he says. “I love Colorado Springs. It’s one of my favorite places on Earth.”

When asked what made him think Louie Louie’s would work in the Springs, Wilson chuckles.

“I didn’t say I thought it would work,” he says. “I just said I wanted to move there.”

The demographics would be different from that college town and that big city back in Texas, where students would buy drinks through all hours of rambunctious shows running past midnight.

That has not been the scene in the Springs. Not yet, says Paul Trausch, the transplanted manager who started in Lubbock.

After one year, “I just think there’s not enough people that know about us yet,” he says. “I’m ready for the party people to come out who are gonna be here all night.”

In the meantime, Wilson is happy to be surrounded by the mountains that drew him here. “And it’s just the right size of city,” he says. “It’s got all the amenities of a big city, and yet it’s small enough to have a community feel to it.”

And a community needs live music, he and his business partner, Joey Hamende, believe.

Performing at Louie Louie’s “is not just about performing, but entertaining,” Hamende explains. “It’s using the crowd to your advantage and making them do things they didn’t know they wanted to do.”

Like singing at the top of their lungs. Like grabbing a microphone on stage. Like dancing around the pianos.

And early on this night, they’ve done just that.

“Heeeeeeey, hey, baby,” Sais sings, followed by a theatrical “ooh-aaah” by Brunworth at the other piano. “I want to knooow-oh-oh if you’ll be my girl.”

One group in the audience joins in, and then another and another. Brunworth raises his thumb up from the keys, and he’s smiling big and nodding as more voices rise. And Sais implores: “Keep it going!”