Pittsburgh's longest running dark dance night began in the Fall of 1996 when Club Laga opened as the only all ages dance club in Pittsburgh's collegiate neighborhood of Oakland.
For twelve continuous years, Ceremony's DJs "The Night Shift" spun a blend of industrial, gothic, and dark alternative music, with a focus on EBM, aggro, synthpop, post-punk and gothic rock.
Their top priority was to expose new underground dark dance music in a comfortable environment. The Night Shift often spun with local and national guest DJs, and every week they took requests in order to keep their format fresh and interesting while providing continuity and familiarity.
In the Fall of 2008, it was decided by the Pegasus Lounge, NOT THE NIGHT SHIFT, to end Ceremony. The Pegasus Lounge suffered a significant profit loss partially due to declining attendance at Ceremony. This is the primary reason for the management ending the night.
The Night Shift is grateful for all of the support by Ceremony's loyal patrons over the course of the past twelve years, especially after the night moved from The Upstage to the Pegasus Lounge in 2006.
Unfortunately, the support was just not enough to sustain the night. The final Ceremony took place on Saturday November 29, 2008. It was decided to lay Ceremony to rest and not seek another venue at this time.
With regard to the numerous materials that were created for the last night of Ceremony, including the "Best of" CD, I can unfortunately no longer accept requests for hard copies to be sent to you.
But I do want to assure you that ALL of the printed materials, as well as all past playlists, fliers, photos, and videos will be available for you to view via our new "Ceremony Tribute" website, which is still currently under construction. We will notify you when it is up and running.
We will also have the "Best of" CD available for download, as well as many more volumes for you to enjoy as we couldn't possibly fit all the music we wanted on to one CD!
If you have any photos from the last night of Ceremony that you would included on the website, please send them to ceremony.pgh.photos@gmail.com - thanks!
In light of the closing of Ceremony, we urge you to actively support other local underground events and music as they cannot thrive without you.
