Music City Hotel - Home of the San Francisco Music Hall of Fame — Hotel in San Francisco

I attended the Edwardian Ball this past weekend and did not want to spend over $150 a night, considering I was staying multiple nights and the event itself was going to be costly. That said, I found Music City Hotel (actually a hostel) and really like the idea of rooms designed with a theme surrounding various music artists/bands. To top it off, the rooms were less than $100 a night, before taxes and fees. This made it an easy choice from a cost and aesthetic perspective.||You have the option of sharing a room with others or a private room. I chose a private room, which is what made my nights a little more costly, otherwise I could have shared a capsule room for about $80 a night, or a little less (I forgot tbh). ||I arrived very early, check in was at 3pm and I got there at 12pm, but they will hold your luggage (they'll give you tickets and write your name) there until you check in for your stay. Since I was volunteering to setup the ball, I didn't get back until about 6:30pm, and was able to pick up my luggage and check in.||The receptionists were nice and the overall vibe definitely matched the rocker type of lifestyle the hostel wanted to portray. I was given my keycard and told my room number (200s), and told about scanning the QR code on the back for events that are exclusive to guests at the hostel, and are free or very low cost (mostly free). After being told my room number I walked in the direction I ASSUMED was the correct direction, which had an elevator but it was out of service. I walked up a flight of stairs and found that I was looking at the 300s section of the hostel. I walked back down stairs and looked around, and the highest room I found was 210. I asked the receptionist where my room was, and he then said it was across the room, door on the left for the hostel side, which would have been nice for him to tell me right away, or when he saw me walking in the opposite direction to correct me. ||I walked through the door and there was no elevator on that side, and walked up two flights of stairs. Found my room and it was at this time I realized it was not a HOTEL, but a HOSTEL. If you don't know, hostels differ from hotels in that bathrooms are typically shared and you have to walk out of your room, through the hallways to find one, and not all of them have showers. I was not exactly prepared for that, since the hostel is advertised as a hotel, and it's even in the name "Music City Hotel". Not the biggest of issues and I made it work. At least there was a sink in my room, don't know if the same can be said about shared rooms, so I was able to take care of most of my bathroom needs in the room. ||The decorations were nice and well thought out, and they had a real guitar, already tuned, with guitar picks and an amp, should you want to play. The bed was also pretty nice and mostly comfortable. For the price, I was pleasantly surprised with the comfort it provided. However, the headboard was not screwed/against the wall, so any movement I made caused the headboard to hit the wall, which was super annoying when laying down doom scrolling on the phone, cause I tend to move a little bit getting comfortable, which cause the headboard to repeatedly hit the wall. I know it sounds like I was moving like an animal, but I really was trying so hard not to move a lot so I wouldn't hit the wall, but the tiniest movements made it hit. Oh, also, there is no phone in the rooms, so if you need help or something, you gotta walk downstairs or hope you remembered your phone charger so you can call them. ||As for AC, that is non-existent. I don't know what's common for a hostel, but there was no AC and all I could do was rely on the wind blowing air through the window (it did not do that well). Also, I tend to sleep with a fan/ac on, more for the noise, and without AC it made it a lot harder to fall asleep. I know this is more of a ME thing, but I feel it should be noted for those that are like me. The blankets were comfortable and warm, the pillows were pretty good compared to other places I've stayed, so that was cool.||Last bedroom related thing, was that you can hear people from down the hallways playing instruments of all kinds, so in the morning I had to listen to people practicing the same notes over and over and over again for about an hour or two (it started around 10am). So, if you want a more quiet environment, this is NOT the place to be. ||As far as the rest of the hostel, the pictures/gallery on the walls, in the hallways, are very nice with great information on them about iconic and influential artists/bands throughout music history. I thought that was really cool and found myself reading a few of them simply walking to and from the restrooms. That aside, there aren't water fountains everywhere. For me, I had to walk down the hall and down a flight of stairs to get to the nearest water fountain, which really sucked. ||The bathrooms are TINY. Like, the smallest bathrooms I've ever come across. Even the ones with the showers are pretty small. There is not much room maneuver around when washing yourself, and there is no bar to hold onto for extra balance. Also, since all this is shared, you're at the mercy of waiting for someone else to be done, and if they leave a watery mess you have to deal with it. When I first walked into the bathroom with the shower, there was a bunch of water on the floor and a towel soaked in water. I honestly don't even remember seeing a drain there, except for inside the shower itself, so any excess water that spills out just sits there. I will say the shower head was nice at least, and the water pressure was solid. The temperature controls was iffy, but manageable. ||Check out is at 11am and I was well on my way of meeting that, however, I stepped out of my room to use the bathroom and could not get into it. I was confused and then thought my keycard was deactivated. I walked back to my room and could not get in. |It was 10:40am when I first stepped out the room. To say the least, I got pretty annoyed with this because all my stuff was inside the room. Imagine if I stepped out to shower and only had on my underwear and towel to wrap me up or something, I'd have to walk down two flights of stairs and through the main lobby for help like that. That said, I went to the receptionist and had to wait since there were people ahead of me. The person helping me got my access back and I was able to continue getting my stuff and checking out. It was now about 10:55am. By the time I left it was 11:15am or 11:20am. The only reason I bring this up is because, one, it was very annoying, and two, they have a disclaimer that if you're late you may be charged an additional fee. So far, I have not seen an additional fee. ||Conclusion:|You get what you pay for. Don't expect anything outstanding, but don't expect the worst. It's very middle of the road, all things considered. If you want a quiet stay, go elsewhere due to the studios in the building and the instruments in the rooms that people can play. If you want a lot of privacy, don't expect a whole lot unless you are in a private room, and even then you may still hear, or be heard, since the walls are thin. The staff was pleasant, although some of them seemed inexperienced in providing directions right away, or even giving you directions when you walk the wrong way.||For me, this means I will 90% most likely not staying here again. I was expecting a HOTEL, not a HOSTEL, and my experience was super average, even though it did reduce my overall costs for the weekend. So if you're in a pinch, this place should work for you, just be go in with the mentality of...

For the location, the price is petty good. The location is waking distance to many resturants and right in the middle of downtown. The hotel's theme and music hall are pretty cool especially if you are into music.

However, I would staunchly suggest calling the hotel to find out what floor you are on because when I visited the elevator was down.. and according to many of the reviews I read prior to selecting this place it's been down for a while, so who knows when it might actually be working again. Not having a working elevator might not have been terrible if they didn't have 4 floors. And to our dismay our room happened to be on the 4th floor and, and we have 6 pieces of luggage between us. So if you decide to book here pack light!

1 of the reasons we picked this location was because they offer breakfast, which is great when your trying to stick to a budget on your trip. Sadly, we were told breakfast is only free to guests who book directly through the hotels website. So we said no problem, and asked the staff checking us in if we could simply purchase breakfast. The lady checking us in, consulted with someone we assumed was the manger who proceeded to tell us "no" we could not purchase the otherwise free breakfast. It's not even available to those who don't book directly. So even dispite the fact that their elevator was down, they still were unwilling to offer us the breakfast. Even after standing at the counter for about 25 minutes while they tried to figure out why their system wasn't accepting my card to check in. Fast forward to the next morning, Oddly, we received a text saying the opposite. The text stated that even if we had booked through 3rd party we could pay $5 for the breakfast. Between 8a.and 11a. So we made our way down the stairs to get breakfastat around 8:30. We got down stairs and asked staff about breakfast, she didn't speak much English, when I broke out my translator and asked about breakfast she told me she knew nothing about it.. that she believed they only had coffee in the lounge. We attempted to go to the front desk to ask but no one was there to ask!

Another thing to just prep for when staying here, We already knew we would be sharing a bathroom, there is literally 2 bathrooms on an entire floor so you sharing with everyone. when booking here make sure to bring your own cleaning supplies for each visit to the restroom, because you WILL have to clean up each time before hand. I think the house keeping only cleans the bathrooms 1x daily. It's unfortunate that between grown people; common courtesy isn't common.

On the positive side the lounge area upstairs was a cool place to hang out. We met some really awesome people who shared great conversion!

The best part of the experience was Mo... he was the front desk staff member the morning we checked out. He was truly amazing. He went above and beyond helping us. He offered to help with details on public transportation, because this was the mode of transportation we were taking upon our departure. This was our first visit to San Francisco so we weren't familiar with the area at all. He gifted us his Bart card and gave us an address map so we could get around. He spent time explainig to us the area. In the end we decided to take an Uber, when it arrived he even carried our luggage to the car and put them in the back for us. His impeccable service earned this establishment back A...

First time I was here it was fine. Noisy but I literally just needed somewhere to sleep for an hour, keep a bag, and do some homework. The all female hostel is what I did, the first room was spacier than the second and all the “pods” are the same size regardless of how many people you share space with. They give you a privacy screen, free small toiletries, a towel, etc etc. Even has a fridge and microwave in the common area. The rooms aren’t the problem

My second time here was literally today about an hour ago, 10:30 AM October 12. I figured it was a long shot but decided to ask if I could access my room early to get some Zs. Front desk guy says sure and gives me the bed and room number with the key. I get there and the bed still has stuff on it, like someone’s cardigan and a box of tampons. I go back down to say basically why did you let me have access to the room, it’s not ready. The guy searches the system and is like “no nobody’s in that room” well yes nobody is but their stuff clearly is. He clicks around some more and goes “oh I guess there is somebody the guy last night forgot to check them in” excuse me? He says “you can hang out in the room” oh yes thank you for letting me hang out in the room I paid for. So kind. So I took the higher ground and waited in the room using up valuable sleeping time till 11, at 11:15 cleaning comes through and tells me sitting at a desk “bed 2 checkout at 11 bed 2 checkout at 11” while explaining that’s not me and my stuff, but is meant to be my bed. A bit before this, the same front desk guy comes in the room and goes “oh there is stuff in here” I literally told you that. The issue is

I go down back down and tell the front desk guy that that person has to get out. He calls the customer and they talk in Spanish and he explains they have to get their stuff so it can be cleaned. He gets off the phone and is like “oh yeah so they said they checked out sometimes they just let this lady stay here without paying so the guy last night probably did that and didn’t check her in” okay since we’re giving out beds for free now I guess it’s my turn?? As I’m typing this cleaning staff again tried to tell me to check out, called the front desk who explained it’s someone else, and she apologized a ton. Cleaning staff deals with a language barrier I could navigate better so they’re the last people I blame. Why in the world is night shift letting people stay for free?? Poor communication and experience so far. It’s been about 90 mins since I got here and I think I almost have my bed they approved...