New name set to rock music hotel scene

Lovers of music can now stay in hotels designed specifically for them - and it seems to be a trend that's catching on.

This week, a new brand called MODO launched in San Diego, describing itself as "The Hotel, Remixed" and providing a US counterweight to NH Hotels' brand of nhow music-themed properties.

The first property will reportedly be open within nine months to a year, with five hotels slated for both India and Brazil and the company also eyeing properties in major US destinations such as New York, Kansas City and Miami.

Each MODO Hotel will house over 100 rooms with a Bauhaus loft design featuring concrete and glass construction with exposed beams, stuffed full of goodies designed to appeal to trendy travelers such as free wifi, iPod docks, HD televisions and music on demand.

The music theme will continue with the restaurant-lounge offering, an attraction named "RPM" which will offer guests thousands of tracks from artists around the world, available in vinyl, CD and MP3 formats through headphones and a sound system.

Other hotel staples, such as a gym, pool, business center and meeting rooms will also be built into the hotels, where rooms should be priced at between $90 and $150 a night (with the exception of larger gateway cities).

MODO's Chris Jones says that the "language of music is universal," which perhaps goes some way towards explaining the eagerness of hotels to adopt it as a motif.

Last year, Spanish hotel chain NH opened its second nhow hotel in Berlin, describing it as "the only hotel where music lives."

Boasting a room service menu that included a Gibson guitar, live DJs in the bar and even its own recording studio, the property was unashamedly geared towards Berlin's hip young creative class.

MODO, following in the footsteps of nhow and the well-established Hard Rock Hotels in the US and Asia, clearly thinks that music hotels have a far wider appeal.

http://www.modohotels.com/