Though two of the bar’s owners hail from Moorhead, the idea for Harold’s came from a fellow musician who was just passing through.

“One of our partners, Rob Pope, was in Fargo playing a show with Spoon a couple years ago,” Tillman says. “After a fun night out, he got a wild hair to open up a bar in the area.”

Pope hit up Moorhead-born Eric Odness and Frank Bevan, some friends with experience in the business. Both had brought a little taste of Minnesota to homesick expats in Greenpoint with Lake Street, then made an even bigger splash in Brooklyn with their cocktail bar, Goldie’s. Tillman and Preston Olson (aka Dirty Preston, who’d grown up with Odness in Moorhead) came on board as smaller-scale investors.

“I had always regretted being too broke to get in on Lake Street when it opened, so I jumped at the opportunity to be a part of Harold’s on Main,” Tillman says, adding that location appealed to him as well. “I’ve always had a fondness for Fargo/Moorhead since we all met in the mid-'90s having wild nights playing at the now-defunct Ralph’s Corner Bar.”

Harold's, which opened this weekend at 1330 Main Ave., is named for Odness' grandfather, who'd been a Hamm’s delivery driver in the neighborhood, and the bar's logo is based on the lettering on one of his old work shirts.

Though not a music venue per se, there are plans to host summer concerts outside, as well as after-parties for touring musicians and comics.

“Four months ago the building was an empty auto shop,” Tillman says proudly. “Now it’s transformed into a beautiful, darkly lit wood-grain oasis where you can get a delicious cocktail or a $3 Hamm’s on tap to wash down your Heggie’s pizza. We basically just built a bar we’d like to go to.”