And the North Avenue changes just keep on coming: Today, venerable East Side bar The Eastsider, 1732 E. North Ave., announced it will soon go to that big North Avenue bar crawl in the sky. Yes, The Eastsider is closing. A farewell party will be held Saturday, December 16.

But wait! There will be a new bar coming to the Eastsider space, albeit a bar that’s nothing like The Eastsider. Owner Jason Growel tells us he has sold the bar to former Milwaukee Wave player Taylor Layton, and that Layton will reimagine the bar as the Baccanera, “a wine/craft cocktail bar with a soccer twist.” Growel has owned The Eastsider for 10 years, and the bar has been around since 1999. OnMilwaukee reported rumors of the sale earlier this month.

“The area is changing,” Growel told the Shepherd Express. “It’s becoming more like a Bay View or something like that. The college scene is dead over there. You can just tell by what’s happened. Rascal’s is gone, BBC is gone and all of the other college bars that were there. I think it was just time.”

Stay tuned to Milwaukee Record for more on this story as it develops. R.I.P Eastsider.