so being a drunk skater kid in the eighties, i of
course fell in love with punk rock. i could not get enough.
i would make up excuses to sneak out of my parents suburban
home and i would go to shows all the time in downtown
sacramento, ca. even though the shows were cheap at that
time, it was getting a little hard for a kid to come up with
beer money and enough to get into the club.
what did i do? i talked to the promoter of the venue and asked
if i could work out a way to get in for free. i told him that i would
pass out flyers for the show at my school and to all of my friend,
and that i would put posters up in my area of town. in return,
i would get put on the guest list at the show with at least one of
my friends. i thought that it made look like a big shot and i
also could split the work with someone.
it went so well, that he started paying me to help promote the
shows. and that is where a lot of years started.
i worked with him for a long time, oddly doing punk rock shows
and dance nights in any venue that we could get. we finally found
a place that would give us three nights a week. they would get
all the bar, and we would get all the door. strangely enough, it was
a gay bar in sacramento. a place called bo jangles. we really could
not call it that on the nights that we were doing shows there, so
we called it Club Me. thought that it was funny.
punk started dying off quite a bit in the later eighties, and really
the only thing that was selling was hard rock and metal shows.
it was never really my cup of tea. so we wanted to reinvent the
club again, and a few nights a month, we called it the cattle club
(music that was meant to be heard). four nights a week with live
music then and one night a week we were still doing dance.
the cattle club really focused more on alternative music at the
time, and was too hip for its own good. there was an uncanny
knack of getting bands there right before they got big. so we
ended up losing money on a lot of shows. google that with
sacramento, and it will tell you the story better than i can. it was
a little crappy sweatbox bar that could cram 200 people in it
if we were lucky. there were more than a few nights that we
would figure a way to put double that in there. so many great
bands. remember this was a small shit box club. social distortion,
pearl jam, nirvana, alice in chains, mud honey, primus, janes,
lush, ride, the list goes on and on.
during most of this time when i was making a living as
a live music promoter, i really started digging into the
largest promotion company on the west coast, bill graham
presents. i used to carry a photo of the man with me in my
wallet, somewhat of a joke, but i would show it to people
and tell them that is what i wanted to become. so i started
moonlighting a little over there also.
just so we have the roll call right. i was promotion at three
different address at the time, working for BGP, and i was
trying to hold a little bit of a day job also.
i wanted to consolidate this effort and knew that i needed
to move to a bigger venue than that. i started managing and
promoting a club that we renamed ?the edge? and worked
there until i moved to texas.
when i came back to california, piercing almost full time, i
was still trying to do a little live music on the side also just
because i loved it so much still. i ended up working quite a
bit with bill graham presents again, but the story of why i
left there is almost too long to tell. the short of it was that
bill had been dead for a few years, and the company did not
hold to the integrity and standard that he always made sure
was a part of each and every event that he put on. make no
bones. he was the one that put together the first lallopolooza.
the first guy that understood how huge alternative music
could be.
when i left there, to satisfy my craving, i just started touring
with bands. road managing, sound tech, and even just simple
production on the road. i would only go out with guys that i
knew and liked. i did not want to babysit a bunch of drunk
asshole rockstars. so i ended up going out with a lot of medium
sized punk bands. but my favorite tour was in 94? with
7 seconds and the bouncing souls. youth brigade and screw 32
was a lot of fun, but 7 seconds will always be the best.
the fluid was a favorite of mine
victims family is a great band if you have never heard them
NOFX headling a small show that we did. five bands for five bucks
evlis is everywhere. i have a photo of me and mojo with no pants on somewhere
buck was shot by an old man feeding birds in the park
there are plenty of people that are descendants purists, but i love ALL also
mudhoney on a sunday night
primus could not headline a saturnight show at the time
i would date a girl that remembers that band. bigger show at the dance place
and one of the first dance nights that i did on my own. i was
still not even old enough to get into the bar
