The Pads That Built Me

Music venues are the beating heart of music culture, now and forever.

Me n’ Watt

By now you all know Mike Watt of West Coast punk pioneers The Minutemen is a major hero of mine. Over several tours together in the early 90s, Watt taught me how to jam econo. He taught me the difference between gigs and flyers. He taught me how to run a small business with uncompromising values. He’s one of the greatest humans to ever walk this earth. Watt and his bandmates (but especially Watt) invented and popularized a language that may or may not be spoken by the regular folks of San Pedro California, which Watt calls “Pedro” (long e).

Watt calls all music venues “pads.” CBGB is a pad, and so is Madison Square Garden. Someone’s living room can become a pad, just as Wembley Stadium is, from time to time, a pad.¹ This is a story of The Pads That Built Me. Do you get the reference? Is it too Music Row inside baseball? I mean the 2009 song The House That Built Me by Miranda Lambert, written by Tom Douglas and Allen Shamblin. It’s easily and objectively one of the greatest country songs of the past 20 years. Treat yourself.

If you listened to the song, then you’re feeling emotional. I am not a particularly nostalgic person, but I do get nostalgic for the places from my past where I had the most fun, found the most community, and essentially found myself. I am so completely shaped by the things that happened to me in these rooms, the people I met, the music we made together, the music we experienced from the audience. These are The Pads That Built Me, In chronological order. The dates are when I frequented the pad in question, not necessarily its entire lifespan.

Ricky’s Canteena (1983-1985)

For a few years in the early 80s, I was a hardcore kid. As much of a hardcore kid as you could be in Southern Indiana. My teenage friends and I had bands and we just wanted to play. We also figured out that our favorite hardcore bands would play our town for a couple hundred bucks to fill in a date between Cincinnati and Chicago. We could have shows if everyone paid a few dollars at the door.

“For more information or a place to stay” - my friend Jeff, now a Psychology professor in the University of California system, booked this show. That was his home number. We would arrange for floors for out of town punks to sleep on, high school kids would have kids sleep over at their parents’ house, just like travel sports. Very wholesome, very awesome. Sometimes they’d stay to skate our half pipe. I was the drummer for Killing Children.

A slightly older punk guy named Rat Rondell, later known as Jack Whitebread around Chapell Hill, North Carolina, worked for a still older caretaker/landlord character named Ricky who had access to a lot of empty space in downtown Bloomington before its gentrification several years later. Ricky offered some storage space above a Salvation Army store on Fourth Avenue between College Ave. and Walnut Street. A bunch of us high school kids emptied out and cleaned the space, built a stage and makeshift PA system, and declared it an all-ages club.

MIA at Ricky’s, 1984. I can name every kid in this photo. It’s surprising I’m not in it.

Ricky’s Canteena lasted just over a year, from 1983 into 1985. We had a bunch of great hardcore shows, 7 Seconds, Samhain, JFA, 45 Grave, DRI, The Zero Boys, and many others. After it closed my mom sat on the Board of Directors for the local United Way. Seeing how much Ricky’s meant to my friends and me, she helped fund another local all-ages club called Rhino’s, which lasted more than a decade. For me, playing shows on that stage with all my friends and bunch of cool punks who came from out-of-town, those were the greatest times. I’m still way, way down that exact same rabbit hole.

The Middle East Cafe (1987-1990)

For the first year of my band Blake Babies, around 1987, we struggled to find the right stage. We played rock clubs like The Rat, but rarely on a good bill. We played coffee houses, colleges, even a prison. It never felt like our place. We never felt completely welcome.

I met a friendly Lebanese guy named (I think it was) Mudi who worked in a sandwich shop across from Berklee College of Music. He told me his relatives had a restaurant in Cambridge with a great space for music. The back room, set up for belly dancing shows, was the perfect size and setup for a small rock show.

Here’s where I challenge Wikipedia’s account. I set up a show in 1987 with Blake Babies and some buddies of ours called The British Norberts (including John Dragonetti of Jack Drag) I believe was the first rock show in the room. Our friend Billy Ruane attended, and that’s where he got the idea to have his 30th birthday party there, which led to Billy booking shows on the regular. Roger Miller? Could be. But I think we were there first. Blake Babies and Lemonheads played there many times. Once Juliana and I sang country songs. Another time Evan billed himself as “The Eagles” and played solo drums while singing Eagles and Al Stewart songs. Truly anything went.

Billy’s another heroic figure in my life, and you can read more from me about Billy here.

The Middle East instantly became the place to play as well as the place to hang. It was an incredibly creative space that encouraged collaboration, experimentation, and just all sorts of weirdness. I felt completely at home there. After I moved away in the early 90s, The Middle East expanded and became more of a conventional venue complex with several stages. I played the big room in 2001 with Blake Babies, then most recently I went to a memorial for a friend, Joe Harvard, in 2019. Those sorts of events happen with more frequency as you get older, kids. Hug your friends while you can.

Second Story (1990-1996)

The 4th Street building that housed (rather padded) Ricky’s was torn down in the late 80s, replaced by a large parking deck that’s since been replaced with an even larger parking deck. On 4th Street, across the alley to the west on the same side of 4th St is a two-story limestone building in the former location of the Loyal Order of the Moose, which became Bullwinkle’s. Get it? Bullwinkle’s was an LGBTQ-friendly bar that held (I believe still holds) outstanding drag shows. I first learned of Bullwinkle’s from my homophobic classmates growing up in Bloomington. Then I remember first hearing about “upstairs at Bullwinkle’s” as a music venue in the Ricky’s era. Older punk bands played to over-21 crowds in the early 80s.

I first played Second Story as a Bostonian when the Lemonheads played there on tour in 1988. I remember I did an interview with the local daily that came off as judgmental of the local music scene. It was an important early lesson in publicity, and it made for a great show when everyone wanted to show up these Boston poseurs. We held our own, but the local support consisting of irritated friends of mine brought the heat.

When I moved back to Bloomington a couple years later, Second Story became my clubhouse. That was a lost weekend for me, catching the show at Second Story then moving on to one of several late-night haunts. I saw a lot of great shows at Second Story, including an unsigned Gil n’ Dave in 1995, a super-early Wilco show soon after, and a take-no-prisoners Guided By Voices show I set up myself and opened. GBV were in Dayton, a few hours away. They set the new record for beer consumption by a band, even though they brought their own coolers with multiple cases. That happened in January 1995, one of the greatest nights of my life.

Mostly, it’s where we played, the place I could play pretty much whenever I wanted. During the years I lived in Bloomington, 1991-1996, I played Second Story every few months with my bands Antenna and Velo-Deluxe. We always packed the 350-cap room but never left anyone outside. Just the right size and vibe for us and a host of great local and regional acts. Crowds swelled when the students were in town and tapered off to just locals in the summer. Summer is the best time to be in a college town.

I met a lot of great people in Second Story, most notably my wife. Well, I sort of met her. It’s a long story I’d told I think on Facebook for Valentine’s a few years ago, I’ll stick to the relevant part. Heather, an I.U. business student, had a best friend back home who loved The Lemonheads and Blake Babies. The friend, Rob, encouraged Heather to go to the Antenna show to get him a set list. Just after as I broke down my gear, on a high from a great show, a tall, beautiful brunette approached me and asked for the setlist. I handed it to her, about to introduce myself, when she took the page, said a quick “thank you,” and exited the club. I didn’t catch her name, but I remembered her face.

The Bottletree (2006-2011)

I moved from Bloomington briefly to Minneapolis, then I followed my girlfriend, the aforementioned Heather, to Birmingham, Alabama in 1998. I hadn’t given up the music dream quite yet. I played quite a few shows in the couple years after I moved to Birmingham but before I started law school. I had a decent following there playing under my own name, as good as anywhere. Birmingham had a few clubs that booked original music, but none of them were quite what I wanted. I never felt at home, and the shows felt more like work.

I didn’t really play much during law school, 2001-2004. Heather and I had two kids in that window; I was suddenly busier than I’d ever been. Maybe that was the end of playing live music for me. I certainly didn’t want to do it if it felt like work, especially if it didn’t pay much. Then in 2006, a couple years into my first law firm job, along came The Bottletree.

The Bottletree looked a little like a roadhouse, a nondescript one-story building with a neon sign on a busy stretch of Third Avenue South, just west of Avondale. Avondale wasn’t quite yet and “entertainment district,” there wasn’t much nearby of interest, slightly seedy area.

When you walked inside, however, you were in another world. Every detail sparkled with life, from the kitsch retro design and furniture to the art movies that showed on a screen between sets, from the delicious, healthy meals to the Airstream trailers that served as the backstage. Owner and siblings Brad and Merrilee Challis and visionary Brian Teasley of Man or Astro Man? and The Polyponic Spree understood what made a great small music venue, and they brought it to life. I had a place to play whenever I wanted, and just like those magical rooms in Bloomington and Cambridge, I had a place to go that made me feel like I belonged.

My greatest memory at The Bottletree was just before I moved to Nashville, summer of 2011. I’d been tipped off that a band called The Shakes was worth seeing. I’d heard a couple rough tracks on Reverb.com, enough to pique my interest. These kids came down from Athens in a couple cars, loaded straight onto the stage and tuned by ear. I wasn’t really expecting much as one of about a dozen in the room when they launched into Hold On. Brittany Howard sang those opening lines, “Bless my heart….bless my soul…” It was obvious from there.

After the show, I chatted with an acquaintance at the bar. I told him I thought they were amazing, and that they were going to be very famous very soon. He laughed, said he didn’t hear it. But that opening band, he said, THEY really had something … I can’t remember which local band opened. That’s all you need to know.

If you play Birmingham, you’ll get a lot of the Bottletree experience if you play Saturn. I helped Brian open Saturn over a decade ago, and it’s probably the best club in America. What Bottletree helped me understand is that a great venue can change a city’s reputation as a music town. If the band has a good experience, a good crowd, and a good meal at a club, that might be all they see before the hotel. They leave and tell everyone “Birmingham is awesome.” That happened a lot and it was fun to witness.

The Basement (2011-present)

The Basement and The Basement East are probably the best-known venues on this list. I played the “O.G” Basement on 8th Avenue in 2007, when I released the album Everyday Life. It was fine, nothing special. I hadn’t yet discovered Nashville, but I remembered my generally pretty good experiences at Nashville clubs like Exit In and The Sutler.

Then I moved here and met Mike “Grimey” Grimes, a local musician and entrepreneur who co-founded Grimey’s record store, The Basement, and The Basement East. Grimey is an exceptionally generous, friendly, and affirming guy, a natural builder of musical communities. I think of him as a good friend, although there are probably a thousand people in Nashville who think of him as a good friend. And that doesn’t mean he isn’t a good friend! He has a huge capacity for friendship, positivity, and encouragement. Thinking about Grimey makes me reflect on all the amazing people who have welcomed me into this Nashville community.

I met some folks from Grimey’s friend group when I first moved here, great musicians such as Bobby Bare, Jr., Wilder Embry, Brian Wright, Ken Coomer, many others. I fell into a loose circle of players and singers who got invited to join in on theme nights, single-artist tributes, and all sorts of other mostly recreational musical hi jinx. I’ve done a few “official” shows in the venues, but much of my playing has been extracurricular and pure fun. My peak moment had to be playing guitar on a few songs in Ruston Kelly’s band just after his classic album Dying Star came out on Rounder in 2019. For posterity the video below at 13:04. A close second was opening for Guided by Voices at the Beast last fall.

Since the Pandemic - and since a tornado nearly destroyed The “Beast” (as it’s known) in 2020 the week before the Pandemic - there’s been a much greater demand for stages, meaning less clowning in the venues and more lucrative shows. Still, if I need a stage for a client’s showcase or even my own personal bullshit, it’s usually a phone call away. I’m in those rooms most every week, and it’s where I know I’ll see a lot of friends. If it’s any different from those other Pads that Built Me, it’s because I’m different, my life is different. It used to be pads were the most important thing in the world because gigs were the most important thing in the world. Now I’m afraid Watt would be disappointed in that I spend more time and effort on the proverbial flyers than gigs. Such is life.

Onward

I like to think there’ll be more places like these great pads in my life. More pads, more joy. I live in Nashville, where The Ryman Auditorium is a pad - in that sense my life is very rich. Maybe someday I’ll create or invest in a venue that will fit the bill for another generation’s pad, or even a chow pad² for that matter. Maybe someday my dream will come true of having a group that plays the same stage once every month or so, with an appreciative audience and supportive venue staff. That’s really all I want; and if I ever move away from Nashville, that’ll be part of the reason. It’s hard to play gigs in Nashville because there are so many gigs in Nashville, so many masterful musicians, so many bands, so much competition for stages. I would move to some sleepy town if I could have a great band that played a free-wheeling show to an audience once a month. I’d move for that, if only I didn’t love it here so much. Maybe I’ll find my next Pad That Builds Me right here in Middle Tennessee. A guy can dream.

1. Importantly, a place that serves food is a “chow pad.” A pad may also be a chow pad.

2. See fn 1.