That's one of those gigs where you have to say:

"all this, and a pay check too."Falling Do

thirsty whale chitown

I recall playing a club when I was 15 or 16. At the end of the night I went in to the restroom. One of those classy establishments with the trough for a urinal. While I was in there, this extremely drunk patron walks in wearing jeans, work boots, a t-shirt with a flannel shirt over it; pretty typical attire for late 70's dives. Anyway, he stumbles to the urinal and I am concerned he is going to topple over on me. Eventually he steadies himself, unzips his pants, pulls out his shirt tail urinates down his leg, zips up and stumbles out. Classy.

The two nightmare's place's both were in orange county.ca..The Doll House back in the mid 80's a very small nightclub it was about 40 feetx40 feet in size.Helped a freind out just one night in his blue's band and nevered got paid...The Lions Den.Top 40 cover band,back when i was 19 years old 1979 i should have played by the name of the place it was the only *** nightclub, but i got paid the fastest show i never played and left fastest in my life....Mikey

Okay... I've been waiting to post this. Now's the time.

The town is Fresno, at the Belmont loop / underpass. The time was 1972. The club was named:

Tiger's Palace

Tiger was this biker guy that sort of, kinda, came into a bit of change... strictly legal of course... so he said, maybe.

It was a two night gig, Friday and Saturday, two bands both nights, we opened. The other band was and is still good friends of all of us.

We're still amazed we walked out alive.

The first thing that set the venue off as a bit different was the amount of businesses Tiger had going in the old, dilapidated two story building. The main floor was the 'club'. Your basic variety, nothing to write home about place with bare plank floors, a number of tables (bolted to the floors), light plastic chairs (think about it), a bar on the north end of the building and a stage on the south. Smallish stage at that with the obligatory dance floor directly in front.

All this is NOT what gave the place it's charm and personality (or notoriety). It was, as we termed them in those ancient days, a biker bar. You know the places... you could play a few tunes by Steppenwolf over and over and over and over and over and over and be assured you'd get a big tip from the, um... clientele and asked to return ad infinitum...

No, this is not what set this venue apart from others... it wasn't even the house of ill repute Tiger had running upstairs. It was filled with what only be termed interesting females. Most, it seemed, toward the end of their days in their profession... nope, it also wasn't even the fact that their were no waitresses working the tables. Not a one, which in a place like this kind of surprised me. It wasn't even that if alcohol just wasn't your 'cup of tea' you could purchase a line of... why it must have been flour, right from the barmaid or bartender. Yep, they would just take the fellows money and pour a bit of flour out on the bar, line it up with some paper scraps and hand the client a straw cut in half. Nope, it wasn't even when one of the bars regulars (well, he seemed like a regular) took a liking to the barmaid, paid the fare and got the transaction consummated on a bar stool, in front of everyone. When this happened, Tiger stepped around while the deed was in progress and took over bar duties.

Nope, none of that was surprising in 'Tiger's Palace'. What was surprising was that a group of five nineteen year old kids actually played two nights there and lived to tell about it.

What's also surprising? Nothing I stated above is embellished... every bit of it happened over the course of our two nights there. We were a group of kids, fresh from the country, a rural farming town just west of Fresno where we had done a pretty good run of playing all the local schools and private parties. Tiger's Palace was our first foray into the world of bars. When even a couple of us get together, the gig still comes up as a conversation item.

Within about six months the place burned down. I thought it was fitting, really.

a line of... why it must have been flour,

Sounds like they used "Self Raising Flour"

Cheers

Toilet

fish - There must have been one guy that went around the country setting up the same biker bar over and over again because -all- of those joints, just the way you described it, look the same!

This wasn't at a gig, it was after, but it happened in an 'Angel's' biker bar in lower Manhattan. After a gig, one of my buddy's (that I grew up with) picked me up and invited me to meet some 'femininas' at a bar on the East Side. My 'friend' was a hard-core biker and I should have known better because he dumped me on the back of the bike and he hustled me over to the Hell's Angel's bar in the east Village - and in record time I might add!

When we got there, it was only me, my buddy, the bar tender and two 6.5 feet tall, 350 lb. Angel's in full regalia, head bands, colors, the whole nine yards right down to the chains on their motorcycle boots. I asked my friend, "Where are the chicks you told me about?"

"Don't worry, have a few beers, they'll be here." Had a real sincere look in his eye when he said it too. I should have done a double take as soon as he said, "Don't worry!" Sentences that begin with, 'Don't worry' never end well.

Half hour later, I'm buzzed, bored and no chicks. The two bikers down at the other end of the bar start yelling at each other. I tried to ignore it, but when one guy accused the other guy of boinking his wife, I started paying attention. They growled at each other a few times and then one guy walks out of the bar. Fight over I figured, nothing to see here.

WRONG!

The other dude comes back in with a Loiusville Slugger in his hand, he walks over to the other guy and -overhand- nails the other guy right on top of his head! The sound of the bat when it connected with the guys skull, sounded like a home-run crack at Yankee Stadium. A chill ran up my spine because I thought I had just witnessed a murder.

Not two seconds after this guy nailed him with a baseball bat, the other guy comes up from behind the bar and -shook it off-! I couldn't believe this guy was still alive after that shot he took to the head. Me and my friend got the hell out of there as fast as we could. I was still shaking three days later.

Biker bars...

John

The Rock Pile, Saugus Ma. Dirty, rats, dried blood, vomit, #1 and 2 here and there, things fall`n from the drop cieling. Made it through the nightmare and left without being paid. Tons of teenagers, stoned drunk or high on coke and it was a youth hall !!

Few years later it lost it`s fight against a excavator with a jabber jaw attachment !! Fitness center sit`s there now !!

I played a place in Wyoming that had a live rock bar on one end, and a strip joint on the other with the bar in the middle. The band had free rooms upstairs for the week we played there. It had a Dennys in the same parking lot and a liquor store across the street. I was in heavy metal drummer heaven. Dont think I left the property all week.

Played a place in Denver called the Broadway. Back in the early 1900s, it was a crematorium. You could still smell death in that place. Plenty of homeless guys hanging around outside and people dealing crack in the apartment above the place. Always made sure someone was watching the van while gear was loaded in and out.

P.S. Jaghog, the whale is a legend. Loved that dive!

Back in th mid 80's I was with a fairly raunchy country rock band aptly named "Shotgun". We played quite a lot of "Kick ASS" music which appealed to some of the "rebel biker clubs". Many times we would be playing to a regular audience and the sound of 40 or 50 Harleys would be heard over the band... & in they'd come.. More often than not, the regular crowd would finish their drinks & leave the premises in the interests of caution. For some inane reason ?, we accepted an afternoon gig at the clubhouse of one of these notorious international clubs.. the clubhouse was in a fairly affluent district of inner Sydney..Waterfront property onto Sydney Harbour.. Complete with Bars, Pool Room "Armory" and a few hundred intimidating club members, most of whom were primed up with booze long before we even got set up..

Anyhow, as the afternoon progressed the intimidation of the band stepped up. Requests for songs not part of our repetoire Etc.. Ever heard "Born to be wild" with a pedal steel ??? .. we had a regular gig to be at, 1-1/2 hours following this Biker gig.. but due to the late arrival of the second band.. we were basically "held captive" until their eventual arrival.. an hour or so later..

No more "Biker" gigs for me.. I told the band to get another drummer if they ever ever agreed to another.. luckily we all agreed...

Cheers