re: Was early 2000’s the greatest era of local band scene in BR?

When I played with the Gutter Sharks we had some good times back in the late 80’s. Got our start at Chris’ bar on North Street.. But the Caterie was probably the best venue to play. Though it was also a blast playing at Sports, Fred's and Murphy's. This was 86-87.

Lucian and Darren, two managers at Sports at the time would stop us in the middle of a song and make us take shots out the titty pitcher. They really liked getting us liquoured up.

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Benji Davis Project

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I’ll be honest, I photographed a bunch of their shows and thought they’d break out. Around that time they were fun to watch. They had the Abita commercials, were playing Jazzfest, and had huge turnouts at local places. Within a couple years…poof, vapor.

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Original Chee Weez

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Fun fact.... I'm the original bass player.

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No. The late 80’s and early 90’s saw national acts appear at varsity. The Pixies and spin doctors played one year, amongst others. The Bayou has some bands in the early 80’s that later went big, like REM. The Chimes had a good routine of acts including Mojo Nixon, IIRC.

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Violent Femmes at Murphy’s. Panic and Blues Traveler at Fred’s. Dave Matthews Band on Chimes Street. Dash Rip Rock everywhere. Panic at The Varsity.

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Incubus used to make regular stops at the Chimes.

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Incubus played at The Varsity, not The Chimes.

As the popularity of the food at The Chimes blossomed in the late 80s, when a crew of former Mike Anderson's guys bought it, live music would cost them restaurant revenue when they had to shut down most of the seating to make room for the band and audience, so they bought The Varsity next door (which someone had tried to convert from a movie theater into an Alamo Draft House/Suds N Cinema type "movies with food and beer" thing that didn't work (probably because the only movie they had for months and months on end was "Pet Semetary," which was not good for food sales...) and then tried to make it into a music venue, but the guy was so in debt and short on cash it didn't work for him... That Pixies show, their road manager had been warned by the road manager of an act that had played there the week before that no matter how packed the show was they would be shorted on money... so they refused to go onstage until they were at least paid the guarantee and shown the receipts for ticket sales... which held up the show for probably an hour after the touring opener played before their set, while the Varsity owner at the time ran around town scrounging together the money...

Anyway, the Chimes guys bought the Varsity, renovated it, and moved live music there so the Chimes could concentrate on being a restaurant. That was done by '91?

I just read this entire thread to see if I had posted in it. Incredibly, I had not.

At least somebody mentioned The Dick Nixons, the greatest rock and roll band of all time

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the bayou was a big deal back in the day. it was regular stop on for the up and coming college-sound bands. believe it or not, the police played there more than once. the police really established a circut for that era which rem and others of the same ilk followed.

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The Police played at The Kingfish (which was where that gym is next to The Bulldog), a few months after The Sex Pistols played there, around 1978... and the Centroplex (now RiverCenter) in 1981, and The Assembly Center (now PMAC) 1983 or 1984, but never The Bayou, which I don't think existed yet in 1978, when they would have been a small enough band for that... They played somewhere in New Orleans in 1979, can't remember where... but The Police were based in England and didn't just play around the south... they'd put out an album and then do an American tour.

The connection between The Police and R.E.M. was Ian Copeland/F.B.I. Booking (Stewart Copeland's brother... R.E.M. drummer Bill Berry and bassist Mike Mills actually worked as his assistants when he worked for Paragon Booking in Macon, GA, which was The Allman Bros/Capricorn Records booking agency and he was hired to bring in "new rock bands," and when he signed on new wave and punk bands they instantly fired him and he started his own agency) and Ian Copeland (other brother) who was the manager for The Police and owned R.E.M.'s record label, I.R.S. If you don't know why they chose the names The Police, I.R.S. and F.B.I., it's because they grew up living all over the world because their dad was a "businessman," which they found out later was his cover when he retired from the C.I.A.

R.E.M. did play at The Bayou in 1982... R.E.M. and Black Flag are really the ones who kind of pioneered a circuit for touring including the Southeast and its college towns, whereas before that it was just a few of the bigger cities (including New Orleans and often Baton Rouge because of its proximity) that smaller touring club bands would play. If there was a college or community radio station in a town that would give their records a chance, they would find somewhere in that town to play... a pizza place or art gallery or a woodshop if there were no clubs in the traditional sense, and they built a big following that way. And following that, bands on small indie labels could just contact those radio stations to put together a tour and have people have some idea about how they were when they showed up. That was a game-changing thing.

The Flaming Lips played at The Bayou in 1987 or so, then The Varsity a couple of months before they scored a hit with "She Don't Use Jelly" and there were very few people there.

At The Drive-In played at The Varsity in 1998, opening for The Archers Of Loaf, and then at The Spanish Moon in 1999.

Modest Mouse, Cat Power, Explosions in The Sky and tons of others played at The Bayou...

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The Dick Nixons, the greatest rock and roll band of all time

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Somewhere in a box I still have a baggie of "fortune ravioli" they threw to the crowd at a show... excuse me for hoping that I never find it...

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I know guys in Baby in the 90’s and Humble Kind. Good bands.

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Those guys are DICKS

...here's my new project