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Down In The Alley

Down In The Alley image
Parent Issue
Day
9
Month
July
Year
1971
OCR Text

DOWN IN THE ALLEY

A few weeks ago a friend of mine told me that Canterbury House was vacating the building at 330 Maynard and that it was up for rent. It took me about a minute to realize that thls could be the chance to establish a dream for a type of club that I've had in mind a couple of years. A club featuring a great deal of Blues, both old time and up to date, plus Jazz, Folk and other professional forms of music that don't normally reach Ann Arbor.

I got ahold of the ace local real estate man, Archie Allan, and he quickly secured a long term lease for me, and in the next week I rounded up the necessary funds and backers to do the whole thing just right. E. G. Clawson, drummer with Blue Scepter (SRC) kicked in his life savings along with Cholly Bassoline who produces Blue Scepter. Next we decided to lease out the basement for an entire arcade of games, pinball, and pool. By doing this we added some fun for our audiences plus we helped pay our rent which had doubled what Canterbury House was paying. Our whole idea had been that if we could get the other uses of the building paying most of our expenses then we could really surprise people with the talent we could then afford. This is just what has happened. In addition to the arcade, the Ann Arbor Film Co-op will be using the upstairs hall Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, or all the nights we are not operating as a club. So it will be a theatre as well and the whole idea is to create a really good recreatlon center.

In addition to everything else we are now working on a food program for during the day. We will probably end up serving only very healthy foods at very low rates. I see the situation as one where a person can get a full good meal for 45 cents. We may not start this until the fall since a lot of work still remains in this area.

I should mention that in the arcade downstairs they will be doing everything possible to secure the very best games and pinball, and they will always be open to suggestions and criticism. They have a lot of work to do, not only on the machines but on fixing the downstairs up. They have a repair shop right in the building so you won't have the usual situation of half the machines out of order.

Finally a few more words on the club itself. For the balance of the summer while we are fixing the place up we will feature mostly local talent such as this last weekend when we had Terry Tate (who destroyed the audience twice over) and Buddies in the Saddle (also excellent). This coming week Love's Alchemy and Ragamuffyn will perform Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The following week on the 16th and 17th, Friday and Saturday, the Brat and Guardian Angel will both be there and the next week on the 21st and 22nd, Wednesday and Thursday, the Contemporary Jazz Quintet will perform. We are working to meet fire laws so our capacity can be 324 people by August. This will also help us afford better talent while still keeping the admission price down as low as possible.

For the fall we have already been in contact with a number of possible people including Jimmy Reed, Luther Alison, Howling Wolf, Buddy Guy, Sun House, Robert Pete Williams, Junior Wells, Houndog Taylor, and there are so many more possibilities.

So if you get a chance check us out, because we're going to be trying to do it right, and it looks better every day.

-P. Andrews