At the perfect concert, you can hear every note, see the stage from every conceivable angle and never step in strange puddles while using the bathroom. It helps, too, when the bartenders are nice. Though such a utopian club doesn’t exist in Chicago or anywhere-we asked Chicago musicians, radio and record label people, producers and regular clubgoers to help us concoct one. In each category except favorite club, we offer two views: one of the performers and other music folks and the other of the clubgoers. Here are the results of our unofficial survey.
FAVORITE CLUB
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Anna Fermin, country singer and leader of Trigger Gospel: “I’m going to have to say FitzGerald’s-it’s close between FitzGerald’s and the Hideout. What I love about those two places is just the family, (the) real down-home feel of them. FitzGerald’s-not pretentious, really comfortable. Also it’s got great sightlines.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Lisa Feuer, flutist for Black Tape for a Blue Girl and promotions director for Projekt Records, who recently left Chicago for Astoria, N.Y.: “The Vic. It’s a nice beautiful big theater; I like the fact you have the choice of standing or cabaret seating or upstairs in the balcony.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Erwin Helfer, boogie-woogie pianist: “Villa Kula. It’s small enough that I don’t need a sound system, and the people really listen.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Bruce Iglauer, president of Alligator Records, blues label: “When it’s not full of tourists I probably enjoy BLUES on Halsted as much as any club I’ve ever been in because you’re almost in the middle of the band. Everything’s acoustic. It’s the closest thing to a South Side blues joint on the North Side.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Brian Jones, a student at Northeastern Illinois University: “Dragon Room just has good music. I like the way the light shines off the picture of the samurai guy. And a sake bar. I can usually weasel my way into the VIP area.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Paul Kasprzak of the Rock Star Club band: “House of Blues is pretty much my favorite place to see a show if I know somebody that can get me into one of those cool-guy party-box balcony things.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Yoko Noge, boogie-woogie pianist: “Lee’s Unleaded Blues. I like a place that has a touch of the community-gathering feeling.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Koko Taylor, blues singer: “Kingston Mines. It’s made up on the blues. I think the bricks that are holding the foundation up are singing the blues. And then I would say the House of Blues, and across the street we got BLUES. And don’t forget Koko Taylor’s Celebrity.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Dave Trumfio, producer and musician in the Pulsars: “It used to be Lounge Ax, but now I like going to shows at the Empty Bottle and the Metro. They’re most familiar to the music scene for me and I feel more at home at those clubs. … Especially the Metro; (it’s) kind of a staple, you know?”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) James Van Osdol, assistant music director of WKQX-FM 101.1: “Metro, for its proximity of the crowd to the stage, top-flight sound and quality of booking.”
FAVORITE STAGE
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Anna Fermin: “I think the Metro’s got a great stage, and it’s actually got a nice feel too because it’s just your quintessential rock club. … It just kind of has that old-school kind of auditorium feel.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Brian Jones: “Dragon Room. I have a few drinks and cigarettes, and once you get me going dancing I get like MC Hammer.”
FAVORITE DCOR
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Kelly Hogan, country singer: “Hideout. This is the house of love; it looks like girl scouts decorated it, it looks like a rumpus room with the big fish. … You’ve got all these bikers at one end of the floor with leather on but you’ve got all these snowflakes with Scotch tape hanging from the ceiling – you can tell girls created it.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Jake Austen, publisher of Rocktober, a Chicago fanzine about music: “The Hideout’s pretty comfortable. Empty Bottle – it’s rarely so packed that you can’t be standing somewhere.”
FAVORITE BAND/SINGER
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Lisa Feuer: “I would have to say one person that I admire who has more than one band in the Chicago goth scene is Preston Klik; he had the band Big Hat, My Scarlet Life, and is now doing other projects; he’s a really motivated man, (and) started DivaNation label.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Lamont Harper, who works loss prevention (security) for Tower Records: “R. Kelly. Definitely. R. Kelly is it. He put us on the map.”
FAVORITE BARTENDER
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Kelly Hogan: “I used to love Kevin and Sarah at Lounge Ax. Marie Marasovich at the Hideout-she is like the bartending pro of all time, she’s fast, she’s sassy. … `How do you make your drinks taste so good, Marie?’ `Lots of liquor, Kell!’ She calls everybody `doll.’ “
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Harry Rutz, fireman in Cicero: “I used to like the ones at Borderline. Nice girls! But I went back last week and she wasn’t there.”
FAVORITE PARKING
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Son Seals, blues singer-guitarist: “It’s a mess, man! Blue Chicago, when they moved down the street from their first location, they had a parking lot not owned by them, but a public parking lot. Few times I played there you could move. That guy would give us musicians a break. That turned out to be the best spot in town.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Lamont Harper: “It’s easy to find parking at the Wild Hare. They have a McDonald’s lot.”
FAVORITE SEATING AREA
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Richard Milne, deejay at WXRT-FM 93.1: “I don’t go to many shows that actually have seats. I like the mobility of the Double Door. The fact that you’re uncomfortable in one spot you can walk 15-20 feet and feel like you’re in a totally different part of the room.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Diesel, veteran punk rocker from Chicago: “House of Blues has a very, very good setup, I was pretty impressed with it. It’s all very good design. That circular design works well with the music, and gives you room to dance.”
FAVORITE VIBE
Ken Vandermark, jazz saxophonist: “One thing I like about the Velvet Lounge is it’s like this old club, it’s not even the way it looks so much as the vibe the place has. It feels like this history’s been there, present in the room.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Paul Murphy, a house painter from Chicago: “Thurston’s is kind of cozy. There’s a mini-bar downstairs, and it’s not super crowded. There’s a couple couches down there-and upstairs too.”
FAVORITE KEY BOARDIST
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Dave Trumfio: “Jeremy Jacobson, the Lonesome Organist. He’s amazing. He’s like a one-man band: plays drums, keyboards, ukelele”
FAVORITE BATHROOM
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Koko Taylor: “You know what? I hate to say my favorite kind of bathroom because it’s going to sound like my whole story is Koko Taylor Celebrity. But when it comes to my favorite bathroom that would be the spot. Simply because it was designed with my own instincts. It’s pink like women’s bathrooms should be.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Pete Sorensen, floor manager at Target in Itasca: “The Aragon. I love that bathroom. The big waiting room, and the tiles. In the old days they had chairs in there.”
FAVORITE DRUMMER
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Gina Black, singer-bassist in the Blacks: “I like Scott Giampano, Cash Money, now Cash Audio. He’s just a monster when he plays; he hits really hard.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Brian Jones: “The guy with the bongos at Mad Bar.”
FAVORITE SOUND SYSTEM
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Koko Taylor: “The House of Blues has a great sound. But then, that doesn’t mean the others don’t have a great sound. It’s just very specific, it’s clear, you can hear it, no feedback, no nothing, just the voice that’s coming through. Now also the other clubs that I have worked in and go in they have a good sound too. The way I would describe that is just like you driving a Jaguar but I’m driving a Cadillac but they’re both good cars. It’s the same thing with the music.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Eric Phillips, who works at Tower Records: “Fireside Bowl, House of Blues. I guess you don’t really need good sound for punk rock.”
FAVORITE GUITARIST
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Kelly Hogan: “My favorite guy is my guitar player, Andy Hopkins. We call him the Vanilla Genius because there’s a soul player called the Chocolate Genius. Great guitar player, great frontman, wears makeup sometimes. I love all my guys I play with.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Pete Sorensen: “John Primer. He played with Muddy Waters, he sat in with the heavies. There’s not many heavies left.”
FAVORITE AUDIENCE
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Son Seals: “I used to really enjoy playing at Kingston Mines, and I guess one reason why was the later it got the atmosphere got more down-homey. More people would come in-it was like being down home because it stayed opened all night. Back down home where I come from the stages stay open all night. It was something about the wee hours, man you know, certain time at night the jukejoints and things settled in and got mellow. For that reason the Mines used to feel like that to me. . . . I don’t play there now. I got no reason to be there at 5 a.m.”
(ORANGE = REGULAR JOE) Eric Phillips: “Fireside Bowl. They’re all pretty much the same genre as I am. If you’re a punk rocker usually you have an easier time getting along with them.”
LEAST FAVORITES
THE BEST OF THE WORST
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Bruce Iglauer on bathrooms: “I entered the bathroom (of a South Side blues club) and encount-ered a full-size rat. We had a conversation about who needed to use the bath-room more and I won.”
(PINK = MUSIC BIZ INSIDER) Richard Milne on parking: “One night, like 1990, I’m emceeing a Naked Raygun concert, and I parked my car on one of the side streets (in Uptown). My girlfriend … comes in and says, `Where’d you park your car?’ I said, `Oh, over on Leland.’ She says, `I walked by I thought I saw some kids sitting in it.’ So I go by and the car’s smashed, the radio’s smashed, everything’s smashed. Then I had to go back onstage.”
———-
Where to find the clubs: Aragon Ballroom, 1106 W. Lawrence Ave., 773-561-9500; Blue Chicago, 736 N. Clark St., 312-642-6261; BLUES, 2519 N. Halsted St., 773-528-1012; Double Door, 1572 N. Milwaukee Ave., 773-489-3160; Dragon Room, 809 W. Evergreen Ave., 312-751-2900; Empty Bottle, 1035 N. Western Ave., 773-276-3600; Fireside Bowl, 2646 W. Fullerton Ave., 773-486-2700; FitzGerald’s, 6615 W. Roosevelt Rd., Berwyn, 708-788-2118; Hideout, 1354 W. Wabansia Ave., 773-227-4433; House of Blues, 329 N. Dearborn St., 312-923-2000; Kingston Mines, 2548 N. Halsted St., 773-477-4646; Koko Taylor’s Celebrity, 1233 S. Wabash Ave., 312-360-1558; Lee’s Unleaded Blues, 7401 S. South Chicago Ave., 773-493-3477; Metro, 3730 N. Clark St., 773-549-0203; Thurston’s, 1248 W. George St., 773-472-6900; The Velvet Lounge, 2128 S. Indiana Ave., 312-791-9050; Vic Theatre, 3145 N. Sheffield Ave., 773-472-0449; Villa Kula, 4518 N. Lincoln Ave., 773-728-3114; The Wild Hare, 3530 N. Clark St., 773-327-4273.
