The South Shore Needs a Venue: Part 3
In the final of three installments, Brian Buchanan explores the music landscape of Staten Island and advocates for a venue to serve audiences on the South Shore.
As it stands today, the South Shore is not The Land Without Music. Far from it, actually. The annual Mt. Loretto Food Truck Festival erects a massive ProSho Sound stage to keep the foodies entertained. This summer, like in years past, saw weekend concerts at The Conference House, culminating with the Raritan Bay Festival. Before COVID, the Kreisler Mansion held a series of concerts, which featured two (!!) stages. And just like the North Shore, there are countless bars and restaurants that offer some form of live music, ranging from meager karaoke nights to full-bore band outings. Any claim that it’s impossible to play music on the South Shore would be patently false. The issue is that—for an original music scene to grow and thrive—the standard needs to be better than not impossible.
There are other problems. To start, most of the events I listed above take place in the summer. Now, live music in the sun’s heat is an exhilarating pastime to be sure, but music doesn’t only happen when the weather’s nice; to wit, there are no winter festivals. Warm weather in and of itself is no guarantee, either. Killmeyer’s Old Bavaria Inn has a performance space out back, but more than once over the years, shows have been canceled or shut down due to rain. Beyond that, the bars that host musicians usually have deficiencies in ‘stage’-space, PA systems (if there is one), age restrictions, or some combination thereof. While it is certainly their prerogative, many spots only want cover bands, too—bands with originals need not apply. All told, occasions for original music on the South Shore are few and far between. This would be, hopefully, enough reason to highlight the need for a South Shore, music-first venue. That said, such a space could serve another purpose, one I’d wager is even more important.
My introduction to local music was as basic as they come: a Battle of the Bands. I was a Viking Player at St. Joseph by-the-Sea, and a friend in the marching band was part of the competition. He’d been hyping up the event for weeks in homeroom and offered to get me in for free if I could shoot some footage of his group on my parent’s camcorder (this was before the era of ubiquitous smartphones with high-definition video). I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I walked into L’Amours off of Arthur Kill Road, but I certainly didn’t have a life-altering canon event on my Bingo card. Words will do little to relay what I—and many others—experienced that night but suffice it to say the night was ELECTRIFYING. I felt as if my soul had been switched on and I had a new directive: I must join a band, I must play on a stage. Those were my friends making all that noise… and that could be me!
Without exaggeration or hyperbole, I can draw a line starting from that night to this moment—right now!—writing these exact words on my computer, advocating for a South Shore venue. And it’s because there could not have been a more perfect spot for my first local show than L’Amours. Essentially everything I listed on THE CHARTER™ in my last article was culled from my reveries of that place: the stage, the PA, the music-first mentality… But perhaps most of all, the drive couldn’t have been more than ten minutes from my home in Tottenville. I believe that fact alone played a significant role in the night’s success. All the competitors that night were able to tap into their vast network of friends from Tottenville, Farrell, Tech, Moore, St. Joseph by-the-Sea, and even New Dorp High Schools. To this day, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve been to a local show of equal size, and it can only be attributed to the fact that it was easy for high schoolers to get to, be it by carpooling or by public transportation or by having their parents drive them. Conversely, there is simply no way—no way!—this could’ve been replicated on the North Shore. Even then, nearly fifteen years ago, anything beyond the Staten Island Expressway would’ve been too far, too inconvenient. Whose parents would make that trek? But as it was, L’amours was right here and so it was packed out. The collective thrill that ran through us like a current resulted in a night none of us would soon, if ever, forget.
Naturally, L’Amours closed up within a few years. Apart from some annual, memorable shows at the JCC, the closest the South Shore came to having a consistent spot for bands to play all-age shows was the Pink Room, a charming (if not notorious…) event space attached to a convenience store on Amboy Road. For a few glorious months, the Pink Room was heaven: they had a small, but state-of-the-art PA system and it was a five-minute walk from my house. I went every chance I got. As is the fate of all things too good to be true, however, the Pink Room did not last long. The convenience store in question never quite took off; even if it had, the ruckus caused by bands and loiterers in the back parking lot drew the ire of nearby residents. As a result, the NYPD was a constant presence at shows, and that kind of sustained attention does not make for an enduring venture. Before long, it shut down. That was years ago, and nothing on the South Shore has filled the void left in its wake. We’ve been living in exile.
Part V
After that mythical first show at L’Amours, I had to know where I could get some more of that. When would bands be playing there again? “Not a lot of shows happen at L’Amours,” I was told, “The Battle of the Bands was something of a one-off. If you want to see bands, you should come to a show at Dock Street or The Muddy Cup.” Those were the venues back in the day, and it wasn’t long before I became well acquainted with each. These venues were both on the North Shore, but that didn’t matter to me; like a moth to a flame, I could not resist. Almost immediately, I joined bands and booked gigs. I couldn’t absorb local music enough… and with it came everything the North Shore has to offer. I felt like I was coming home, like I had found my people. And I wanted to be not just a supporter, but a worthy contributor.
In this pursuit of actively involving myself in the ‘Staten Island music scene’ (which by now I hope I’ve demonstrated is really just a moniker for ‘the North Shore’s music scene’), I’ve become a better person. Without a doubt. Through it, cornerstones of my worldview have been set, including the virtue of community: when individuals come together to share their gifts and receive the gifts of others, we all become rich in spirit. This goes far beyond the music itself: shows become a common meeting place for people and ideas. I’m not an anthropologist or an urban transit activist, and so I lack the parlance to adequately articulate the significance of physical spaces. But for all my regular-dude-ness, what’s clear to me is that cultural exchange requires cultural exposure; it's the people who are the vehicles of plural thought.
I often wonder how easy it would’ve been for me to have been sucked into the South Shore’s monoculture (thank God I went to that show at L'amours!!!). Instead: I made countless ‘show-friends’ or people for whom shows are the only meaningful time we get to hang out; I made all of my dearest friends through the music scene, even if today some of them have been out of music or moved away; hell, I’ve fallen in and out of love with people I’ve met at local shows. But each of them challenged me—personally, creatively, politically—and helped refine me into who I am. Where else would I have gotten that? I have no good answers. And my evolution hasn’t stopped; as it stands, I am being ever-sculpted into someone better, and the community is in the shape of me. I could not be broken down and reconstructed without it. Surely—or at least I must believe—I am not the only one that can say the same.
Another virtue I’ve learned is that communities are like fire. For example, they provide warmth. They also require tending to, lest they burn out. The South Shore’s original music scene, whatever exists of it, is in its last embers, which is why I’ve been so adamant that we need a legitimate venue. We must find ways to feed the flame and light the way for the next generation if for no other reason than there might not be a next generation if we do nothing. With the right accelerant, even small kindling can explode into something formidable. We need a space, but it can’t be temporary, or a half-measure, or without a clear sense of purpose.
And so, what is the point? What’s the larger purpose? Connection. We need a place that serves to unite our shores through music, yes, but one that unites us in so much more. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that we so often apply the semantics of infrastructure to communities. We are either ‘building bridges’ between them or ‘putting up walls’ (and only Staten Island could perfectly epitomize the twisted irony of a ‘road’—the Staten Island Expressway—acting as the ‘wall’ that divides us). But these platitudes are so ingrained in our daily lexicon that they wash over us, leaving no real meaning or resonance. Still, I’ll risk invoking cliché by saying what we need is a tunnel, a figurative underground passage between our shores. That is the point. I want to construct the same pipeline that channeled me to the north shore. “You think this place is cool? Just wait until you play Pugs or Flagship or MakerPark or Hub 17 or…” That is what I’d like to say. That, and, “The Staten Island music scene? Yeah, we’re a two way street…”
If only wishing made it so. Easier said than done is the understatement of the century. Personally, I wouldn’t even know where to begin. By trade, I’m a physics teacher. I don’t have the money. I don’t have the time. I don’t know anything about the litany of permits a venue requires. My father likes to remind me, too, that there are always pesky unknown unknowns to contend with, problems that cannot even be fathomed at the onset of a massive project. I’ve spent three articles and nearly five thousand words pleading my case, using all the rhetorical tools in my writer’s toolbox, and in all likelihood, the best I can hope for is that some of my friends will read this and at the next local show, they might say, “Hey, yeah, I agree; we do need a venue on the South Shore,” before we abruptly change the subject to literally anything else. So, yeah, I freely admit that I cannot lead this charge…
But I can help. I can pitch in. I don’t know how, but I’ll find a way. When a retired Staten Island real estate mogul with Scrooge McDuck money is sparked by their love of music to construct such a venue after being roused and ensorcelled by my words, I’ll… paint the venue walls or something, I don’t know. Anything. I so badly believe in this idea that I’ll do whatever I can to see it through, and I know I’m not alone. I reject that line of thinking that says, “If there was demand for such a space, we would already have it.” Nothing just happens; it takes a team. And I want to be a part of that team. I’m player 57, and my starting position is the-guy-who-has-your-back. I want to help build a place of refuge for music on the South Shore. We need it. Staten Island needs it.
At the beginning of this article, I said that Staten Island was something of a Rorschach test, and I asked, “What do you see?” I’ll leave you with this: what do you wish to see? If you want to answer this rallying call for like-minded individuals that share this vision, I encourage you to fill out the short form below. Let’s get organized! There’s an old saying I’ve been trying to remember—I don’t know if I’ve got it exactly right—but I think it goes something like this: the best time to plant a music venue was twenty years ago; the second best time is now… Yeah, that sounds about right. So let’s bust out the gloves and get gardening! Who’s with me?
Brian Buchanan is a physics teacher by day and, by night, a masked vigilante versatile artist. His passions span the realms of football, guitar pedals, & the law of large numbers. Brian finds beauty in the patterns of the universe, and his artistic soul is reflected in both his music and writing, where he weaves melodies and stories that touch the heart. At home, he finds inspiration and comfort in the company of two pups: Boo & Jem. Brian's gentle spirit and insights leave an enduring mark on everyone he meets (hopefully!!), making Shaolin a more beautiful place through his diverse talents.