Birmingham Indie Retrospect (1998-2005), Part Three: The Boiler Room

In the wake left by the death of Big Dan’s Fantastic Planet, Birmingham’s independent music scene was left once again without a place for its music to flourish.  As with the fall of Slacker 66, the remaining options were pretty grim.  But, the scene quickly regrouped when Molehill guitarist Drew Reid converted an abandoned downtown church on 2nd Avenue North into a music club and a home, which he dubbed…

The Boiler Room: Independent and Commercial Music United Under One Man’s Roof

Imagine a one-story, one-bedroom, one-bathroom home with an average-sized living room.  Now add to that home a sanctuary that measures roughly 1,000 feet in length and 200 in width.  This “sanctuary”–a fairly appropriate term, considering the almost ritualistic gathering of scenesters in an effort to save the local scene–constituted the Boiler Room proper, complete with stage, lighting, and sound system.  The living room doubled as a sort of green room for bands, where Drew essentially invited them into his home and treated them hospitably with beer and TV.  Bands/artists to grace this room–and the stage, of course–included Marky Ramone, members of Black Flag, The Dead Kennedys (sans Jello Biafra), The Misfits (sans Danzig), Vader (Polish death metal; they’re so big in Poland, they made fun of the Boiler Room for its small size as they are used to playing sold out arenas with the likes of Slayer), Origin (Relapse Records brutal death/tech metal; fans would typically gather behind the stage to watch drummer John Longstreth), Soilwork, This Bike is a Pipe Bomb, Piebald, Hot Water Music, Atreyu (before they got REALLY big), Mastodon, The Red Chord, Maharaj, Good Clean Fun, and many, many more.

In spite of these big name acts, The Boiler Room did not lose its down-home sensibility.  It also hosted many local acts, including Molehill, None But Burning (fresh from the release of their split EP with Closer Than Kin, with new material on the way that would eventually become “A Love Like Boxing”), Blue Eyed Boy Mister Death (a supergroup of sassy punk and hardcore metal, with a number of line-up changes that rivals the number of tags in my previous post), .ofmeansandends. (the guys from xovertheyearsx doing Blood Brothers-style spastic metalcore), Biscayne (Plate Six runners-up playing grunge/indie rock), Pen-15 (get it?  Anyway, pop/punk in vein of Jawbreaker; they would later be renamed Death or El Dona) and their parent band The Original Muscle Men (reunion show).

My most memorable experience with this group of locals was when I first saw Plate Six (“rock and yell” post-punk band comprised of two guitarists–with trading “bass” riffs via Boss Octave effects pedals–and a drummer; think Drive Like Jehu and Hot Snakes with a Southern twang).  When I confronted scene guru Trent Thomas (of NBB/BEBMD/30 Pieces of Silver/every Birmingham band at some point or another fame) about whether I would enjoy this show, he told me that if I liked Radiohead, I was sure to enjoy Plate Six.  Well, me being a rabid Radiohead fan and all, I got my hopes way up, only to be let down by this group playing angular rock with ridiculous time signatures and yelling “WA HA HOO!!!”.  Needless to say, I hated Plate Six the first time around.  But I tried them again, and I fell in love immediately.  In that respect, it was a bit like how I got into Radiohead; I loathed “Creep” the first few times I heard it, but once “The Bends” came out and I saw the video for “Just”, I was sold.  I was equally impressed with their occasional improv alter-ego called Spanish Boat Patrol; singer and guitarist David Hickox introduced songs with the line “This next song hasn’t been written yet.”

Another truly memorable local act is Swami Records’ darling Dan Sartain (whom Plate Six have played backing band to), a lanky, geeky looking fellow who is eternally stuck in the 1960′s–a perfect mash-up of Desi Arnaz, Elvis Costello, and Buddy Holly playing blues/rockabilly/surf rock.  I first caught him in Anniston at a DIY club called Room 213, but it was his Boiler Room show that really got me hooked.  With songs like “Panama City”, “Besame Mucho”, and “Walk Among the Cobras”, he had the sizable crowd–which was dwarfed by the size of the venue itself, but formidable nonetheless–dancing and singing along and having an awesome time.

[A final local act note I'd like to add for some personal history (insert self-serving bias here) is my path to becoming a guitarist in Linear High (more on that in a later entry).  It all began with Shelbie, a Christian melodic rapcore band fronted by my close friend Ronnie Moore, who also played at The Boiler Room.  In my Dredge days, I shared the stage with Ronnie and his group; after Dredge and Shelbie both disbanded, Ronnie and I got together to work on music that went in a new direction.  In his words, we were "two sides of the same coin."  In the end, we wound up going our separate ways musically without ever forming our own band (though we tried one band practice with former Dredge bassist Billy Lawley on drums; I don't remember if we ever tried to name ourselves, but we were playing heavy experimental indie post-rock).  However, Ronnie played a one-off show at The Boiler Room as part of an instrumental improvisational group called Film at Eleven.  This is where I first encountered their drummer Guyton Sanders, who had been involved in past Birmingham groups including Audomobil? and later started the electronic shoegaze group Highspire during his time in Pennsylvania.  Fast forward about a year, and I was learning songs from a shoegaze band called Linear High after I learned that their guitarist had quit.  Eventually, Guyton and I started writing new songs and I continued to play with them for the next three years.]

Sadly, The Boiler Room also ran into financial troubles, and for many of the same reasons as Big Dan’s Fantastic Planet.  But rather than rely on a feel-good charity drive, Drew decided to obtain a liquor license and operate The Boiler Room as a bar and venue simultaneously.  While this brought a new group of patrons to the club, it greatly hindered Birmingham’s youth from coming to shows.  At this point, shows were either all-ages (with no liquor sold) or 18+ (liquor sold).  This quickly became a problem, as the approach relied on an honor system in which Drew had to promise not to sell during all-ages shows; since that was not practically enforceable, shows became strictly 18+.  However, even the liquor move could not make up for the overall lack of revenue, and as a result, The Boiler Room closed.  But this club provided the Birmingham scene with an opportunity to mesh the independent and commercial scenes in a meaningful way, and it marked a time where I became more directly involved with the ideal that I had discovered at Big Dan’s Fantastic Planet.

(coming soon, Part Four: Cave 9 – DIY re-reborn and “We’ve Got Too Much Heart”)