Eugene Rock City Memories

 Back in my day... I used to spend a lot of time at bars and music venues in Eugene, Oregon, where I lived from 1992-2012. Some of my favorite venues to come and go over the years are/were the Wow hall (still there), John Henry's, Downtown Lounge, Samurai Duck, Wild Duck (wtf is it with all these Ducks?) and of course Sam Bond's Garage and let's not forget the many basement and unofficial venues that have come and go over the years - River Ruin, Ryder's basement, the Monkey House (RIP), that place on 13th and Washington that has a basement (where the punks would frisk you for weapons and also tell you what to do in the event of a fire or emergency - very considerate.) There has always been a vibrant and radical music scene in Eugene, a combination of punks, anarchists, college students, hippies, homeless crust punx, belligerent frat boys and just regular folks with good taste. The first show I ever attended in Eugene was at the WOW hall in 1991 - Nomeansno and Victim's Family, the ultimate prog-punk bill. NMN were already one of my favorite bands at that point. Victim's Family were at their peak and really shredded, but NMN brought the doom, starting with a free-form "jam" on the intro of "The day everything became nothing." It was killer. 

Some of my favorite shows over the years: 1. Jonathan Richman at the WOW hall with a pick-up band of semi-pro guys that did not know his material that well - the entire show, Jonathan was calling the names of the chords back to the bassist and keyboardist - "E!", "C sharp!" "F 7!" while also singing the lyrics and dancing the way he does. 2. Chris Knox at Sam Bond's Garage, Chris being a former member of New Zealand's Tall Dwarfs, he played a great set with a drum machine and his guitar, awesome New Zealand pop 3. Sebadoh at old John Henry's 1993 I think this was one of the very first times I went to John Henry's, was already a Lou Barlow fan. I loved the fact that his guitar only had 3 or 4 strings on it and yet the band sounded awesome, no one needs 6 fucking strings. 4. Tom Waits at the Hult Center 1999, probably the only time I will ever see one of my songwriting heroes, Tom had a great band that included Smokey Hormel on guitar and banjo. 5. Circle Jerks at the WOW hall 2009 I'm surprised they even made my list but the band was so smokin hot that night and Keith Morris was really funny with the stage banter that night, chastising the bumbling mosh-boys for running into the girls and women near the front of the stage, "that's no way to get a girl interested in you, by running into them like a football player - why don't you try just talking to them after you've calmed down?"

Okay that's my short list and overview of Eugene as a warped and funny music town. Thanks for reading -Ed