RTP-area local music and culture

[grady <grady AT ibiblio.org>]

In the past month, I have attended [multiple] shows at the Cat's Cradle, 
Bull City Headquarters, and the Cave. I haven't been to any shows at 
Local 506. Saturday night I walked up to 506 from the Cave and sat 
around outside talking to some friends in the between-bands downtime, 
but then once Filthybird went on, I had to decide between seeing a band 
I really liked in nasty smoky Local 506, or walking back to the Cave to 
see Twilighter (a band I like, but not as much as Filthybird) in 
smoke-free comfort, and I chose the Cave.

So I think anything you were to do to mitigate the smoke would be a very 
good thing, although I'm not sure about this half-measure you're 
proposing, which would necessitate running a smoke-gauntlet to 
enter/leave the club, to use the bathroom, or to buy drinks. It's 
possible to do all 3 of those at the Cave, plus watch the band, without 
ever going into the smoking back room.

But I'd at least be willing to give it a try. Be aware, though, that in 
the past your perception of the smokiness of the club has differed 
sharply from mine, a fact that I've chalked up to your senses having 
been dulled from all the secondhand smoke ;-)

What direction does the ventilation move in Local 506? I should know 
this already, but I don't. If the outside-air fans at either end aren't 
set up to pull air from the back alley and push it out onto Franklin, 
you'll need to change that . . .

If you're going to do anything that involves changing the smoking 
situation at 506, you'll have to do a couple of things if you intend for 
the experiment to be semi-valid:

1) publicize the change thoroughly to the large community of folks who 
might be attending shows were it not for the smoke (and keep in mind 
that they may not even be aware that's why they aren't attending shows . 
. . it may be more like "I'm too tired to go to a show on a weeknight 
because I feel like crap all the next day," not realizing that it was 
the smoke that was primarily responsible for that feeling of assy-ness)

2) wait long enough for the word to trickle out, and for the smokers to 
adjust, before declaring the experiment a success/failure

Keep us posted!

Ross

local506 AT gmail.com wrote:
> Although this discussion died down on here, it's still something I've
> been battling on a regular basis at the club.  Recently, by request of
> the artist, we tried restricting smoking to the bar-area only, while
> no smoking was allowed in the room where the artist performed.  And it
> worked really well - I got several comments about how (somehow!) the
> smoke itself didn't infiltrate the smoke-less room (or likely, it did
> so at ceiling-level, not head-level!)  And this show was well-
> attended, over 100 people.
>
> Anyway, I'm seriously considering this as a permanent policy, but
> looking for feedback before making this decision.
>
> glenn / local 506
>
> ps: Of course, all Summer I've been seriously considering adding wine,
> updating our Reverbnation page, taking a vaction, among other things,
> and they haven't happened yet (but Summer's not over!)
>
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