Located in the Little Armenia section of East Hollywood, it was a comfortable, no-frills venue in a shopping center with ample parking. Safari Sam's short life marked the end of underground-friendly nightlife in Hollywood.
It was demolished in 1975 to make way for the Long Beach Convention Center. Kiss made their L.A.-area debut there in 1974, and prog-heads still speak in hushed tones about the legendary ’73 King Crimson performance. Through the mid-’70s, the Auditorium (and adjacent Long Beach Arena) was the local rock & roll parking-lot hangout. At first it was mainly used for trade conventions, dog shows and tennis matches, but the Auditorium kicked into concert gear in the ’40s with appearances by stars of the day including Liberace and Judy Garland, with Elvis the Pelvis thrilling the teenbeaters in 1956 (a year before his more heralded show at Pan Pacific Auditorium). Near the site of today's Rainbow Lagoon Park, Long Beach ( map)īuilt on landfill in 1931, the Long Beach Municipal Auditorium was a 10-story Italian Renaissance colossus with a huge Roman arch on its front facade, set in an 8-acre park and 32-acre lagoon.
Jonny WhitesideĪ postcard from the late '30s or early '40s, showing the Long Beach Municipal Auditorium Credit: Boston Public Library/Flickr Employees removed the body and Fitzgerald finished her set. The place could get rough lyricist Don George recalled the night he and Duke Ellington went to there to hear Ella Fitzgerald, who was interrupted when a man suddenly lurched onstage with a knife protruding from his chest. Berg’s was home to jive geniuses Slim Gaillard and Harry “The Hipster” Gibson, and was where Frankie Laine, the first explicitly black-influenced white pop star, made his bones. Black artists couldn’t perform anywhere on the Sunset Strip, but Berg routinely booked Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker. Sure, it featured the top names in music but, more importantly, it was an integrated club - a rarity in 1946. Lily Moayeriīilly Berg’s was a critically important jazz room in post-WWII Los Angeles. Held every Friday, the forward-thinking night hosted international DJs and top live electronic music acts of the time such as Death in Vegas, Dub Pistols and Lionrock. Taking place in the late ’90s, and helmed in part by Los Angeles tastemaker Philip Blaine, Frequency served as the connector between Blaine’s unforgettable Organic Festival in 1996 and the advent of Coachella in 1999. Nearing its centennial, the incredibly unique, labyrinthlike space is arguably best remembered for its run as the venue for Frequency. Since its construction in the 1920s, the Hollywood Athletic Club has had many guises: awards hall, record company, recording studio, billiards club, restaurant. The Hollywood Athletic Club still stands, but its days as a dance club are long behind it. Until 2003, the Teaszer also hosted one of L.A.'s last great after-hours, Does Your Mama Know?, where you might find Marques Wyatt or Louis Vega on the decks and Grace Jones dancing in the crowd.
But it was precisely that ramshackle quality that, for nearly two decades and especially throughout the ’90s, made the Coconut Teaszer such an appealing alternative to its more famous, touristy neighbors further down the Strip for then up-and-coming bands like Green Day, Weezer and Rage Against the Machine. The layout was too cramped and funky for any band larger than a trio, the stage felt like a postage stamp (though compared to the Teaszer's basement space, 8121 - later the Crooked Bar - it was vast). The rambling purple house at the corner of Sunset and Crescent Heights never felt quite like a proper rock club. Credit: Fragwurdig Fotograf/Los Angeles Public Library Texacala Jones of Tex and the Horseheads performs at the Coconut Teaszer.
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