In my inbox this morning, from Andrew DiMola, booker at the Lily Pad, the anything goes music venue in Cambridge:
IMPORTANT!!
the lily pad - boston's beloved forum for original, creative music - has been forced to cancel all shows until further notice. due to noise complaints, the cambridge licensing board is obligated to follow the letter of the law in serving the lily pad with a 'cease and desist' order. the lily pad needs YOUR help urgently to survive. we need to show the city that the lily pad is a vital cultural center that serves a valuable function by providing a forum for creative musical expression. by showing our overwhelming support we can help overturn the order.
what you can do to help RIGHT NOW:
1. write a letter of support for the lily pad, stating that the venue is a vital asset that is necessary to the community, and that it does no harm. letters can be sent by mail to the following address:
Richard V. Scali, Chairman
Cambridge License Commission
831 Massachusetts Avenue
Cambridge, MA 02139-3068
or via email:
license@ci.cambridge.ma.us
I am looking forward to both hearing and playing music at the Lily Pad in the future- it's the last place in Boston that gives artists the freedom to pretty much do what they want. (Mind you, we pay up front, which doesn't thrill me, but...) Andrew and Gill, the owner, are two striaght up good guys in a business that discourages any decency, and my letter goes in the mail tomorrow.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
3 comments:
Oh for fuck's sake.
For a city with metropolitan aspirations, Boston sure has a small-town mentality sometimes. I love the city, but this is exactly the kind of shit that always drove me insane about the place.
Good luck -- you'll need it.
Well, of course they're gettin' harrassed. They evicted the old Zeitgeist gallery, just like the mafioso crowd that they are. They also evicted their third floor tenants on about 15 days notice. They talk big about community, but they are assholes who don't care about anyone. I hope the city takes them to the cleaners every day of the week-- they are just like the other evil cambridge landlords, evicting longtime residents and "springing up" corporatized pablum in their places. . . . i sure as hell wont' be paying the $200 a night to play there!
mark setrekian
bass
Mark, methinks you're being a tad...silly. They pissed some people off by sending the Zeitgiest out, but my dealings with the Zeitgeist people over several years alternated between confusing and downright frustrating, and always terribly disorganized. And if you see their website, Gil has dumped a lot of money into getting the place up to code, something that was ignored for a long time. Do I think they charge too much? yes. Does that make them somehow evil and anti-community? Not at all. It's the best of a set of bad options right now for musicians in Boston.
Post a Comment