The Elvis Room Interview (Repost)

I previously posted this on a defunct blog but I think its interesting so I thought I would carry this content over to my new blog. I have also been toying with the idea of writing a zine about NH punk history and some of this information is great.

The Elvis Room was a punkrock club in Portsmouth, NH and an important part of the New England punkrock and hardcore scenes of the 1990s. Because I grew up near Portsmouth and spent a lot of time in the city's record stores, coffee shops, and skate shops, The Elvis Room was a place that I (for better or for worse) now associate with coming of age, getting into punkrock, being 15, and all that crap. I was able to see shows at The Elvis Room (in 8th and early 9th grade) before I was able to go to Boston, Worcester, or Providence with older friends with cars. It ended up to be a relatively safe training ground for the following 3 years of driving all over New England to go shows.

In retrospect The Elvis Room booked a pretty limited selection of bands. I know I would have gotten bored with the club if it hadn't closed when it did or started to book more MA metal and hardcore like Converge and the Hydrahead Records stuff I was into. However, I got to see a lot of bands that were pretty important to me at the time and helped expose me to other (and mostly better) punk and hardcore bands. Here is a list of bands I remember playing The Elvis Room: Less Than Jake, Against All Authority, The Queers, Earth Crisis, Piecemeal, 40 Days Rain, The Showcase Showdown, Blank 77s, Anal Cunt, Atom and His Package, The Pinkerton Thugs, :30 Over Tokyo, The Trouble, August Spies, Scissorfight, The Unseen, The Pist, Hatebreed, Bruisers, Dropkick Murphys, Reach the Sky, Catharsis, Elliot Smith, and The Donnas. I know I am forgetting some. Apparently Milemarker, and Don Caballero played there too.

The Elvis Room suddenly went out of business when I was a sophomore (99?) in high school. It shut its doors (supposedly) because of rising insurance costs and rent, money spent on drug addictions, and generally poor business decisions. I have no idea if all of this is true. It was just the word on the streets. I also wouldn't be surprised if there was also a lot of pressure from the community to change things or leave. I remember vandalism, violence, underage drinking, and drug use being fairly prevalent in Portsmouth and often associated with The Elvis Room's crowd.

As some of you know, before moving to Pittsburgh, PA to start library school, I worked as a paraprofessional in a high school. The former member of The Elvis Room (and regular throughout its later years) taught in the same school department. This interview was done via email by some students I was working with for an English project. This is relevant because I did not write the questions (I mostly provided guidance), because the interview was done in school for school and was written from this perspective, and because no one intended for this interview to be published in any form (which is why there is no mention of this person's name). I decided to post this this because it seemed like it might be of interest to some people, because it provides a different perspective on a fairly well known punkrock club and its relationship to teens, and because New Hampshire punkrock history (outside of GG Allin and maybe The Queers) is underdocumented.

Other than some slight grammatical changes for readability's sake, neither the questions or responses have been edited.


Do you think that Portsmouth is missing something for its youth that its used to have?

Not really. I've only lived on the Seacoast for 15 years so I can't really say what things were like prior to then. I think there are probably more things for teens to be involved in now... whether they take advantage of what's out there is another story...

What was The Elvis Room? How did it start?

The Elvis Room was the brainchild of my ex-wife Dawn-Marie, Barbara Becht, Lori Baker, and myself. We wanted to create a coffee house in the same vein as the beat era coffee houses that could have been found in New York, San Francisco, etc. in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Dawn-Marie and Lori were the actual original partners in the enterprise and had met at a small business seminar for women.

What did you do at the Elvis Room?

I was not at the Elvis Room for very long (from the opening in May of 1992 until March of 1993) so I was more associated with the early years of the place than the later years. This was before they served alcohol. I opened the place most morning as worked until 3ish in the afternoon. Then I usually came back at night to help or run the open mics of music and poetry that we used to have. Having your own business means you don't really get much time off.

Was the Elvis Room good for the community when it was open? Was it generally a positive thing?

I think it was. I come from a social worker background and Dawn Marie always cared deeply about kids. Prior to it becoming "punk rock bar" there were a lot of kids and families that used to come on a regular basis. During my shift I'd always get the middle school crowd around 2:30pm. I made sure that it was a safe place for them to be and I encouraged them to get their damn homework done. At night it was truly a place for everyone... that all changed when they started serving alcohol and opened up the other side of the room.

Would the Elvis room be good for the community now? What role did the Elvis Room have in Portsmouth?

If it was like it was in the very beginning... yes I think it would be. However, one would have to decide which Elvis Room one wanted... music club or coffee house. As far as it being "a place for the kids to go" that was baloney after it became a music club... then of course you had to be 18 to get in unless there was an all ages show it wasn't really a place for "kids" anymore.

Having said that... for a lot of 20 somethings and older teens the E-Room (as we used to call it) was an introduction to a real "music scene"... probably the closest this town will ever get to having a "scene" and all the stuff that goes along with it... stuff that kids don't typically want their kids doing.

Would you ever consider starting something like that up again?

I have often thought of doing it again but you have to remember that the time our only competition was Cafe Brioche (now Breaking New Grounds) and it was a lot cheaper then... our original rent was $750 a month if I remember correctly. Currently on that end of Congress Street the rent is in the thousands. It is a different town than it was in 1992.

What kind of problems did the Elvis Room have?

I know that in the later years there were a lot of drugs flowing through the place. People deny it, but they almost have to deny it. This is the part of the "Great Elvis Room" myth that nobody wants to hear about... a good deal of underage drinking went on as well. A fair amount of violence as is typical of most places that serve alcohol... but overall there probably weren't any more problems there than there were at State Street Saloon or Wally's during the same time period. Probably one of the worst things that happened (long after I was gone) was Barbara almost getting stabbed to death by some guy who had some severe mental problems. I can't remember how many times he stabbed her but he just attacked her out of the blue one afternoon. I think he'll be locked up for the rest of his life.

How was the Elvis Room's relationship to the community, police department, and other businesses?

Initially I think it was very good. I remember going to meet with the police chief at the time (Chief Burke I believe was his name) to explain exactly what we were going to do and that we planned on being cooperative with the police department. The mayor came by to do a ribbon cutting ceremony when we opened... so initially I think there were some good vibes from the community and "city fathers."

Breaking New Grounds opened several months after we did and we always had a good relationship with them. We both recognized that we were catering to a very different crowd. I think that even now you find people who own local businesses all very supportive of one another.

My sense is that the E-Room got a little annoying for the city after a while. Things seemed to spiral out of control toward the end... I suspect the city was happy to see it go just as they were probably happy that Wally's and Spin bit the dust, although no one would say it out loud.

Do you think there needs to be more for teenagers to do in Portsmouth?

I'll refer you to my first answer... but...
Has there ever been a time when there was a lot of stuff for teenagers to do?
Overall I think that most teens probably want to be out of the reach of adults (I know I did) but that is not entirely possible. Its an unfortunate reality that part of being a teenager is dealing with boredom... not all the time, but if i had a dime for every time I heard a teen say, "I'm bored" I'd be rich enough to have a secretary typing this up from me from my house in the Bahamas...

The question sort of implies that it's somehow my or the community's responsibility to find something for teens to do and I'm not sure I totally agree with that.... Even if someone did, I'm not sure what it would look like...

What can be done about this? Do you think a good solution would be to have a facility in downtown for teenagers that would appeal to teenagers?

These two questions seemed to go together so I merged them. There are two ways to look at this issue. One... someone can open a business that primary caters to teenagers thereby giving them something to do. Alternatively, the city or community as a whole can get together and spend the money to put something together there by giving teens something to do. The city has been unwilling to, unable or not interest in doing something like this. For someone to open a business and try to make a living out of dealing with teenagers on a daily basis... I do not see this as very likely. The Elvis Room was not geared toward teens initially but to 20-30 somethings (people my age at the time)

Here are some Elvis Room related links:

• The Elvis Room on MySpace (top Pinkerton Thugs image stolen from here)
  
• An Article about its closing from The Portsmouth Herald

If you have any more information, stories, details, photos, recordings, etc. from this era of New Hampshire punkrock please share them with me.