Local concert hall closing

By: Brian Washburn

Posted: 9/5/08

A piece of Fayetteville music history will soon to be gone. At the end of this month, the warehouse behind Foghorn's and Pho Saigon, which is usually crowded with teens lined up around the building and the parking lot filled with white vans and trailers, will shut down. The Fayetteville Music Hall will close its doors and turn off the speakers after more than a decade of shows and thousands of bands gracing its stage.

A decade ago, what is now known as the Music Hall was called Klunk Records, but it still produced the same rock shows.

"I came here for college and started going to shows at Klunk," said Jeremy Brown, owner of the Music Hall for the past six years. "Then Chris [the original owner of Klunk] shut down in July of 2000, and then in December of 2000 Expressions, a church, wanted to take it over, but didn't know how to run it.

"At that time, I was a senior [at the UA] and they asked me to run The Music Hall because I had been writing a business plan for a music venue," Brown said. "'I ran it for nine months and they funded it, but then they backed out so [for the past six years] I've used my own money to fund it and I ran it."

Over the past decade, the venue has hosted bands the likes of Modest Mouse, The All-American Rejects, Underoath, Blindside, Norma Jean, Anberlin, and Bowling For Soup among many others. The hall has also seen the rise of several local musicians to the national ranks, including The Wedding, Spoken, School Boy Humor and Take It Back!.

"The Music Hall was definitely a launching pad for us. It's where we were discovered," said Trevor Sarver, lead guitarist for Fayetteville pop-punk band The Wedding. "We got signed because the record label flew down to Arkansas and saw us play at the Music Hall and signed us."

However, while the bulk of the bands who have performed on the Music Hall stage have come and gone, the music industry is just not what is used to be.

And that is the number one reason this long-time Fayetteville venue is shutting down, Brown said.

"The music industry is decreasing every year because the 14-year-old is not buying [music] legally and they are also not buying into the culture, scene, shirts or any of the music scene that would need to happen to bring it back up to par," Brown said.

"I can't afford to do it anymore," he said. "It's never been that profitable because we don't have a bar, but there were months where we would make money and then those where it would lose money, so it would balance itself out."

However, the balance took a turn for the worse when this summer The Music Hall tanked worse than it had before, Brown said. The music industry is not the only one to blame, though. America's failing economy is even tearing down local music scenes.

"The economy is the number one reason the local music scene is declining," Brown said.

"It came to a point where it's like 'do I pay the Music Hall's electricity bill or buy groceries this month?' and I have a good job, so why am I in this situation?" Brown said. "As much as I love the Music Hall, I'm too old to move into it again and too old to starve just to see it tank."

But while the Music Hall has tanked in the past, other venues, such as George's, seem to never have that big of an issue, mostly because they have a bar in their venue, Brown said.

"I have been approached by Bud and Busch about putting in beer and serving pizza because then [the venue] would still be all ages, but I'm just not called to that," Brown said. "I just can't justify a 10-year-old being in there with that. It's not what I'm called to do and not what my vision was.... I could put a bar in and make $20,000 a month, but I always turned the offers down. I never did it for the money. If it was about the money, there would be a bar in there.

"The goal of the Music Hall was to impact peoples lives with music, whether it's taking bands to the next level or the fans," he said. "If you read the blog [on the Music Hall's MySpace], that's what the Music Hall means to them, but what did it mean to you, or the guy that's three years older than you that played in a band, or even to me when I was in college."

Brown is right. Not only is the Music Hall's MySpace page cluttered with posts and comments about how saddened people are about the venue shutting down, long-time fans and even bands who have moved on to the national stage are expressing their sadness.

"It's a bummer it's closing," said Nick Thomas, bassist for Fayetteville hardcore band Take it Back!. "It's the only place to play around here and home to every band who plays around here, so it's a bummer."

However, local bands will not have to travel far to find an all ages venue. This year, Brown opened up the Rogers Music Hall on Walnut Street, and they will continue to host one or two shows there a month, he said.

Brown will also be taking a step aside from the full time concert business, but he will be booking national tours in the Fayetteville area.

"The way I see it is that if I'm going to lose money, it might as well be a big deal," Brown said. He is also looking at straying away from the typical "Music Hall genre" and booking more national pop and rock acts.

"[Closing the Music Hall] is going to be emotional," Brown said. "This is worse than a divorce, but it's time and a good thing. If divorce could be a good thing then this is what it would feel like.

"I'm not called to do it anymore, maybe someone else is," Brown said. "In it's current condition no one can make it succeed unless a miracle is involved."

The Music Hall fans will get a few last chances to see the place be rocked out. On Sept. 27, Hold Your Own and many other Music Hall veterans will be playing "The End'" show, which will mark the last local band show at the Fayetteville Music Hall. The last show the Music Hall will host in it's history will be a national tour featuring metal band Becoming The Archetype.

For more information on the Music Hall or upcoming shows, go to its Web site at www.myspace.com/themusichall.