From its outset, Star Wars was a pastiche. The 1977 original collected elements from Saturday afternoon serials, westerns, Buck Rogers, Flash Gordon, teenage hot rod movies, Akira Kurosawa and so much high and low cinema that creator George Lucas loved and spun them into a modern-day sci-fi adventure fairy tale. While the majority of Star Wars stories revolved around the dysfunctional Skywalker clan, the Rebellion, the Empire or the totally and completely different Resistance and First Order, the new breed of Star Wars spinoff films brought to life different sides to the galaxy as well as exploring different genres (the war film of Rogue One, the heist film in Solo: A Star Wars Story). In its opening episode, The Mandalorian continues that notion, leaning heavily into the franchise’s western roots and delivering something truly different, exploring the nooks and crannies of the vast universe that were touched upon in the spinoff films, while delivering a totally new cast of characters and an intriguing world that is new to audiences yet just familiar enough…and no lightsabers.

Beginning media res (like all of the best Star Wars stories do) on a bleak ice planet, The Mandalorian doesn’t waste time on exposition (no opening crawl, no “A long time ago”), finding the titular main character (Pedro Pascal) on a dangerous mission to collect a bounty. Wasting no time delivering the action, he brutally kills off a group of criminals in a tavern that is reminiscent of the original film’s cantina. Earlier this year, co-creator and writer Favreau told The Hollywood Reporter that he was trying to “evoke the aesthetics of not just the original trilogy, but the first film.” The saloon is populated with humanoid aliens — looking like they’re simply wearing rubber masks off the shelf from Rick Baker’s shop — in dingy leather and burlap costumes. The outfits and the makeup tell the stories of the characters in broad strokes. There’s nothing slick here, this is the lived-in universe that Lucas brought to life in his original film. The Mandalorian feels like a story from Tales From Mos Eisley Cantina come to life for the rest of its runtime. The episode even makes several references to the maligned — and also extremely weird — Star Wars Holiday Special from 1978.

The show isn’t so reverent of the original films that it slides into nostalgia for nostalgia’s sake. In that same interview, Favreau explained that he loved “the idea of the darker, freakier, side of Star Wars,” and that side is on full display in The Mandalorian. The Last Jedi arguably gets too much credit for being a different kind of Star Wars despite cribbing heavily from The Empire Strikes Back and Return Of The Jedi. Despite having being tasked with setting up a 12 hour or so series, The Mandalorian is still blissfully brisk in the way it moves its story along and the characters. Director Dave Filoni—an animator directing live-action for the first time—utilizes a traditional style — again, more in line with the original films — observing the world and that letting the characters and sets breathe and live, sometimes choosing to fill the frame with familiar creatures and weird-looking aliens and other times allowing openness of the episode’s vistas to paint a picture.

After turning in his bounty to Greef Carga (Carl Weathers), the Mandalorian looks to set up another job, turning to Werner Herzog, a mysterious client guarded by an entourage of stormtroopers. Herzog is appropriately mysterious and brings a gravitas similar to Alec Guinness and Peter Cushing. From there, The Mandalorian jets off to a desert planet with abundant, mountainous vistas resembling the old west of Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns. The Mandalorian meets a lone Ugnaught (Nick Nolte) who helps lead him to his prey knowing that, if the stories he has heard are true, the bounty hunter will make short work of the army of bad guys and bring peace back to his planet.

The centerpiece of the premiere is a Sam Peckinpah-inspired shootout featuring production design that combines Mexican influenced architecture with those standard Star Wars flourishes: beat-up barrels, blinking lights, and punctuated by a score that combines the traditional Wagnerian sound of Star Wars with an Ennico Morricone influence. Upon reaching his bounty, the Mandalorian finds IG-11 (Tatiki Watiki), a bounty droid hot on the same trail. The two strike up a tenuous arrangement to team up and split the bounty and the ensuing gunfight plays out like a combination of Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid and The Wild Bunch, complete with a massive laser cannon. The episode feels like the most consistently violent Star Wars has ever been, reminiscent of Obi-Wan Kenobi slicing off Pando Baba’s arm in the cantina and leaving a bloody mess. This is the violent underworld of Star Wars that was touched upon in Solo.

Thankfully, despite the darker characters, the film doesn’t lose any of that Star Wars wit that energizes the best Star Wars films. There’s a quippy sensibility to the dialogue that harkens back to the funnier lines of the original films (“Lock the door. And hope they don’t have blasters.”) While the Mandalorian himself is a man of few words when he does get chatty, it’s all quite comical, engaging in snappy back and forth with his unlikely droid ally. The Last Jedi got a lot of flack for its irreverent sense of humor—one that film’s strongest elements—but when you make a Star Wars story without a sense of humor, well then you’ve just got the prequels.

The Mandalorian himself presents an interesting main character in the grand scheme of Star Wars. Never has an antagonist been this cold in the series: most characters are driven by good or evil and even young Han Solo appeared to have a heart of gold before he became so cynical. The Mandalorian is a man with out a name, and it would appear driven only by money. Time will tell as the series moves on where he’ll end up, but as of right now he is a mystery.

This being the first live-action Star Wars series, it’s notable that the studio has decided to release the episodes weekly, eschewing the concept of “binge-watching.” The Mandalorian makes good on the serialized nature of the show, and at 40 minutes, delivers just enough without overstaying its welcome and ending on a compelling cliffhanger. Hopefully, the series will continue at this clip and bring audiences to even stranger, even weirder, even seedier new worlds each week.

A chapter from my upcoming memoir, Fast, Casual, And Out Of Control…

I interviewed Anthony Bourdain for genre film website Daily Grindhouse in the summer of 2017. One of the world’s favorite personalities graciously sat on the phone with me — a bartender who fancies himself a writer — for an hour to talk about ten of his favorite heist films despite nursing a negroni inspired hangover.

I bristled at the notion of a “celebrity chef” when Bourdain first came on the scene in 2001, catching appearances on Real Time With Bill Maher and occasionally one of his television shows. I became enamoured with the man. I started traveling more than ever when I began to review movies at film festivals, and The Layover or No Reservations were always my first stops when researching where to eat and where to drink in Austin, Montreal, New York, and New Orleans. He was even pretty right on about Chicago, although I would have added a stop at after hours favorite Brewbakers on the city’s south side.

His Twitter account endeared me even to him even more— he was a provocateur, always honest, and didn’t mind ruffling feathers with an opinion that wasn’t approved by the culture police. As someone who works in craft beer, nothing tickled me more than knowing that Anthony Bourdain hated craft beer.

I was relatively intoxicated on a porch in Blue Island—a suburb of Chicago — on the Fourth Of July. It’s been a tradition that myself and a few friends get together on the holiday and drink warm Captain & Coke out of water bottles that we sneak into the local ce-ment pond. We have a steak dinner, crack open a bottle of wine, and debate whether those “are fireworks or gunshots” as all the dogs in the neighborhood go crazy.

Checking my Twitter account for a moment, and I saw that Bourdain had tweeted out a three word review of Edgar Wright’s Baby Driver, simply, “Fuck Baby Driver.” I chuckled to myself, gave it a like and a retweet. I had reviewed Baby Driver for Daily Grindhouse and felt like I was the only person out there who didn’t dig that flick. It was too cutesy, too twee, and at the same time too similar to a late ’90s entry in the Tarantinosploitation genre of films about hitmen who also love pop culture.

Sometimes I wonder if maybe I’m too harsh on movies, particularly when my opinions don’t fall in line with the public or other critics. There is a certain sense of loneliness when everyone likes something but you just don’t and can’t.

Twitter is a hive mind, all of social media is. Its a social media nation.

Maybe things have gotten worse in my thirty-nine years on this Earth, or maybe it’s that nowadays I’ve just got to at least be aware of everyone else’s opinion on pop culture. As a teenager throughout the ‘90s, I would really only know my friends opinions and what Roger Ebert wrote of a recently released film. It’s not all bad though: social media has been a conduit for voices of social and political change, giving a big loud voice for the maligned and unheard. It can also make you realize that no movie is truly underrated: every movie is someone’s favorite movie, you just haven’t met them yet. Social media — and Twitter in particular — is much like the force in Star Wars: it surrounds us and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together. And much like the hokey religion of George Lucas’ space opera, there is a dark side. Provocateurs hiding behind anime avatars looking to play devil’s advocate, regular guys and girls looking to become famous for doing nothing, and celebrities with blue check marks and too much time on their hands.

It gives everyone a big loud voice…even if they don’t deserve it.

It wasn’t long before Bourdain came under fire from filmmakers, critics, movie lovers, and anyone looking for a fight and getting some “likes” in the interest of pop culture virtue signaling. So many people commenting on the issue of the day needing to be “part of the conversation.” The Twitter crime of offering up his unsolicited opinion, Bourdain was brought to task by a bunch of people offering up their unsolicited opinion. Ava DuVernay responded “You don’t have to like it. But have some respect for the artists who made it. You’re better than this. Critique doesn’t have to be cruel.” People I know and love, people I generally agree with even were taking potshots at Bourdain asking, “who cares what a chef thinks about movies.”

Well…

Who cares what critics think about movies?

Who cares what your friends think about movies?

Who cares what YOU think about movies?

Of course, Baby Driver was almost universally praised by critics and audiences. If Bourdain had tweeted “Fuck The Book Of Henry ” — a film reviled by audiences and critics as a whole — would he have caught as much heat or been retweeted into infinity? Must we only subscribe to the “lens of positivity” when it’s something we like? It’s not as if Anthony Bourdain was crashing into people’s mentions explaining to them why they are wrong. The only response he made to the offending tweet was to tweet a poster from 2011’s The Raid as if to say, “now this is an action movie.” Taste is subjective, and this is something Bourdain and I happened to agree upon. Twitter can encourage groupthink as much as it can encourage contrarianism. As a fellow loudmouth, contrarian — and opportunist — I saw a chance to snag a big interview for the site, and simply to chat with the man so he could explain his opinion to the masses. My favorite interviews with celebrities dive into their hobbies and interests. I like hearing musicians discuss their favorite films, filmmakers discuss their favorite music. If Anthony Bourdain followed Daily Grindhouse, he and I must intersect on some of our favorite movies.

I went through all the proper channels: publicists, agents, but I couldn’t get a hold of the man. (Years later, a fellow journalist was attempting to get a hold of him and described him as a ghost.) Then I learned something that turned the whole situation around: Anthony Bourdain followed Daily Grindhouse on Twitter. A piece Wendi Freeman had just published — written in response to Baby Driver — regarding romance in heist films had been retweeted by Bourdain and Bourdain followed our site and our Twitter account. I felt like Rob Gordon in High Fidelity.

“She’s in the fucking phone book.”

The answer was in front of my face the whole time. One of my first “big” interviews was with Tom Holland, director of 1985’s Fright Night, and I caught that simply by writing on the wall of his official Facebook page. Social media really can level the playing field, bringing people together…for better or worse.

One afternoon, while on a bartending shift at Chili’s in Orland Park — a restaurant I’ve called home for over a decade — I slipped into Anthony Bourdain’s DM’s. This sometimes can be considered a modern social faux pas, but since I wasn’t offering up dick pics, I figured I was in the clear. I politely pitched the interview, asking if he’d be interested in explaining his opinion on Baby Driver and offering up some alternative heist about talking about his favorite heist movies.

He responded quickly with a resounding “Sure!”

He explained that he’d love to do a list of his favorite heist flicks but wasn’t “interested in elaborating on [his] hatred of Baby Driver.”

I sent him a link to my review of the film and he wrote back, “I enjoyed your review. It gave me comfort in my moments of seemingly being the lone person in the world to despise that film. Great piece on Thief, too.”

Anthony Bourdain had searched Daily Grindhouse for my name and found my piece on Michael Mann’s 1981 theatrical debut and loved it. Had to play it cool, though…and certainly not admit to working at a Chili’s.

Our conversation made its way to email (he signed them Tony) and I spent the rest of my Tuesday afternoon bartending shift alternating between making Presidente Margaritas, running Chicken Crispers to table 72, and chatting with one of America’s favorite chefs about Michael Mann films. We discussed how Bryan Cox’s Hannibal Lecter in Manhunter may be superior to Anthony Hopkins’ as Bourdain excitedly kept adding to the list of films he wanted to talk about: Mann’s Heat, Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, Sam Peckinpah’s The Getaway, Nicolas Winding Refn’s Drive; all favorites of mine. He turned me onto The Friends Of Eddie Coyle. It wasn’t long before his handler stepped in and said, “alright guys, let’s just set up this interview.”

I needed some time to prep: catch up with the movies I hadn’t seen and jot down some questions. I was also tending bar at Lollapalooza that weekend, but I figured if anyone could be sympathetic to four doubles in a row, it would be the author of Kitchen Confidential: Adventures In The Culinary Underbelly. He was, and we set up the interview.

Confession: I had never read Kitchen Confidential. As I said, I was familiar with the man through television appearances, eating weird shit in foreign locales in a sleeveless Rolling Stones shirt. Time was of the essence so I signed up for Audible and downloaded the audio version read by the man himself. I never saw myself as a “lifer” in the service industry, but that’s where I’m at now. Here he was, writing about the kitchens of high class New York City restaurants and I could completely relate having done 12 years at a suburban Chili’s and various taverns around the south side of Chicago. His stories painted a vivid picture of “the industry” that I had lived for a good chunk of my adult life.

It’s a cliche to say that any piece of art or culture changed your life, so I won’t say that. However, Kitchen Confidential did inspire me:

It inspired me to be a better bartender, to take more care into my craft. This is my career at this point. Bourdain succeeded as a chef because he believed in it, but at the same time, it wasn’t his whole life.

It inspired me to be honest about my past. We’ve all had moments when maybe we weren’t the best person we can be.

It also inspired me in my writing. Yeah, being a bartender is a pretty great gig, but something I learned in Kitchen Confidential was that Bourdain was 42 when his career as a writer took off. I was 37 and that meant I still had time. I related to the man and was inspired by him, too. He was just a working man who found his niche and truly, even before he became a world traveller, lived a life; a life of ups and downs, lows and highs, successes, failures and mistakes. He never had any serious training as a writer but honestly loved the craft and he became one of my favorites. He had a voice unlike anyone else’s at the time — honest and funny — and he brought a certain dignity to an industry full of degenerates, drunks, and weirdos. His writings inspired an industry of cooking and travel shows and — for better or worse — the concept of the celebrity chef.

It was a Wednesday morning, I was sitting in my basement when the call came through. I asked him how he was and he responded “I had a few too many negroni’s last night.”

Honesty. There it was. This was the same guy I had seen on television for over a decade.

During the conversation, he was 100% cool. He was excitable, and it would seem, simply over the moon to be talking about something other than food and travel, which I obviously also loved. I work in craft beer and I don’t think I’ll ever be someone who wants to discuss flavor palette and run down a list of their favorite brewers with bar guests.

The conversation moved along easily; he laughed, he joked. It’s hard to imagine that at one moment this guy was throwing back beers with former President Barack Obama in Vietnam and the next he was chatting with the assistant editor of Daily Grindhouse about The Asphalt Jungle.

When the subject of Walter Hill (who co-wrote The Getaway) came up, I had to ask Bourdain his opinion on Streets Of Fire (a favorite of mine). He responded simply:

“That’s not a good movie.”

Nobody’s perfect.

At about the hour mark he mentioned that we had to wrap it up, so after a few more questions, I thanked him for his time and he replied, “always happy to talk about movies.”

The article ran on Daily Grindhouse about a week later and it did gangbusters numbers for our site. It was probably one of our biggest gets in terms of celebrities. Bourdain wasn’t a cult figure in film, a scream queen, or an up and coming director. This was someone that everyone knew, even if they didn’t like him. Some of the best feedback I got on the piece was that people who initially thought he was an asshole turned a corner on him and noted, “he’s pretty alright.” Bret Easton Ellis read it and said he liked it. A friend shared the piece stating, “what I love about this most is that it’s two guys just shooting the shit about movies.”

I was up early the morning of June 8th, 2018 as the trailer for Blumhouse’s Halloween reboot was set to premiere and I was working on a piece for the site. I was still laying in my bed when my phone began buzzing.

“Dude, Anthony Bourdain died.”

It was shocking to say the least, and honestly my first thought was “that boy likes to eat, drink and party. Had to be a heart attack.” Daily Grindhouse had just been tagged a week or so before about an episode of Parts Unknown that was set to air. I went about my day, penned a tribute for Consequence Of Sound, and played a rock ’n’ roll show at Quenchers with Modern Day Rippers that night. The next night, I worked my usual bartending shift at Rock Island Public House where a Saint Anthony Bourdain candle now watches over us all.

I would have loved to talk movies with him again.

— MIKE VANDERBILT (@MikeVanderbilt)

Solo: A Star Wars Story is the sequel audiences probably would have expected in 1980: a simpler, much smaller story far removed from the deeper, darker The Empire Strikes Back. Eight theatrical films later, Solo is the closest the Star Wars series has come in tone and style to the 1977 original, eschewing the grand space opera and epic tragedy of the Skywalker saga for a slam-bang swashbuckling adventure flick featuring a car chase, a train heist, and a series of narrow escapes.

Upon its release in May of 2018, Solo received fair reviews, a tepid response from audiences, and ultimately flopped at the box office — as much as film that ultimately grossed $392,924,808 worldwide could be considered a flop. It simply didn’t make as much money as the other Star Wars releases from the past forty years.

Was it Star Wars fatigue? This was the shortest period of time between the release of Star Wars films in the franchise’s history. Was Solo simply (and ironically) up against impossible odds, taking on the juggernaut that was Avengers: Infinity War?

Was it the Boycott Solo “movement”? Maybe, but it is ironic that those who pledged to boycott Solo as a reaction to The Last Jedi featuring a diverse cast of women and people of color missed out on what is essentially Cool Straight White Guy: The Movie. (A movie that, at the same time, featured one of the most diverse casts of the franchise to date.)

Some fans called the movie unnecessary, but what movie really is necessary? Star Wars would have been perfect as a standalone film. Isn’t it enough to see one of your favorite characters in a new big screen adventure? Fans ate up the extended universe from Brian Daley’s Han Solo trilogy of the ’70s and beyond. There’s the argument that there’s no stakes since we know Han Solo survives, but they must not have seen The Force Awakens.

He dead.(Also, there are more to “stakes” than who lives and who dies.)

Or perhaps, it was due to the behind the scenes shake ups that shut down production on Solo in the summer of 2017. Kathleen Kennedy is no dummy. She’s been cranking out hits for over three decades. Very little of the footage that Phil Lord and Chris Miller shot has been seen — it’s been rumored that over 70% of the film was remade during reshoots — but if it wasn’t working for Kennedy, it more than likely simply was not working. It also appears the production wasn’t jiving well with Empire Strikes Back scribe and Solo co-screenwriter Lawrence Kasdan, for whom Solo was obviously a passion project (Kasdan has always stated that Han Solo is his favorite character in the franchise.)

orman has admitted in interviews that upon seeing the original Star Wars in 1977, that he recognized the game had been indefinitely changed: the B pictures were now becoming the A pictures.

That time crunch, along with a budget depleted by multiple shoots, lent a low-budget vibe to Solo that hadn’t been present in the franchise since the making of the original. The rough edges offer up a cobbled together look akin to the original film — which, don’t forget, featured a laser sword that was built out of old camera parts. The humanoid aliens made up with plastic and hooded capes, the sets that look spray painted and dingy; this is the lived-in universe that the original Star Wars introduced to audiences. It also nods to 1977, costuming Alden Ehrenreich’s young Han Solo like a member of the Clash crossed with Steve McQueen and Donald Glover’s Lando Calrissian like the coolest cat at Studio 54. The behind the scene shake-ups — and a knowingness of what feels like Star Wars — add to the delightfulness of this film.

Solo recalls the original film while giving audiences something different, making good on what was teased with Rogue One and The Last Jedi. While notable entries in the Star Wars franchise, both promised something different in terms of vision and storytelling, but ultimately fell into many of the same tropes that populate the series: the Rebellion versus the Empire, the dysfunctional Skywalker family, and lightsaber showdowns in throne rooms.

The first Star Wars film not to open up in space — and almost the first one not to feature a lightsaber — instead beginning with a stolen hot rod speeding down a city street, Solo gives the audience a better look at a part of the Star Wars galaxy that has only been glimpsed in previous films: the criminal underworld. The Empire exists on the periphery of this world: They are in control of the galaxy, and the climax teases the birth of the Rebellion, but the focus is the gangsters and thieves who have been teased throughout the franchise’s run from Mos Eisley Cantina to Jabba’s Palace. Solo is one part heist film and one part Western, and this is the corner of the Star Wars universe that Michael Mann or Walter Hill would have thrived in, featuring hitmen, crime bosses, gangsters, and duplicit thieves with their own code.

In exploring the underworld, Bradford Young’s cinematography eschews the flat, well l-lit style of most big-budget action fare — including the Star Wars prequels, sequels, and Marvel films — for something darker and more experimental. The criminal underworld of the Star Wars universe lives in the shadow of the Empire and the Skywalker saga, and Young wisely uses that darkness to create a world full of mystery and danger around every corner. Solo doesn’t look like any Star Wars movie that came before it, and while The Last Jedi usually gets the credit for changing the way Star Wars can look, Solo deserves credit, too. The film’s visual language has more in common with the foggy McCabe & Mrs. Miller and the rain slicked, Chicago streets of Thief than The Phantom Menace, or even Return Of The Jedi.

Of course, for all its deviations, Solo is still a Star Wars story. From Revenge Of The Sith to The Last Jedi, the mirroring of adventure from generation to generation has informed the Star Wars story for decades. While Solo certainly deviates from storytelling tropes and visual style of the franchise, it still has one foot in the saga: Han Solo’s story slyly mirrors that of Luke Skywalker. Both are young men craving adventure and excitement, bored with their bleak, desolate homes, longing to escape. Along the way — essentially over the course of a long weekend — they meet a slightly older, much cooler guy who becomes their best friend, meet new alien and robot companions, find their signature ship, and meet an older mentor who helps shape the trajectory for the rest of their lives — albeit in different ways. Whereas Obi-Wan Kenobi puts Luke on the righteous path to become a guardian of all that is good as a Jedi Knight, Han is betrayed by Woody Harrelson’s Tobias Beckett — as well the woman he loves- — taking a wide-eyed, optimistic kid and turning him into the cynical man audiences will meet in Mos Eisley Cantina. In a film loaded with terrific performances, Harrelson truly steals the show. An A-list character actor, Harrelson simply does Harrison and disappears into the role of the older criminal who takes Han under his wing.

Harlesson’s Tobias Beckett is just one of the memorable new characters that father-son screenwriting team Lawrence and Jonathan Kasdan introduce in the film. From the foul Lady Proxima to Beckett’s crew, the characters are admittedly sometimes dispatched as quickly as they are introduced, but that has always been done in the Star Wars. Fans tend to forget that long before Timothy Zahn’s Heir To The Empire and the introduction of the expanded universe, some of the coolest characters in Star Wars had very little backstory explained away in the films. Most times, they had none at all. From the space werewolves and Bo Shek in the Mos Eisley cantina to Boba Fett, they are simply archetypes in cool costumes. And so audiences pieced together what they could from the back of Kenner toy boxes, the occasional novelization, and most importantly their own imaginations to create a mythology for these characters, who were cool looking designs with personalities told in broad strokes.

A misstep of Star Wars films since the prequel trilogy was not focusing on the interpersonal relationships of the characters. The original Star Wars features strangers on and adventure who become friends and then Empire splits them up. The prequels and the more recent sequel films don’t give the characters enough time with each other, just hanging out. Solo delivers this right in the middle, allowing the driving adventure to slow down and allow the characters to get to know each other as a respite to the action. Han and Lando quietly discuss their parents, Beckett imparts wisdom to Han, and Han and the otherworldy Emilia Clarke as Qi’ra have a truly romantic moment in Lando’s cape closet, and Star Wars has been almost devoid of romance since Return Of The Jedi. It’s broad strokes, but that’s a tenant of the franchise. Let your imagination fill in the gaps.

A masterwork of effortless world building, the Cantina sequence left an indelible mark on pop culture. It was parodied and copied for years afterwards, even by the creative team at Lucasfilm, but no one was never able to quite recapture that magic. Drydon Vos’ pleasure barge recaptures a little bit of it, giving the audience something that’s both familiar and out there. It feels like a crime lord’s hangout from an ’80s Cannon film: slick, chrome, with the cocktails flowing and Imperials mingling with aliens. Vos’ hangout feels gangster.

John Powell is the soul of Solo: A Star Wars Story, delivering the most memorable Star Wars score since 1983. John Williams’ “The Adventures Of Han” features the composer at his most swashbuckling, playing on the audience’s knowledge that the characters of Han Solo and Indiana Jones have the same D.N.A., to create one of the most memorable film themes in recent years. Powell blends military style drums and soaring notes, creating a track that at once recalls Moriconne’s overlooked Disclosure score & ’90s Bruckheimer/Simpson productions. The diegetic use of the “Imperial March” at the recruitment center on Corellia is one of the film’s most memorable moments, implying that everyone from Luke Skywalker to Dengar have at one point in their life heard Darth Vader’s theme music. With “The Han Solo Megamix” that is “Reminiscence Therapy” , Powell effortlessly blends Han Solo’s new theme with elements “Death Star Theme,” “The Asteroid Field,” and other classic bits of Star Wars music. That isn’t fan service, that is leitmotif.

Solo: A Star Wars Story deserved better, and perhaps audiences simply weren’t ready for it. I do predict that upon its tenth anniversary of the film’s release, on whatever social media has devolved into by then, there will be countless hologram think pieces about how it was underappreciated in its own time. I’ve been on board since day one. Solo was for all intents and purposes the Star Wars sequel that I have been wanting to see since 1983. There so many things to adore about Solo: A Star Wars Story: brandy exists in space. Humans can have sex with robots. It’s a welcome return to romance, a return to fun…a return to the galaxy far, far, away that I have always — and will always — love. Also, Solo is the only Star Wars movie to feature Clint Howard, and that should really say it all.

In February of 1977, Cheap Trick unleashed its self titled debut on an unsuspecting public. Like most of Cheap Trick’s history, the facts are uncertain; there’s no exact release date to be found, but anyone who was there suggests that it was around the first week of February. This is very on brand for the band: Cheap Trick’s liner notes explain that Cheap Trick is a band without a past. With its first record, Cheap Trick created something truly unique, which has been both a blessing and a curse for the band over the past four decades. While they were a favorite of Kurt Cobain’s, and remain a favorite of record store clerks and rock ’n’ roll enthusiasts to this day, the very same uniqueness that attracts these tastemakers has made it difficult for the band to attain U2 or Bruce Springsteen levels of stadium success.

1976 saw rock music in a state of flux. As Cheap Trick was coming into its own in the midwest, punk rock was taking over New York City and London. Hip hop was coming into its own on the east coast, and for the first time, the cassette tape was rivaling the LP for consumer dominance. Blondie had released its debut album, and The Damned and The Sex Pistols had both unleashed their first singles. A sea change was coming — even if, in the midst of the punk rock explosion, the Eagles’ Hotel California hit #1 that December. Cheap Trick signed to a five year recording contract with Epic records on August 1, 1976, and in less than six months the band’s debut record would populate record stores around the world. Cheap Trick , particularly on its debut , was unclassifiable, splitting the difference between the heavier rock acts that crowded FM radio, the British Invasion-inspired pop that came in the wake of The Beatles, and the punk acts that were unleashing a sonic assault on the record industry.

Audiences — and, arguably, record labels and managers — never knew what to make of Cheap Trick; the band was at once too smart for radio rock, too proficient for punk, too heavy for the pop tarts, and too succinct for the prog rockers and metalheads. Plus, their look was bizarre and wholly original, even in an era was David Bowie was king; singer Robin Zander and bassist Tom Petersson resembled members of late-era Roxy Music, while guitarist Rick Nielsen took on a cartoon character persona. And drummer Bun E. Carlos? He looked like the band’s accountant.

Cheap Trick has always been a quintessentially Midwestern band: too cynical for the glamour of Los Angeles, and too down to earth for New York City. Elvis Costello told Creem in 1981 you have your entire life to write your first album, and Cheap Trick was the result of vigorous playing and constant touring out on the Midwest bar-band circuit. The result is a rock ’n’ roll record like no other, equal parts poppy, powerful, angsty, funny, scary, sweet, and — to paraphrase a future hit for the band — just a little weird. Producer Jack Douglas, who is credited with signing the band, aimed to capture the raucous live sound that the band had perfected in clubs back home.

There was something in the ether in the Midwest (or maybe it was the water ) around that time, as kids that grew up on The Who and The Beatles were ready to stab bloated ’70s radio rock in the heart and let it bleed all over the stage. Fans often refer to Cheap Trick as the “midwest Beatles,” as well as luminaries of power pop, a term coined by Pete Townshend of The Who. In the ’70s, Chicago and its surrounding areas gave birth to Pezband — which The Today Show’s Jane Pauley called called “the sound everybody would be talking about” in 1977 — as well as Off Broadway, Cleveland’s The Raspberries, and countless bar bands that cribbed from the British Invasion playbook.

But while Cheap Trick is often categorized as power pop, “We’re a bit heavier than those types of bands,” as bassist Tom Peterson explained to the Chicago Reader in 2016. “We tend to have scarier lyrical content and subject matter. Darker and really heavy — it borders on heavy metal sometimes.” Power pop was quickly becoming a catchall for rock bands that weren’t quite AOR and weren’t quite punk that labels didn’t know how to sell, similar to “new wave.” While Cheap Trick’s influence on, and contributions to, the power-pop subgenre cannot be denied, what makes Cheap Trick more memorable than most bands of its era is that while it is power pop, it also transcends power pop. (It’s like how the Velvet Underground isn’t “punk” in the traditional sense, but many punk acts were inspired by Lou Reed and company.) In the 40 blistering minutes that make up 1977’s Cheap Trick, the band runs the gamut between sweet harmonies, dissonant guitars, and peculiar subject matter, never feeling like its pandering to a particular audience. They’re simply being themselves.

There’s something more sinister and infinitely more sardonic in the DNA of Cheap Trick than most power pop or rock acts of the day, whose lyrics are all about falling in love or getting laid. ”Jack Douglas tried to pick songs that were controversial,” Zander revealed in Reputation Is A Fragile Thing. “That’s the kind of record he wanted us to do. It could have been all sweet stuff, because we had a lot of sweet sounding stuff.” Nielsen added, “I feel like I should use different songwriting names” because of the band’s wildly divergent subject matter, but “screw it. Your personality is that you have all that stuff inside of you. You shouldn’t feel embarrassed about any of it.”

From its opening salvo, Cheap Trick is unlike most rock records of the era: The opening track, “ELO Kiddies,” is a rock ’n’ roll rumination on getting older from a band barely out of its twenties, an alarm clock in the mix subtly telling listeners to wake up. “ELO Kiddies was one of my favorites,” drummer Bun E. Carlos explains in Reputation Is A Fragile Thing. “In one way, it tells kids to go out and have fun and go nuts and go completely wild, but remember when you get to be a little older you’re going to wake up with headaches and you’re going to get ulcers.”

With a pitch black sense of humor, “Kiddies” seamlessly transitions into “Daddy Should Have Stayed In High School,” where lead singer Robin Zander takes on the role of a character proclaiming that he’s been “waiting every night after school,” fantasizing in falsetto about being ”your daddy.” About the song, Nielsen told Guitar World that he was “trying to put [himself] in the place of a grown man who’s consumed by lust for girls half his age.” “

The cynical “Taxman, Mr. Thief” riffs on money, greed, and The Beatles while emulating the feel of a wood-paneled Midwest basement that reeks of low-grade grass and stale Point beer. “Cry, Cry” is closer to a traditional pop song, full of bluesy swagger as Zander cribs from Elvis Presley’s “Heartbreak Hotel,” asserting that “he’s been so lonely, baby.” Closing out Side 1 (the album features a Side 1 and a Side A, suggesting that the band has no B material), “Oh, Candy” — arguably the most traditional “power pop” tune on the record — at first appears to be a lovelorn song of romance gone sour, but it is in fact about the band’s photographer, nicknamed M & M, who had died by suicide.

An Advertisement For Cheap Trick.

Side A kicks off with the blistering and lusty come on “Hot Love,” followed by what would become a live showcase for Petersson’s 12-string bass playing (he played a 4-string on the recording) cover of Terry Reid’s “Speak Now Or Forever Hold Your Peace.” Next up, “He’s A Whore” is two minutes and forty three seconds of punk fury that would go on to inspire both Steve Albini and Joey Ramone.Then, “Mandocello” is the closest thing to a ballad featured on Cheap Trick, but still features heavy bass groove and drives almost as hard as anything else on the record. Finally, closer “The Ballad Of T.V. Violence (I’m Not The Only Boy)” — decidedly not a ballad — was a favorite of the band’s live sets. Originally titled “The Ballad Of Richard Speck”, the heavy number finds Zander singing from the point of view of the infamous serial killer who, in July of 1966, brutally tortured, raped, and murdered eight student nurses in Chicago. “I’m not the only boy,” Zander wails like a madman, before the album closes out with a lone gunshot.

To promote the record, Cheap Trick recorded a series of promotional videos at a club called the Night Gallery in Waukegan, IL, a far north suburb of Chicago. The band played the venue regularly, “I don’t have that many fond memories [of Night Gallery],” Petersson revealed to the Chicago Reader in 2016. “It was such a drag with the hours. You’d get there at 4 PM. We’d go on at 10 PM, we’d go on at 2 AM, and we’d go on at 4 AM. Then six in the morning rolls around.” But regardless of whether they really wanted to be there, the band recorded clips for “ELO Kiddies,” “Oh, Candy,” “He’s A Whore,” and “The Ballad Of T.V. Violence” at the venue.

This was still a pre-MTV landscape, but according to Pitchfork, “local television stations would often air the clips between programs, and discos started streaming them on loop via closed-circuit TV. Actual music video programs started taking shape as well.”

The music press lauded Cheap Trick upon its release. Trouser Press’ Ira Robbins wrote of the band that they were “sarcastic, smart, nasty, powerful, tight, casual, and destined for something great,” while Rolling Stone compared the band’s playing to the coaching style of Vince Lombardi: “heavy emphasis on basics with a strain of demented violence to keep the opposition intimidated.” An appropriate comparison for a band of Midwesterners. Meanwhile, back in Chicago, “[Cheap Trick’s] first album came out during a time when everything that wasn’t Linda Ronstadt or Styx was considered punk rock,” rock DJ Lin Brehmer explained to the Chicago Reader. “Working at a progressive rock FM station, we embraced ‘Mandocello’ and ‘ELO Kiddies.’ In those days, the music director would put a large index card on the album for DJs to make comments and suggest which tracks to play. I remember the first comment on Cheap Trick was simply, ‘ELO Kiddies!,’ which was shorthand for ‘killer track’.”

Throughout the ’80s, Cheap Trick would lean into the power pop tag that had been put on it with the catchy, melodic MTV staples “If You Want My Love” and “Tonight It’s You,” as well as peppering albums with weirdo jams like “I Want Be Man” and “Man-U-Lip-U-Later.” The closest the band ever came to recapturing that raw sound of their debut would be twenty years later, with another self-titled record that most fans have called a sonic rebirth. With their first album, Cheap Trick set the stage for a long career with ups and downs, never truly gaining the stadium success of their contemporaries, but never truly selling out, either. Cheap Trick — like most debut albums — is the band at its most honest: schizophrenic, darkly comic, and just a little bit weird.

Give a listen to Cheap Trick on Spotify!

Follow Mike Vanderbilt on Twitter @MikeVanderbilt

The story I’ve concocted in my own head is that on a bitterly cold May afternoon in the Windy City, in a corner tavern, sometime in the late ’00s, a pair of jagoff, day shift bartenders were doing a deep clean. They got out the simple green and buckets of soapy water and started down the bottom shelf behind the bar, blowing the off the dust off of the collection of ancient booze and liqueurs that haven’t been produced since the Kennedy administration. The sunlight beamed through the dusty air, like the Staff of Ra, revealing the yellow label adorned with a blue and white crest and a rose. They had discovered a bottle of Malört. The fearless heroes cracked open the bottle, the distinct aroma escaping from the neck, and made a suicide pact to each to a shot. The men cringed, making two of the first Malört faces in recorded history, and they both knew they had a new shot for amateurs who wanted something “fun and fruity” or something free for their birthday. From there, a new Chicago tradition was born.

The facts are that Carl Jeppson, a Swedish immigrant to Chicago, originally distilled Malört in the 1930’s. Malört is actually the brand name of Jeppson’s bask, a spiced liquor flavored with wormwood, although some might suggest that it’s actually earthworm. (Bask is Swedish for bitter— which anyone who’s done a shot of Malört can attest is, certainly one way to describe it—while malört is Swedish for wormwood). Like Q-tips and Band-Aids however, Malört has become the catchall term for this particular style of booze. Malört was made in Chicago at the Mar-Salle distillery until the mid-‘70s after which it was distilled in both Kentucky and eventually Florida (of course).

“Most first-time drinkers of Jeppson Malört reject our liquor. Its strong, sharp taste is not for everyone,” original bottles read. “Our liquor is rugged and unrelenting (even brutal) to the palate. During almost 60 years of American distribution, we found only 1 out of 49 men will drink Jeppson Malört. During the lifetime of our founder, Carl Jeppson was apt to say, ‘My Malört is produced for that unique group of drinkers who disdain light flavor or neutral spirits.’ It is not possible to forget our two-fisted liquor. The taste just lingers and lasts — seemingly forever. The first shot is hard to swallow! Perservere [sic]. Make it past two ‘shock-glasses’ and with the third you could be ours… forever.”

Now the label simply reads, “Jeppson Malört has the aroma and full-bodied flavor of an unusual botanical. It’s [sic] bitter taste is savored by two-fisted drinkers.”

There’s something to be said for truth in advertising.

I first encountered Malört around ’08, in the suburbs of Chicago, of all places. I had been drinking that afternoon away with some co-workers when we stumbled into Pelican Harry’s (14807 Founders Crossing Homer Glen, IL 60491) a nondescript sports bar in Homer Glen. My friends had shifted from fun to annoying and asked a bartender for a fun shot. He simply replied “How about a Malört?”

I had been tending bar for a few years and been drinking for a few more, but I had never heard of it. A friend of mine claims that his dad kept a bottle around the house and dared people to drink it “before it was cool,” but I can’t confirm or deny that I tried it. I thought this bartender was going to pour up shots of red wine. The girls took the shots.

And they were none too pleased.

I watched Malört evolve from a cruel bartender’s joke, to a craft beer enthusiast’s favorite side dish, to a right of passage at Rock Island Public House (13328 Old Western Ave, Blue Island, IL 6040) where I tend bar on weekends. When IPA’s became the big trend in the craft beer explosion, the distinct flavor of Malort was a natural pairing to the bitter, hoppy beers that crowded bar room taps. Bartenders like it because it’s (relatively) low proof, so you can shoot it all night with your unassuming guests and still be able to count the drawer at the end of your shift. The “ Malört face” has become synonymous with this bitter elixer, from novices to old pros. It can only be described as a cross section of surprise and disgust, and sometimes even followed il with “thats not so bad.” It began as a regional thing, but now drinkers around the nation have become aware of Malört. Whenever I’m on the road covering a film festival for Daily Grindhouse, I will try to bring a bottle, and try to track it down at a tavern in town. Malört become a secret handshake between bartenders, and it also announces that you have probably spent some time in Chicago. Two perfect conversation starters.

What follows will be an evolving list of places I’ve visited and where to find the Malört. Enjoy—or don’t, some jagoff is going to make you do a shot someday, someway.

Austin, Texas

Hard Luck Lounge

3526 E. Seventh, Austin TX 78702

It took me three moves on my original “Quest For Malört” during the South By Southwest Festival. I escaped a dull industry party—where I was listening to writer types wax about social issues in horror films—to the Brixton next door. I had visited the Brixton years before; I always like to stop at any bar that Jon Taffer got his hands onto that’s still open. The Brixton in East Austin is probably too clean to be considered a true dive, but it certainly had all the rock ’n’ roll dive aesthetics that I appreciate: band stickers adorning the bathroom stall, bartenders in their best Fred Perry, and a jukebox loaded with CD’s that might as well have come from my personal collection. They even offer a T-shirt that riffs on the classic Cheap Trick logo. I sipped on whiskey as ELO blasted out of the jukebox. South By attracts all types, and the Brixton was catering to all of them. As ELO poured out of the jukebox, I struck up a conversation with the bartender the only way I know how.

“You guys got Malört?”

He chuckled a knowing chuckle, and explained that they didn’t carry it there, but I should make way over to the Eastern (1511 E. 6th St.)which was just in walking distance. He and I continued to chat about the Bar Rescue renovation and how Pearl beer (the local swill in Austin) is the inspiration for Alamo Beer on King Of The Hill. I wrapped up with a shot of Fernet and made my way down the street. The Eastern is a true dive—grimy, dark, tiny—in other words, my kind of place.

They didn’t have Malört (in hindsight, I believe the bartender at the Brixton recognized I was industry and a good tipper, so he figured he’d send me to his buddies place to spread the wealth), but the bartender did suggest that I check out the Hard Luck Lounge.

Located just a Lyft ride away, the Hard Luck Lounge (3536 E. 7th St.), features a slightly ’70s lounge aesthetic on the inside and a patio that looks like it was built especially for a Tito’s Vodka commercial populated with influencers in cute cowboy hats and wayfarers. A pretty good roots rock band had the stage, and there were plenty of food truck options.

“You guys got Malört?” I asked

“We sure do, and I’m going to guess that you’re from Chicago, and maybe a bartender.”

He was right. The secret handshake had worked, and I had struck bitter gold deep in the heart of Texas.

Los Angeles, California

The Greyhound Bar & Grill

5570 North Figueroa St., Los Angeles, CA 90042

By the time I landed in Los Angeles, the word was already out that I’d be on the prowl for a bottle of that magical, Chicago elixir. I was immediately pointed in the direction of The Greyhound. Described to be as a “Chicago themed bar,” I certainly didn’t notice anything Windy City-centric on the walls — but plenty of Ohio and Los Angeles sports paraphernalia. My friend David Lyons of the Beyond Yacht Rock podcast and I sauntered in there pretty late on a Tuesday night, the lights were down, chairs were up. Even with last call already having been made, the bartender was pleasant and sympathetic to our plight.

“We just need two shots of Malört and we’ll be out of your hair.”

He laughed and replied “if that’s what you really want.”

We did our shots and absconded into the night.

I wanted to make a more sober, more lucid stop before I was winging my way back to Chicago, so on my last night in town after dinner at Columbo’s — a classic “red sauce joint” — Dave and I returned to The Greyhound. Once again, I was struck by the friendliness of the bartender, a different one, but excusing that same service industry professionalism.

Dave picked up the round, including two shots for some friendly locals who were curious about Malört. The shots could best be described as “long pours”: at least two full ounces rather than the standard ounce or ounce and a quarter. Well lubricated at this point, Dave and I attempted to explain the origins of Malort to our new friends as well as the geography of Chicago, noting that I’m from the south side of the city, home to the White Sox and Leroy Brown. The conversation slowed and the booze started to catch up with us. I checked my phone, gliding through all of my social media. A man who had been sitting on the other end of the bar eavesdropping tapped my shoulder.

“Hey fella.”

I looked up.

“South siders don’t brag about where they’re from,” he said with a smug smile.

“Who said I was bragging!?” I shouted as he retreated out the door.

Even in Los Angeles, I’ve got a 24-karat, south side jagoff attempting to ruin my good time. He’s lucky Dave didn’t hear him. Dave studies karate.

New Orleans, Louisiana

Pal’s Lounge

949 N. Rendon St, New Orleans, LA 70119

Pal’s Lounge is a divey, neighborhood joint with a great jukebox located in the Mid-City area of New Orleans. Mid-City is also home to the Dixie Brewing Company—the local swill, the “Old Style” if you will, of New Orleans. Always cheap, always there. Pal’s hosted the closing night party of the 2018 Overlook Film Festival, honestly, one of my favorite film festivals I went to last year. It’s cliche to say, but you gotta go to New Orleans once in your life. There is truly no place like it. Austin is fine, but Chicago has spoiled me with 4 A.M. bars, so a city that never shuts down is like a dream come true for someone that never sleeps.

I had been running my mouth about Malört my new friends Andre Gower (a.k.a Sean from The Monster Squad) as well as the brains behind the Monster Squad documentary Wolfman’s Got Nards, Henry Darrow McComas and Wes Caldwell. Lo and behold, Pal’s was offering a Malört special. Pal’s is apparently a favorite amongst service industry workers, so the presence of Malört up. I ordered up a round and was surprised to notice that it wasn’t the bottle I was familiar with. It was Leatherbee’s brand Malort, which I had never fucked with before. (Leatherbee’s has since been renamed Besk, as the brand name Malort is trademarked by Jeppson’s). The Besk went down smooth…a little too smooth. The bitterness was still there, but there was so much citrus that it was almost…palatable. It didn’t carry that distinct flavor of Fabuloso and shame. It just wasn’t the same. I mean, we still got drunk, and here’s photographic evidence of that.

My quest wasn’t over. I still had two days left in that town. There had to be somewhere down here that carried bonafide Jeppson’s Malört.

Lost Love Lounge

2529 Dauphine, St. New Orleans LA 70117

I found Malört accident at Lost Love Lounge, one of the oldest taverns in the Faubourg Marigny section Of New Orleans. A new friend named Lauren Clement who worked for the festival had invited Katie Rife and I out for drinks at this cool little dive. (Lauren and I met after she introduced herself at another Overlook party, despite the fact that I “looked like some sort of asshole in those sunglasses.”) Lauren had become interested in the concept of the “Chicago handshake,” which is a shot of Malört a can of Old Style. Lost Love didn’t carry Old Style, but in a pinch, a Dixie will do.

The bar itself is spacious, featuring a pool table, a great jukebox featuring 2 Tone ska, punk, and new wave favorites (pay heed to the sign that reads “Let bartenders know that you’re playing the jukebox,” or you’ll be waiting for Godot), and Vietnamese food in the back.

And most importantly, Malört.

New York City, New York

Nitehawk Cinema

136 Metropolitan Ave. Brooklyn, NY

The Nitehawk Cinema in Brooklyn is known for showing art house films as well as their carefully curated midnight screenings. I blew into town from the Fantasia Festival in Montreal to host two screenings of the rarely seen cult classic The Astrologer. There was no Malört to be found in Montreal, as it is considered a terrorist act bringing it out of the country.

While waiting for The Nitehawk to open up on Friday afternoon, I wandered into Skinny Dennis next door. Skinny Dennis was one of the most memorable dives of my trip to New York City. Paintings of Graham Parsons and Willie Nelson adorn the walls, while peanut shells cover the floor. I felt like I was in an Old 97’s or Whiskeytown tune, sipping on an ice cold Narragansett out of a mason jar.

I made my way over the the theater to share a drink with Jon Abrams, editor-in-chief of Daily Grindhouse. Per my M.O., I sidled up to the bar.

“You guys got Malört”

Sure enough they did, but it was buried all the way in the back of a cabinet— some might say where it belongs. It was Leatherbee’s, but what should I expect? I’m in New York. I can’t blame the Malort soley for being “wildly intoxicated,” as one journalist wrote during my introduction to The Astrologer that evening, but it certainly helped the cause.

Check back for further updates! It’s a new year and I’ve got lots of places to go and spread the gospel of Chicago’s own Malört.

The Mutiny is closed for good, and with that another Chicago rock club bites the dust. It shouldn’t have come as any surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention to Logan Square over the past decade: the neighborhood’s been changing and strangers are moving in…strangers with strollers. Over the summer, the other rock club on Western, Quenchers Saloon — located just down the block from The Mutiny — hosted their final show, and in its place, a medical office in a sky blue paint job will be raised. Rock clubs come and go. Musicians and fans ten years older than me pine for the days of Enuff Z’ Nuff at The Thirsty Whale, old punk rockers reminisce about Tut’s and Medusa’s, and the boomers look back fondly on suburban rock clubs like B’Ginnings in Schaumburg and Night Gallery in Waukegan where Pezband and Cheap Trick made their bones. The (original) Double Door may be gone, but smaller clubs like Empty Bottle, Subterranean, and Hideout remain although they are constantly feeling the threat of gentrification. The Mutiny — despite its sometimes nefarious reputation as a dump — was indeed special. From the outside, The Mutiny was indistinguishable from any other bar in Chicago with an Old Style signing hanging over the doorway…except for the paint on the main window exclaiming “Bands Wanted!” When a band is just starting out, it’s hard to get a gig. You have to have some notoriety, or at the baseline, the right friends to get a night at “The Bottle” or the Hideout, but all you needed to do to play at The Mutiny was make a phone call. The Mutiny gave bands that were just starting out a place to get their stage legs. For anyone who’s ever been on the job hunt, this is that “experience” that employers want; you might say The Mutiny offered rock ’n’ roll internships. The Mutiny let anybody play…even The Romeros.

I played with The Romeros from 2004 all the way up until 2016. I have a bad habit of holding onto things way past their expiration date from relationships to jobs to bands. When I was 24 and could barely play guitar, much less play guitar and sing, The Romeros made Ray’s Pizza in Blue Island our home base. We were just starting out and during these early days, gigs were few and far between. Even knowing plenty of people in bands around town, we really weren’t getting offers for one reason or another. Friend, bandmate, and occasional partner in crime Pat O’Sullivan gave me an expert piece of advice on booking shows, a piece of advice that I’ve held close to to this day.

“Find a bar you want to play, call them, and book a show.”

It really was that simple. That’s how we got the Ray’s Pizza gig, that’s how we played Stash Leahy’s on Olde Western Avenue, and that’s how we got our first gig at Stage 83 out in Lemont. Most bar owners were happy to have a band play, especially if they brought in “a couple two tree” weekday drinkers and weren’t asking to get payed. The Romeros played more than a few dives on the south side — most times there was barely a stage and certainly not a sound guy as we supplied the P.A. — but playing a north side of Chicago gig felt like a step towards something: it was a big deal. I took to the music section of The Chicago Reader and found The Mutiny’s number. I dialed it up on my Nokia flip phone and a bartender answered. I explained to her that I had a band and we wanted to play. The bartender replied simply “What night would you like?” We ended up playing on April 20th, 2005…a Wednesday night. Even at The Mutiny a Friday or Saturday gig was coveted, but as most Romeros worked wonky hours, a Wednesday night would be a perfect night to play a show…and get ridiculously drunk. Honestly, that was the appeal of a Romeros show to most of our friends, a reason to toss a few back with the gang on a weeknight.We played alongside another band doing the power pop thing, Greenlight who we would share gigs with from time to time . I remember soundchecking with Prince’s “When You Were Mine” and the bartender complimented our Cyndi Lauper cover. The set went as well as early Romeros sets did, and the whole band felt alive. It was exciting playing The Mutiny. We felt legitimate. We felt like we could take on the whole Empire by ourselves.

A bar like The Mutiny is important, and I imagine every town has one. The place was hated as much as it was loved and there were plenty of musicians I knew who refused to play there. The stage setup was odd: a singer/guitar player wasn’t allowed to set up center stage due to the fire code and the drummer generally was set up stage right, there was no green room so your gear was kept up front with the audience (my Fender 410 doubled as a pub table more than a few times) and everytime I played there, someone’s car got broken into. That said, for as many musicians I knew that refused to play there, there were twice as many that only wanted to play there. It was a fun venue, greasy and grimy in all the ways a rock club should be. Owner Ed Mroz was always happy to have you at his place, even if you didn’t draw 20–25 people on a Tuesday. The sign in the window exclaiming “Bands Wanted” wasn’t just a ploy to get people in the door, Mroz genuinely enjoyed hosting rock ’n’ roll outfits from all over America and the world, even the south side of Chicago. While having a draw is important, The Mutiny also served as a favorite local dive for Logan Square residents and rock ’n’ roll types from around the city and as there was never a cover charge, anyone could be there. Even if it wasn’t a tastemaker from Creem or Rolling Stone, somebody would be there to check you out for a few songs and maybe compliment your energy. Rock ’N’ Roll in Chicago is like any scene: “community” becomes a code for clique, and gatekeepers and promoters could lock a band out if they simply didn’t like the way they looked. Anyone who’s been on the job hunt can relate to the concept of “how do I get experience if I can’t get a job to gain said experience.” It’s the same thing being in band, how are you expected to put on a show if you can’t get a gig. The Mutiny made that very easy to do. All it took was a phone call and you could set up your own gig, There were more than a few Mutiny shows I played that when I booked ’em three bands (the magic number) were on the bill and by the time I unloaded my gear it had practically turned into a festival. One time when I played there with Modern Day Rippers, we played so late that I couldn’t even get a post-show beer because it was already past last call.

The Mutiny provided a valuable service to rock ’n’ roll in Chicago. You got a friend’s band coming in from out of town? You could get ’em a show at The Mutiny. Your show got cancelled because the bar you were booked at got busted for serving underage rodents? You could jump on a bill at The Mutiny. There was no guarantee, they didn’t ask for a rider, you got what any green musician wants: a drink special — three free mini pitchers of whatever you wanted — and if you were lucky, a little bit of scratch. The mini pitchers will always be remembered fondly by anyone who took the stage at The Mutiny. You could do PBR on tap, a whiskey and coke, or as the high octane drinkers figured out, a mini pitcher of Long Island Iced Tea that would be recycled and returned to the world’s largest urinal. Sometimes there was a sound guy, the bartenders were always friendly, and a gig at The Mutiny would even get you a mention in the listings of the Chicago Reader.

That’s over now. The Mutiny closed down last week, appropriately enough, with no pomp, and no circumstance. The rock bar had survived fires, suburban kids tearing the ceiling down, but Mroz is done. “I lost my ability to keep fighting” Mroz told Block Club Chicago. He suggests that the building will be torn down and replaced with something new…and probably overpriced. It was announced this past week that the Double Door will return in a new location, but it’ll never be the same. A good rock club — or a good dive bar — is not just about the location or the staff, it’s about the spirit that inhabits those walls. It’s every ding in the doorway, every sticker on the cooler, every vomit stain on the floor. Gentrification threatens The Hideout, The Fireside Bowl went Hollywood in The Break-Up and Widows and while the new Double Door may be a fine place to see a show, but it’s never going to be the Double Door. We can mourn the losses, toss some beers back and remember the good times, but to use a cliche, it’s the circle of life. As the rock clubs we love close, new ones will pop up and the next generation of rock ’n’ rollers probably won’t appreciate them until they’re gone either. It breaks my heart a little bit that I’ll never play The Mutiny again, be it with The Romeros, as a solo act, or with Modern Day Rippers, but at least I can say I was there.

The Mutiny will be open December 6–8 for long time patrons to pay their last respects and perhaps buy a piece of the place for their practice space.

—MIKE VANDERBILT (@MikeVanderbilt)