Richard Brown: Dayton Music Scene Archivist
The Day the Music Died was when TheBoxxcar lost his YouTube channel.
For the last 12 years, Richard Brown has been ubiquitously documenting the Dayton, Ohio music scene with a Kodak Astro Zoom, capturing standard-definition wide shots to upload under his moniker, TheBoxxcar. He’d sometimes hit seven venues a night, amassing nearly 13,000 videos before his Wild West copyright-infringing habits caught up to him.
Over a decade of rogue documentation vanished from Brown’s online archives in 2023, some of which contained the only recorded performances of several Southwest Ohio bands. TheBoxxcar catalog vanishing was undeniably a copyright issue, which comes with the territory of Brown’s prolific, no-frills bootlegging. Though he never monetized, the algorithms couldn’t understand that Brown was merely chronicling the scene, granting us a pure look at what a real music fan perpetually sees from the front row.
Brown’s footage was raw; the unedited performances felt like you were at the show, witnessing the flubs happening on stage through a pair of beer goggles. And maybe that wasn’t the objective, but that’s what happened — all because a determined man with a unipod and a 2014 Kodak had a love for music.
It was my understanding that there’s a 72-hour grace period for any terminated YouTube account, so, in January, a day after Brown posted the unfortunate news on Facebook, I met up with him at the Dayton Metro Library to see if we couldn’t convince Google to change their mind. When I entered the lobby, Brown was sitting on a bench, staring at the ground with a backpack on his lap, his long gray beard bobbing as he chewed something.
“Hey, Richard,” I said.
“Howdy.”
We spent half an hour in the computer room. In his words, he “can’t spell too good,” so as he talked, I typed. Together, we concocted an earnest plea for a second chance, only to have Google return a canned email a few days later:
Thanks for contacting us about being unable to access your Google Account. It looks like the email address you asked about isn’t associated with an active Google Account.
It was disheartening, but I wasn’t surprised: Brown had been using an iWon dot com email address—an offshoot of a gaming website that has gone unsupported since October 2017 — as his YouTube login. Compounded by the copyright issues, Brown’s time as a defendant was short-lived.
But despite Google’s cold response, it did bring up interesting discussions: is bootleg culture at death’s doorstep? How will independent creators evolve in a culture of algorithmic curation where “high-quality” content prevails? When will Archive dot org be put under such scrutiny? Is there a way to capture and securely preserve moments in time? And if bands want fans, at what cost will they go to alienate them (i.e. report loyal fan videos)?
Because Brown didn’t own the music he shared, everything he worked years to collect was consequently erased. But Richard Brown deserves better than that: an auto-focus celebration, a digital-zoom retrospective, and thanks for all the standard-definition memories.
A few weeks after he received his final communiqué from Google, after TheBoxxcar was officially in retirement, I spoke with Richard Brown, who recently turned 65, about his YouTube alter ego.
Where did the name TheBoxxcar come from?
I used Boxxcar on a lot of my games when I first got on the internet, I think because of the sandwich. So I just carried that over to my YouTube page.
Did you say from the sandwich?
There used to be a sandwich called “the boxcar.” I don’t know if they do it anymore. I always liked trains, too. Boxcar Willie. When you look me up, The Boxcar Boys always come up first. Yeah, I read that book. Kids was living inside a boxcar.
What made you want to start filming?
When I retired, I got season tickets to plays and ballets and operas and all that. After a year and a half, I needed to try something different. I seen something in the paper about Canal Street [Tavern]. When I went to Canal Street, I fell in love with it. Then I took a video of a band just playing around and I put it on YouTube. And, man, I just got so many compliments and everything. It was unbelievable, just with one video.
Who was that first band you filmed?
I think it was [Cincinnati band] SOHIO. Yeah, they’re still around. They played a couple of years ago at Yellow Cab [Tavern]—
With the Neo American Pioneers. I remember that show. It was like their comeback. So you started to do this at Canal Street.
Well, the first time going out listening to music was at Canal Street. And after I went there several times, I started to have favorite bands. So I’d follow those bands other places. I fell in love with Emily & the Lost Cat Ramblers. And then Rich Reuter. He had his own band, a three-piece. And I started following him, and some other bands. Canal Street had it all.
And you probably did that until they stopped doing music.
Yeah, I was there for the last show: Ryan Roth. I filmed some of it. At the end, we all went up on stage with him. So I didn’t get the last song.
When you started to upload these videos to YouTube, did you ever back up the files?
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They’re all on USD [sic] cards.
Do you still have everything?
It might be hard to find them all, but I’ve got a lot of them. Probably about sixty-percent. I don’t have everything. Some of the SD cards are scattered around the house. Everything from Canal Street is on one of those drives. It’s sitting in my dresser. It’s been in there for ten years, so who knows if it still works.
Was there ever a time you made the executive decision not to upload?
If it was something nasty like the saying ‘kill somebody’ or do this or do that. There were several videos I deleted ’cause I’d never use them. Especially when you get that rap stuff. And they’re doing a lot of cussin’ or saying a lot of bad things about god or something. But that’s not very many videos.
It seemed like you were able to film every band and musician all the time, every night. How did you have the energy?
Well, when you think about when I started, I was a lot younger. And with the Oregon District, there’s like six places to go to. Sometimes the record store [Omega Music] had music, this other store had music, and you had Oregon Express and Blind Bob’s and Trolley Stop. And we used to have Gilly’s. So I could hit seven places all in walking distance. I can’t do that now. I’m lucky to go to one show. I enjoy walking. I try to walk every day and get my exercise in.
When you go to all these shows, I’m sure you’re getting recognized by local musicians — you’re the guy that films everything. Are there perks to being Richard Brown? Like, do you get into shows for free?
Sometimes, but most of the time I pay. Back in the day, it was only $5. And I could go to four different places for $5. If you paid to get into Blind Bob’s that got you into Trolley Stop and the Dublin Pub and all that stuff.
I wanna talk about this YouTube thing. Do you want to give me some context as to what happened?
Someone complained about several videos’ copyrights. I guess I didn’t follow the protocol right. And that’s when they shut my page down. They said something about I had to go to copyright school and stuff like that. But I didn’t know I had to do that right that second. And they said something about being on probation for 90 days. But I went ahead and posted the video and I think that’s what got my YouTube page shut down. I had over 1,200 videos [ready] but they wasn’t posted yet. I’ve been posting videos every day for the last two years.
How many videos were you posting a day?
On average, about three or four.
That’s a lot.
If I get ten videos of one band, there’s no way I’m going to post all those videos at one time ’cause nobody would watch half of them. So I’d post a video of them and post a video of somebody else. I’d start from the top and go all the way down to the bottom, posting my videos. And then when I was done with that, I’d go back to the top again. And my plan was, once it warms up, I’d be back at the Levitt [Pavillion] taking more videos. It’s just hard for me to go to bars anymore and walk home. I’ve walked home from the Oregon District at least a thousand times. Especially getting home at 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning, being 65, I really can’t do that no more.
Let’s just say, as a hypothetical, that your YouTube page won’t come back.
I’m going to say that’s a pretty good chance of what’s going to happen.
What are your thoughts on that? How does that make you feel?
I was hoping that when I passed away this thing would be around for a hundred years, that people could watch those videos a hundred years from now. I thought it’d be—I don’t know if I’m going to say it right—it’d be a legracy [sic] that I left behind. That was what I was thinking. That way somebody with a band with grandkids could say ‘hey, that’s my dad’ or ‘that’s my grandpa.’
Are you going to continue filming?
If I can’t put it on YouTube, there’s no reason to film. ’Cause I don’t have anywhere else to put it. ’Cause, man, you don’t realize how much time this takes. Filming, uploading, and adding the information. And I’m not a good speller. You saw that at the library. I copy and paste everything. I’ll get the band's information off the show poster, then I’ll copy it and I’ll paste it.
If you say you’re not going to film, will you still come out to shows?
I’ll definitely be at the Levitt. I haven’t been to Showcase [Thursday at Yellow Cab Tavern] ’cause I go to the casino on Wednesdays and Thursdays. So when I get off the phone with you, I’m gonna get dressed and see when the next bus is coming.
I just wanna let you know that everybody you filmed over the years appreciates you. Some people can’t afford to have videos done, and you provided those services for free. Are you proud of the work you’ve done?
Yeah. I made a lot of friends. And I got to be in six or seven music videos. Like, you let me be in yours. I was in several other ones. And I got to be in a movie. I got to watch myself on the big screen in Bulldog for Christmas. I’m not rich, but I had enough money to buy the camera, the batteries, and the SD cards. That was all out-of-pocket expenses. God blessed me. I got spending money every month. My house is paid for. And I probably got a million hugs.
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Every time I’ve driven downtown in the past few weeks I’ve seen Richard Brown crossing Wayne Ave with sacks full of groceries. Him against the backdrop of that pothole of a road reminds me how much he did for Dayton music: the thankless job he walked to do nearly every night of the week for 12 years. Perhaps we should have been more generous with our time as he was with his.
Richard Brown is a true Dayton music fan. Even though there’s a 404 Not Found in its place, TheBoxxcar legacy lives on.
