I'm reviewing this place from the perspective of a touring musician. I'm not going to comment on the food or service because I have no idea how that stuff is... But I'd imagine it's as horrible as their treatment of musicians.
If you're in a serious band, do NOT play at this venue, unless you're okay with blatant racism, disorganization, unprofessionalism and playing George Strait covers all night long.
My band played this venue on the night of February 25th, 2011. We signed a contract with this venue because we're professionals. We tour all over the state and several other states in the region. Needless to say, we know what we're doing.
Unfortunately, this venue has no CLUE what they're doing.
Strike 1:
Around 4 or 5pm we did a sound check. About an hour into the sound check, the bartenders and staff started complaining that we were making too much noise, and disturbing the patrons. So they cut off our sound check early. Any bar worth it's salt knows that a band needs an hour or two to set up and sound check, and that it gets LOUD. That's just the way it is. Never in our band's 5 years have we been cut off during a sound check, because professional venues KNOW that a sound check is necessary. Professional venues do not cut off bands during sound check.
Strike 2:
Our contract with this venue stipulated that we begin playing at 10:30pm. So, we showed up at around 10:15-20. We arrived to find three or four staff members glaring at us in the parking lot. When we exited our bus, they explained to us that bands are supposed to start at 9pm. They told us we were late, and that we "may not" get all our money. We then showed these folks a copy of the contract that THEY SIGNED, and explained to them that we start at 10:30. Even though we PROVED this to them, they gave us trouble about it all night, and even went through the trouble of telling us that several patrons left and demanded their money back because we didn't start at 9. So, not only are these people disorganized and forgetful, but they're spiteful and apparently don't care enough about their patrons to tell them the correct time the band starts.
Strike 3:
The crowd here is awful. Our band plays original music. We don't play covers unless we've rehearsed them. We don't take random cover requests from the crowd. After every song we played, instead of applause, we got people shouting out covers they wanted us to play... At one point, one of the bartenders looked up at us and yelled, "Play some George Strait!!!" We declined, and she glared at us along with the rest of the bar staff.
Anyway, we stuck to our guns, played the show our way, and got all our money. But we'll never play there again.
Okay... Now it gets crazy...
Strike 4. Yes. Strike 4:
A friend of ours who is also a musician was booked to play this venue. At some point between booking and playing his show, the venue found out that our friend is an African American. At this point the venue contacts our friend and tells him, basically, "Don't bother playing here if you're black." They went on to tell him that Ku Klux Klan meetings are held in the town of Livingston... and he was left with the impression that the meetings are actually held at Buster McNutty's!
So basically, what we have here is a backwoods, racist, redneck bar with a bunch of unprofessional, uneducated people running it.
Bands! DO NOT PLAY HERE. They will PURPOSELY try to scam you out of your money! They will find any reason to make it look like YOU didn't uphold your end of the deal. And most importantly... They will cancel you if you're a minority, or not "country" enough for them.
If you do play here, get everything in writing and do not let these people swindle or scam you out of your money.
If every band in the area realizes how horrible this place is, maybe it will go out of business. One can only hope.
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