Several years ago, I corresponded briefly with Robert Burns, after seeing that he had copies of old Austin posters, and I mentioned that I remembered one very well.

Robert was the art director, I think it was, for the original "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" movie, back in 1973 or so. I need to do another posting about the house for that on its own!

Anyway, the poster that Robert had was of a concert held on the baseball field just as UT was starting up again for the year. I say Sept 1970, but could have been 1971?

Anyway, the lineup for the day was:

The Allman Brothers
Leon Russell
It's A Beautiful Day
Pacific Gas and Electric Company (I don't remember them, but that was common for the time...)

It was a *fantastic* day of music, for sure.

While I was writing this up, I came across the following quote from Willis Alan Ramsey that relates to that concert (from http://www.willisalanramsey.com/content/Riverfront-times-review-2000-11-09.htm)

"Willis Alan Ramsey, his one and only album, at once captures that intimate milieu of folk songs and stories, then leaps well ahead of its time, owing in part to Ramsey's idiosyncratic tastes and a fortuitous encounter with Leon Russell. "I was booked into a motel called the Villa Capri in Texas, and staying at that hotel were the Allman Brothers, Leon Russell, It's a Beautiful Day and Pacific Gas & Electric. I saw their show and made it a point to knock on their doors. Leon was nice and receptive, and I was kind of cocky at that point. I thought I was writing some tunes that he should hear. Leon told me to break out my guitar. He and his road manager listened and gave me their numbers in California.

"They said I should come see them. Greg Allman and Dickey Betts were really nice as well. They invited me to come down and see them in Macon. This was right before the Allman Brothers took off. So I went to see all of them. Greg recorded a demo on me, and then I went out to see Leon, and he made a demo on me. Leon said, "I'm getting ready to tour. If you like, you can stay in my house and record in my studio at night.' That pretty much sold me! It all happened quickly. I was pretty confident in what I was doing, and suddenly I was over my head. I went from playing college coffeehouses and then I'm in Leon Russell's home studio and people like George Harrison are coming over. It was a completely different environment."

Austin has always struggled for a mainstream Christmas tradition... the Zilker Tree, the Trail of lights, Congress Ave. lights. However, there has also always been a counter-culture season tradition as well.

- Take, for example, the (now!) well known "Hippie Christmas" on 37th street. Started off weird-as-you-please but it didn't take long for the Westlake set to start cruising through in Explorers with the windows rolled up.

- When was the first time that you saw a wild cedar tree on the side of the road in full Christmas decoration? Pretty common now.

- Before the Continental Club went legit, you could always count on them being there AND open.

- Christmas Tamales and Tamaladas: one of many Tejano traditions that I first experienced in Austin. Remember when they called it "Austin style Mexican food"?

- The town getting empty. Remember when the UT students leaving town made a significant dent in the population? Suddenly, everything was empty and the folks remaining had the bond of true Austin kinship.

All is not lost. I hear that there is a very healthy chapter of the Santa Rampage here in town. Good for them.

Every Saturday morning, starting back around 1970 for a few years, there would be movies and fun at the Saturday Morning Fun Club (SMFC). It was held in a small movie theatre in the bottom/back of the old Student Union Building, the one just to the left after you crossed the Drag.

People showed a half hour or so before the start time, and I have never seen so many paper darts flying through the air! Nor have I ever seen not just funny little cigarettes, but full fledged water pipes and other assorted paraphenalia moving up and down the rows...

The audience was far from quiet and accepting - loud and opinionated expressions of disbelief and disgust were common. I remember the shorts of Flash Gordon. At the end of one week, Flash Gordon was pinned to the side of the top of a building, with a car engine flying through the air at him, only inches away from him to cause sudden death! The next week, it was resolved as it amazingly seemed to just miss him. Ahhhh....

Good movies, good fun. Not sure I'd want to take *my* kids there, though...

The food was forgettable, but not the red wine served in greasy plastic tumblers, nor certainly Rita herself, in her Carmen Miranda fruit-topped hat and muu muu. The chain-link fence looking out onto 6th only added to the mystique.

My memories of this legendary bar are hazy...not surprising...but for this ingenue, Club Foot was the white girl's unforgettable introduction to reggae--Austin style.

The Country Dinner Playhouse was out past Balcones Research Centre (I live in NZ, and looking on Google Maps makes me think it has a newer name???) on Hwy 1325. Down a hill and cross the railroad tracks, then up the hill - and the theatre was on your right.

In 1972 or so I lived on a 40 acre property just past there, same side of the road. There had been a geodesic dome making construction company there, and they left the skeletons of several domes that made it stand out a bit...

And I worked at the Country Dinner Theatre as a cleaner/dishwasher. At one time there were 4 or 5 of us, then they cut it back to two. We'd get there about 10pm, as the show finished, and bus, wash, setup and drink wine until near dawn. For me, it was just a walk across the field to get home then.

KOKE was just starting to have some great programming back then, and we'd get to listen to Ramblin' Jack Elliot's song about New Orleans just about every night ("Did you ever stand and shiver, just because you were lookin' at a river?")

If you get here through a search, then you remember something listed on this page. Do us a favor and log-in and record that Austin memory!

Treaty Oak - still there in spite of the attempted VooDoo killing
North vs. South Tug of war - The North won, I believe
The Buccaneer - a seedy bar in the south
The old dinner theaters - on the edge of town... speaking of that!
The Edge of Town - a night club in a converted dinner theater
Dessau Hall - country girl, I think you're pretty
Jalapeno Charlie's - in that strange building on S. Lamar
The Hanging Tree - more S. Lamar weirdness
The Chaparral Lounge - what's this "new Chaparral" bullshit?
The Split Rail - I remember this as a biker bar
Duke's Royal Coach Inn - punk club on Congress... Joe King's homeroom
Maggie Mae's - remember when it was so narrow and one of the pioneers of 6th street?
The Salt Lick - before it was famous. The best Friday lunch was to fill a cooler and head out Camp Ben McCulloch road for the afternoon.
Holiday House - wild animals and burgers!
2J's - good burgers, loyal following
The Draught House - the one before the Draught Horse!
Lone Star Beer sign - stood above the Drag for a generation
Dry Creek Cafe - still kicking and lot's of ink spilt already... add your special experience
Scarbrough building and store - Austin elegance
The Silver Dollar - WAY before Dallas, the night club
The Raw Deal - the original... east 6th back in the day
Update: nice photo show of the old RD
The Poodle Dog - still there I think, as is...
The Horseshoe Lounge - got kicked out of there once
emmajoe's - small e, small place, small cover, huge talent every night

Before 1st Street was Caesar Chavez, there was plain old east first. There were several eastside spots that were already "famous"... that is, known to exist by folks on the west side of town. Places like El Azteca, Hernandez, Cisco's. My favorite was Joe's Bar on east 1st. Joe's was a beer bar with a trailer out back serving food. Cheap, cold beer and fresh tacos are a great combination. My favorite tacos were picadillo: a large tortilla filled with extremely spicy beef and topped with a handfull of french fries right out of the fryer.

Joe's tacos were legendary for their "hotness" due to chiles and spice. So much so, it was sport for the regulars to watch for and ridicule the white boys' melt-down after an order of three. I held my own but a few Lone Star's were needed... I felt that the regular crowd approved of that technique.

Back when "The Lord of the Rings" had anything nothing more than minimal popularity, let me see now: 1971 or so it would have been, there was a really nice restaurant down near Rio Grande and about 5th St.

I can remember bicycling down there from the University area in the late, late nights for coffee and desserts.

I don't think the place was around all that long - the food business is like that, I guess - but I remember the building as a converted grand old house, lit up brightly in an otherwise dark and quiet neighbourhood.

Well, smoothies haven't always existed, have they?

Back in the late 60s (I'm remembering either 1969 or 1970?), they were really something new and different, and there was a place somewhere about 16th or 17th, maybe in the San Antonio to Rio Grande area called Mother Nature's Smoothy Shop. I'm sure they sold things other than smoothies, but that was their specialty. I remember it as not much more than a small kitchen and I remember more of the yard than any inside eating place. Anybody remember the place?