The adventures and various works of a photographer, road tripper, former patron of the local arts, aspiring app developer, and late night coffee drinker and conversationalist.
1988 show flyer
The Deep Ellum neighborhood has been home to a dizzying number of music performance venues over the past century. In the early days of Ellum's renaissance, many an aspiring entrepreneur opted to roll the dice on a new venue. Some, like Charlie Gilder, were able to successfully circumnavigate the sea of red tape put forth by the City Council and obtain permits and liquor licenses; other, perhaps more bullish, entrepreneurs chose to go a different way, with all ages clubs and "unofficial" liquor on tap. Some of the resultant venues, such as the Prophet Bar and Theatre Gallery, achieved fairly long term success and drew a regular contingent of music fans and clubgoers, but Deep Ellum's history is also full of short-lived, fly by night venues that had their brief moments in the sun before flaming out and disappearing completely. And perhaps the most infamous of these long gone, also-ran hotspots was a hole in the wall off Commerce Street, a one time weighing scale and butcher equipment outlet turned punk club known as the Honest Place.
1989 show flyer
The Silver Dollar... it sounds like some sort of cowboy watering hole, a place you might expect to see country and western acts and not a series of metal bands. Yet here I was with an old Deadly Force show flyer in my hands promoting moshing and urging support for the DFW metal underground of the 1980s, and the show was taking place at the Silver Dollar Rock Shop. What kind of place was this? Where was it located, and when did it disappear into the ether?
This is the first installment in a series of posts exploring locations of former DFW musical landmarks
Jimmy's Lil' Rockhouse
The original 1986 flyer
The story begins in April of this year, when I stumbled across a copy of an old hand drawn flyer while browsing some listings on eBay. The bands being advertised were ones I'd never heard of, as was the venue listed for the performance, but I recognized the included "Z Nites" logo as that of a long defunct radio network that was on the air during my middle and high school days. Upon closer examination of the embedded (also hand drawn) map to the venue, one "Jimmy's Lil' Rokhouse," I recognized the names of several streets and was able to discern that the area being pictured was in Arlington, between Dallas and Fort Worth and literally down the street from the University of Texas at Arlington, my alma mater from 1998-2000. The dates given on the flyer suggested a year of 1986, based on when those particular dates and Friday and Saturday nights would line up. Where exactly was this Jimmy's Lil' Rockhouse, and what was it today? I decided I wanted to find out.
The 1980s and '90s were arguably the heyday of local, home grown music in North Texas. On the west side of the DFW metroplex, the 1980s bore witness to the birth of the local metal scene in Arlington and Fort Worth, and, on the east side, the solidification of the rock/punk/pop scenes in Dallas, all of which led directly to the national prominence of the area in mid to late 1990s radio and culture. "Ghosts of DFW music history" is an ongoing blog series in which I visit the former locations of DFW area music venues and record labels of days past, showing them as they are today and putting each into the context of its time. Each entry will feature a bit of historical background, an up to date photo of each location as it is today, and period flyers, photos, and/or memorabilia. As this series progresses, direct links to each of the planned posts will be added below. Once the entire series has been posted, this page will be retooled to serve as an official table of contents. Please enjoy the installments and feel free to comment if you remember or were a part of those days!
Silver Dollar sign photo reproduced from Rockulapresents YouTube video upload, used per terms of Creative Commons Attribution license. Original footage taken by Laurel and/or Dee Wilson of Dallas Music Videos.
