Elepent

The Elysium in Austin has stuck around long enough to become a landmark. On the outskirts of the rapidly-changing Sixth Street bar scene, clubs come and go, but the Elysium is pushing ten years of age.  Formerly known as the Atomic Café, Elysium’s smack in the middle of fratboy heaven, an unlikely location for a dedicated goth-industrial haven, but it exists.  On Saturday nights you’ll have to walk through crowds of people who’ll look at you funny to reach the weekly night (named “Haven”), but once inside, it’s a happy place.

If it weren’t for the noisy music and clever faux-stone painted walls, you might mistake the place for a typical honky-tonk bar:  you’ve got a dance floor and a stage at one side, some tables and circular velvet couches in the center, and the bar and some red- covered pool tables at the other end, and you’re constantly going up or down steps: two down onto the dance floor, or one up to the bar.  There’s an outdoor patio as well, for people-watching.  Look closer, though, and you’ll notice the Bauhaus and concert posters on the walls, and random sigils and art that decorate the walls.  Austin does have a goth scene, and this is the place most of them call home.  It’s also where the noisy folks like Funker Vogt and Voltaire come to play, when they’re in town.

Arrive early and you’ll think that there aren’t many people in the aforementioned scene, but by midnight the Elysium’s too crowded to throw an elbow, on most Saturday nights.  The dance floor is old-school wood and a bit smaller than average, because the club’s set up for live music, the bread and butter of Austin’s club scene.   On Haven nights, the stage is open for showing off if you like.  Be careful, though–the surface is a little bit uneven.

Like the Church, Elysium’s staff and patrons are friendly, especially if you’re dressed to the nines and beyond.  Most any form of dress is acceptable, however.

The sound system is also biased toward live music, so the sound is better at one end of the dance floor than the other.  There’s the requisite smoke machine, of course.  A good Haven night will lean heavily toward older synthpop and very new stompy stuff:  VNV Nation, And One, Faderhead, ohGr, Ladytron and Combichrist.  Expect a bit of Depeche Mode and Ladytron to pop also, as well as the odd Rammstein throwback.  Resident DJs Void and The Gothfather spin a good mix that’s fairly constant throughout the night, and since they always play the original mix of “Le Disko” by Shiny Toy Guns, never bothering with any of the many nasty remixes, they get a thumbs-up from me.

The lack of boondocking love in Dallas didn’t hurt our feelings too badly; we had planned to head out of town before too long anyway.  And we did just that, hooking up the AEV and heading south to Austin.  Though it’s a short-ish hop–only 195 miles or so–the cultural landscape undergoes a light-year’s worth of change.  Where Dallas is very Texan Big Business, Austin leans more toward the cultural-mecca end of the spectrum.  The money in Austin isn’t as big (though it’s definitely there: regular spotting of Ferraris and Lamborghinis on the road attest to this), and the focus is on entertainment and lifestyle rather than being the biggest and brightest.

Austin’s unique for its social makeup, in which seasoned hippies rub elbows with college-age hipsters, new-money industrialists, hardworking laborers and an army of musicians.  Oh, yes, Nashville calls itself the Music City, but Austin’s got a great deal more to interest us tune-wise, because its music scene’s a lot more diverse.  We arrived in town just in time for the annual South by Southwest music festival, which we’ll talk about later.

While you’re downtown getting a feel for the college-y Sixth Street bar district, or its more mature counterpart over on Fourth, be sure to arrive before dusk to check out the bats.  The South Congress bridge, over what looks like a river but is actually called Lady Bird Lake or Town Lake, depending on which end of it you’re at, is the summer home of the largest urban colony of Mexican freetailed bats in North America.  Over 1.5 million of these tiny midnight fliers roost under the bridge, and at sunset they head out to take care of business.  The daily exodus is something to see, as the masses of bats take to the air in a steady flow lasting forty minutes or more.  Don’t be afraid; a large crowd gathers nightly to see them take off, and the bats don’t pose any threat to humans.   These little guys eat insects–up to 10,000 to 20,000 pounds a night, which helps to keep the mosquito population down–and aren’t interested in getting tangled in your hair.

This diverse town also offers many places to eat, of course.  It would take years to visit them all, but we can recommend Banzai and Ichiban for sushi and excellent Japanese fare, the tree-themed Woodland for a fantastic breakfast or elegant supper, Curra’s Grill for outstanding Tex-Mex and local favorite Threadgill’s for homestyle American cuisine.  If you want it, you can probably find it.  Looking for Thai?  Try Thai Passion, downtown.  How about Romanian?  Austin’s got you covered; head up to the tiny, family-owned Drakula.  Austin’s also home to the Alamo Drafthouse, a premier dinner-and-a-movie joint.

It seems as though even the “regular” businesses in Austin are somehow cooler.  Why bother with Blockbuster when you’ve got I Luv Video, whose shelves are stocked with just about every obscure and cult DVD you could ask for?  Where most video stores are hard-pressed to offer a full selection of anything but the newest releases, I Luv Video has sections devoted to specific directors’ entire catalogs.  There’s a row containing nothing but classic silent films.  The knowledgeable staff is also well-versed in cinematic trivia, and stickers with commentary on the films at hand are common throughout the store.  Thumbnail reviews by the staff are also found at Book People.  This massive independent bookstore is a great place for browsing.

Speaking of browsing, the South Congress Street antique shopping district is also worth a weekend walk.  You’re guaranteed to find something you didn’t know you needed at Uncommon Objects, to see an awesome rat rod or a flotilla of Vespa scooters parked or on the road, and don’t forget to hit the carnival goodness that is the Big Top candy shop.

RV camping is a bit spendy in downtown Austin (unless you’re coming from California).  The Pecan Grove RV park is a quaint, retro-style park that’s literally right in the heart of downtown, within walking or biking distance to most of the stuff we just talked about as well as the lovely Zilker Park and Barton Creek Springs.  We stayed at Pecan Grove for a few days, then moved farther out of town to save money.  If you’re willing to trek ten or fifteen miles out of town, the prices are more reasonable.  We pulled into the Highway 71 RV Park expecting to stay for a week or two, and wound up settling in for quite a while.  Highway 71 has a decent mix of vacationers and long-term residents, extremely clean facilities, free wi-fi and a friendly staff.   If you stay near the man-made pond, the resident ducks will come to your door begging for handouts and heedless of the fact that bread isn’t particularly good for them (we gave them cat food).

More on Austin shortly…

Credit: the churchpictures.com

Dallas’ Lizard Lounge hosts a couple of noisy-stuff nights a week, under the name The Church.  On Thursdays and Sundays, the DJs spin neo-gothic, industrial and electro (that’s according to The Church’s website) tunes in one of the cooler club environments I’ve experienced.

The Lizard Lounge isn’t a goth club every night of the week, but the atmosphere and building lend themselves well to the task.  The building dates to 1899 and is registered in the Texas Haunted Building Registry, so that’s a good start.  Head through the front door and you’ve got a choice of turning left, right or going straight, up a curved staircase.  To the left, you’ll find the main bar and a good-sized, multi-level dance floor that includes a platform with a stripper pole.  A seating area curves around the front of the dance floor with a walkway in between, providing good people-watching space.  The sound system is fantastic, loud enough to make your chest hurt but clean enough to keep the music clear and distortion-free.  The lighting and other décor are equally well put together.  Random trivia:  the video for Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock & Roll” was filmed in this building.

On the other side (that is, if you turn to the right after entering) you’ll find a more conventional dance floor and a secondary bar, as well as the doors to an outdoor patio.  There’s smoking allowed inside the bar as well (though that may reportedly change soon depending on Texas law) but when the weather permits the fresh air is nice.  The two downstairs dance floors connect at the rear in a small maze of hallways and seating areas.

Done exploring yet?  Nope.  Upstairs there are wingback chairs lining the balcony, the better for people-watching and socializing, and yet another small bar.  Plenty of places to get your drink on in the Church.

The Church’s main dance floor is the most fun, and it’s where the club’s carnival atmosphere is most noticeable.  The multi-tiered space is shallower than most dance floors, which gives it a very stagelike feeling.  There’s no fading into the background here; if you’re dancing, the people watching can see you.  Rather than being intimidating, however, the Church’s dance floor is inviting.  Even if you don’t know what you’re doing, the friendly regulars would be happy to see you take a turn on the pole, or up on the uppermost stage level.  The social hierarchy isn’t oppressive, unless of course you’re a complete jerk in which case the security staff will politely ask you to leave.  Otherwise, the Church wants you to come in, have a drink or two, meet someone, and go strut your stuff on the dance floor when you’re ready.

In my six or eight trips to the Church, the music has gone one of two ways.  Of course, I’m happiest when it leans toward the noisy end of the spectrum, with Rob Zombie, Skinny Puppy, Combichrist and VNV Nation well represented.  DJ Joe Virus is creative, too, putting together excellent “themed” sets:  the “R. Lee Ermey” and “nasty girl” groupings are especially cool, as is the Homestar Runner/Rammstein mashup that’s only available at the Church, to the best of my knowledge.    On other nights, the Church’s main floor is a retro-New Wave paradise, all a-swirl with Depeche Mode, Dead or Alive, Sisters of Mercy and Shriekback.  If New Wave is your thing, the Church’s smaller dance floor is perpetually stuck in the Day-Glo Eighties.  This lends itself well to long club nights; bored of one kind of noise?  You can go over and relax to another.

Of the clubs I’ve been to, the Church comes the closest to creating that “home” feeling that I get back in Detroit, at City Club.  We don’t pretend to have an objective club-ranking system, but to date I will call the Church my second-favorite dancin’ place, and that’s high praise indeed.