1) Audience participation.
Last night at Atomix in San Antonio, watching Sari’s roommate Monica and her friend Chris King play live. Monica finished her spontaneous set with a cover of Amy Winehouse’s REHAB, and Chris and I clapped along to it. It was one of the coolest things I’ve ever done, because I felt essential to the performance.
She started out by saying “I’m going to need you guys to clap like this -” and demonstrated the rhythm – and we started, and she helped, and only once our beat was established did she begin playing.
I’ve seen shows before where people were supposed to join in by clapping, but never one where there actually was no rhythm section – so that the musicians, or performers, were relying on the audience to be part of it. That was great. I’m going to have to steal it.

2) Bar participation.
After they both played, more of Monica’s friends showed up – Kelley and his girlfriend Alyssa – and they were talking about the dynamics of which bars wanted open mics on which nights, and how to plan the event, both in location and in timing in the week, so as to maximize the bar’s profits from the event. It was very eye-opening to me. The musicians play for free, but the bars get money from it – and the musicians get promotion and space.

When was the last time you heard of a theatrical event bringing money to a bar, instead of begging for donations from it? This is a financially vibrant interchange. I’ve thought before that any event that takes place at a bar is performatively successful.

I’ve also thought that I wanted to create an open mic night at a theater. When I saw the way Chris Covics at Unknown was having musical acts come into the space each night after the plays, to bring the theater money, that gave me ideas for one approach.

But the problem with that is the hassle of the liquor license. You get folks in the space, which is great, but a theatrical open mic at a bar would be even more dynamic. What I really want is a stage space with an integrated full bar. Which is what Atomix appeared to be. If I ever do start a company, it’ll be in a location like that, and we’ll only do shows that can be integrated with drinking.

And something we both need to work on:

3) Audience expectations.
Kelley told a story about an open mic he knew where the people running the show had alternated live artists with DJs. The problem was that the regulars in the bar started booing the live acts because they just wanted the DJ to play more dance music.