Reports from the scene

Photo by James Norton

Shot on scene

New Year’s Eve means two things to me. First, people actually pay $80 a ticket only to then overpay for weak drinks at places like the San Diego Marriott Gaslamp. Second, and here’s the good part, guys who look like the hipster version of Tucker Carlson actually land women who, on any other night, would take one look at that bowtie, laugh their asses off and then find the nearest Neanderthal with an Afflicted shirt and a rented Lambo to kiss at midnight. So, for this night, Poindexter, I say, Mazel tov! Play on, player.

Locals Only

While ringing in the New Year means a fresh start for many, some of San Diego’s radio deejays will have to start all over. Several big names on the FM dial found themselves without a job or a new contract during the last few weeks, including morning-show hosts Michael “Mikey” Esparza of The Mikey Show on Rock 105.3, as well as the six-member cast of the Dave, Shelly and Chainsaw show on 101.5 KGB.

A post on the KGB website on Jan. 4 read: “After extensive negotiations, and offering the DSC team a very lucrative, multi-year offer, we were unfortunately not able to reach an agreement to keep the show with KGB.” An e-mail sent to DSC host Dave Rickards was not returned by press time.

Not so cut and dry are the details involving Esparza’s departure from Rock 105.3. During an on-air segment broadcast on Dec. 21, the other four members of the morning show (now just called The Show) said that Esparza was offered a contract by Clear Channel (105.3’s parent company) that he wasn’t happy with. When he approached the other members of the show, they said they would want to stay with 105.3 should Esparza’s contract negotiations continue with the station. They went on to say that Esparza decided to shop the show around to other stations to see if he could get a better deal and that the cast assumed he was trying to broker a deal just for himself.

But then Esparza returned, reportedly with a deal from competing station FM 94/9 for the entire cast to join him at a new station. They say they decided to renegotiate with 105.3 when Esparza refused to give them the financial details of the new deal. While Esparza, on his new website, www.mikeyshow.com, says that he should have been more communicative with his co-hosts, he adds that he was “stunned” when Clear Channel withdrew from any negotiations following the re-signing of the rest of the cast. He goes on to say that while at the moment he is technically unemployed, he’s assembling a new radio crew and expects to sign a contract with another station.

Over at 94/9, station owners Lincoln Financial Media Company let go of deejay Michael Halloran on Monday after seven years at the station. Program director Garrett Michaels has taken over Halloran’s afternoon slot.

These developments seem part of a major shakeup across radio in San Diego that involves four corporate owners (Finest City Broadcasting, Clear Channel, Broadcast Company of the Americas and Lincoln Financial). Finest City owns 91X, Magic 92.5 and Z-90 but has defaulted on a 2005 loan of $110 million from Evergreen Pacific Partners and others. In a notification of public sale obtained by CityBeat from K&L Gates LLP, the law firm representing the lenders, the stations are set to be auctioned off on Jan. 7. There has been speculation on the Internet that Broadcast Company of the Americas is interested in obtaining the auctioned stations, but parties have remained mum. One on-air employee at 91X, who preferred not to be identified, told CityBeat that employees been told that the new owner will, indeed, be BCA and that they will be “let go” on Thursday, only to be rehired on Friday.

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The New Year’s weekend also saw the announcement that two nightclubs, Universal in Hillcrest and Static Lounge Downtown, would close. James Brennan of Entertain SD, which owns Universal, says the economy and bad decision-making led to the club shutting its doors for good.

“At the end of the day, I feel we could have made this decision a year ago. I feel like we were doomed from day one because of the way we opened and the financing that fell apart because of the economy,” Brennan says. “Between that and the fact that the landlord delayed the opening for a year—if that hadn’t happened, who knows where this thing would have stood.”

Brennan went on to say that Entertain SD will try to sell the property and is talking to three potential buyers. He says he’s “very confident” that one of these potential buyers will purchase the club.”

Static Lounge owner Travis Skadberg, however, is blaming the city and competing 18-and-up clubs.

“I tried with all my might to find solutions,” Skadberg says on a post on the club’s MySpace site. “The city of San Diego, the City Council and the San Diego Police Department however did not support my effort to provide an alcohol free place for San Diego’s young adults.”

Skadberg says that after he mistakenly failed to renew his entertainment license during the summer, he was forced to close for six weeks after police shut him down on July 3. This, he says, caused “irreversible financial damage” and ultimately led to the club’s permanent closure.

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The Mashtis will celebrate the release of their debut LP at The Ruby Room on Friday, Jan. 8. Golden Red, Simeon Flick and Lessons From Zeke will open the show. And on Wednesday, Jan. 13, both Boomsnake and Drew Andrews will release new EPs (Re/visions and Playing Birthday Games, respectively) at The Casbah. Writer and Metrofique are also scheduled to play.

The Enrique Experience

Beach bars. You’ve seen one, you’ve seen ’em all, right? Enter Little Bonanza (940 Palm Ave. in Imperial Beach), the stereotype-breaking Wild West saloon by way of a breezy Manila bordello. Awkwardly sandwiched between a driving school and a used-car lot, it attracts mostly retired sailors in small cliques (three patrons total last Saturday night) who, in this case at least, ranted on and on about the price of water heaters as bartender Glinda patiently listened and, at times, got into the convo with all the subtlety of Jerry Springer.

Wood-paneled walls welcome you, along with a sign by the pool table that reads, “Every third asshole shot. The second one just left.” The eclectic décor continues with a mural by the shuffleboard table depicting an old-timey brothel scene, a smiley Buddha who apparently is a die-hard Packers fan—cheesehead foam hat and all—and a blackboard atop the urinal in the little gold-miner’s room, for those scholarly pissers. A fridge behind the bar holds soft drinks, a box of Wheat Thins and the ultimate dive souvenir: a stack of signature bar T-shirts.

“We ran out of storage,” the barmaid said in her Tagalog twang.

A veteran of the I.B. scene, Glinda’s been serving up the good stuff for more than 20 years; she used to work at the infamous Far East Rock (which local lore says was reminiscent of the above-mentioned mural).

“It was so much phan, but police ruin everything,” the grandmother of eight reminisced.

Along with tales of an array of handsome Navy Seals she mingled with in her heyday, and true to her Wizard of Oz namesake, she also dished out sage advice on everything from dating (“You are handsome guy; go to Whirlybird bar—they take care of you there”) and automotive care (“Treat cars like old people. If you don’t maintain, you’re fucked”).

Tickled by her know-how, I asked her what she’d conjure up if she could perform spells, à la the Good Witch of the South.

“I’d make two houses appear, one for each of my daughters,” she said. “But I’d put them both in my name. I work hard for my magic, baby.”