Center stage

The world of open mics has been mostly foreign to me. My perception was middle-aged guys with guitars playing old blues or country songs. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Mostly occupying the slower weekday nights, open mics in the Truckee Meadows have whittled their way into the standard routine of many a Reno performer and audience member alike. Open-mic nights range from the long-running Cat Attack Blues Jam at Dilligas Saloon to the new Artists’ Playroom at the Zephyr Lounge, where pretty much anything goes, from music to poetry to short plays.

One of the busiest open-mic nights in the area is at the Great Basin Brewing Co. in Sparks Thursday nights, where audiences flock to see local comedians—and the occasional professional trying out new material—give it a try. Brewmaster and part-owner Tom Young said that some open-mic comedians who started at Great Basin have moved out onto the comedy circuit but nobody has made the big time … yet.

Young said the open comedy night started about five years ago, but not in the form it appears today.

“It started when we did a music open night,” he said. “Occasionally a comedian would get up, and no one would listen because they were there for music. So we had a few separate comedy nights.”

Young said the night struggled at first, needing direction. He credits former Reno News & Review columnist Mike Price with being able to make the night worth coming to.

Price, who toured with Lenny Bruce before he died, is a veteran comic. Young recalled a night when Price was able to bring in a comedian friend of his, nicknamed the “Grandma from Hell.” What Young expected was not what he got.

“She was the foulest comedian we’ve had up here,” he said, laughing. “She was this 70-year-old, fat grandmother telling jokes about her ‘cooter,’ as she called it. It was one of the funniest nights we’ve had.”

Young said that Price was able to clean up the night, not content-wise, but quality-wise.

It appears to have worked.

During my recent visit, the mostly college-age crowd roared in approval as host Randolph Belmes asked a young woman in the audience on stage to fake an orgasm. Others had done this earlier in the night. The nervous woman, whose name was Dawn, hemmed and hawed, but finally she gave in to the audience’s cheers. On stage, she faked having sex with Belmes, only to turn around and face her fiancé, Jeremy, who was sitting in the crowd. Just as she seemed close to her “climax,” Dawn started yelling: “Not yet, Jeremy, not yet, not yet. Not yet, you fucker.”

She then dismounted Randolph and punched him, obviously not satisfied with “Jeremy’s” performance.

Music has almost always been the big draw for open-mic performers, who’ll often chase down the opportunity to play wherever possible. Nick Ramirez, who has worked on open-mic nights at the Zephyr Lounge and the Reno Jazz Club, said that open mics have a tendency to get popular and then slowly fade before moving to a new venue, where they are revived with new enthusiasm.

“You see a lot of the same faces,” Ramirez said. “Diligent open mic’ers, and that’s what they do.”

In going to several of the open mics, I could tell Ramirez was right. Many of the same musicians migrate between the bars, wisely not performing the same songs each time.

One such performer is James Wilsey, a 32-year-old ex-Navy submarine pilot who looks like a young, tattooed Elvis but sings like Chris Isaak. Wilsey covers Isaak so well that, if I closed my eyes, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

Wilsey was classically trained in music when he was young, but a move to New York cut short his music career. Wilsey showed up at Tuesday’s open mic at the Reno Jazz Club to play a handful of songs, two by Isaak, John Lennon’s “Imagine” and a few originals. He appeared confident on stage, strumming his way through his performance like he was getting paid to be there.

Then I ran into Wilsey at the Zephyr on a Thursday, just before the opening set of Metrophobe, a spoken-word group performing for the first time after rising out of the Inversely Poetic open poetry night at Esoteric Coffeehouse.

“I quote ‘came out of the closet’ with the whole music thing,” Wilsey said.

I had heard him telling Reno Jazz Club owner Alex Panscher that a contractor friend of his just dropped a piece of wisdom on him about his need for owning a microphone.

“You trying to be a musician without a mic is like me being a contractor without a hammer,” his friend had told Wilsey. The advice might have come in handy for Wilsey, since during the previous week the Reno Jazz Club had been microphone-less on open mic night.

Wilsey said one of his favorite open-mic nights in town is at Walden’s Coffeehouse.

“It’s a different crowd,” he said. “You get a really wide variety of musicians. I’ve heard yodeling, Indian flutes—and the owner loves the music. He’s not there for the money.”

Open-mic nights are often handy fillers for slow weeknights at some bars and clubs. The bar owners know bands aren’t going to be playing to big crowds those nights, so many refrain from booking weekday shows. Holes like that leave plenty of space for aspiring musicians, poets or comics to take advantage of—and it’s a good opportunity for bar owners to bring in a few more patrons on traditionally slow nights.

But at Walden’s, open mic is a Saturday-night extravaganza. Jeff Wilson, the owner of Walden’s Coffeehouse, said that his open mic is a bit of an anomaly, but he wants people who can’t make it out during the week to be able to hear and perform music and still get to bed at a reasonable time. The Walden open mic gets an earlier start than most, operating from 7 to 10 p.m.

“All walks of life perform,” Wilson said. “We have attorneys, school teachers, geologists, caterers and a lot of students. I have had people play acoustic guitar, mandolins, harmonica, electric fiddle, bass and a Chapman stick.”

Wilson also says that he creates more of a family atmosphere at his coffee shop. While he sells beer and wine, there is no smoking at Walden’s, and he doesn’t allow profanity by the performers.

“I have had grandfathers and grandsons, fathers and daughters, mothers and daughters,” he said. “That’s the type of diversity we have.”

One night, an area high-school group, Jibe, placed fliers all over their school. The place was packed with students ordering free waters. Wilson recalled that, while he didn’t make much money, customers had a memorable time.

While open-mic nights might not mean big business for the bars and coffeehouses that host them, they are an important meeting point for the area’s art and music scene. Nick Ramirez said that the first band he was ever in was with someone he met at an open mic.

“My first band, The Decomposers, was with a guy I met at an open mic,” he said. “We were terrible.”

But Ramirez said that the fact he was up on stage with a band was an important step for him. He has been in several bands since, including Swamp Witch, Phat Couch and his current project, Nick Ramirez & The Astronauts.

He also credited open mics with overcoming his stage fright.

“Playing every week helps you get over stage fright and hone your performance,” Ramirez said. “I’m way more confident at an open mic than at a band show. Only because I know people are paying, where at an open mic it’s free.”

Jen Scaffidi, of the local band The Spark, said that running the Artists’ Playroom, the open-mic night at the Zephyr, gives her with a chance to see performers she’s never heard of before. She also hopes the Artists’ Playroom can become a place where artists can create new material.

“I want a place where people can come and play with other performers,” Scaffidi said. “Not just a place to play new material, but a place to make stuff happen.”

One of her favorite aspects of an open-mic night is watching performers progress over the weeks.

“I have seen people, two in particular, who have really come out of their shells,” she said. “We had to shove them onstage the first week, and now they are there before I am, waiting to sign up.”

She also noted a trend in which many of the spoken-word performers seem to be asking musicians to come on stage and play with them while they read.

Open mics give individuals a sense of freedom. But, even better, it doesn’t cost anything to play the star for a few minutes.

“I think it’s good to have free stuff,” Scaffidi said. “All you have to pay for is the beer, and [you can] hang out and be entertained.”

The world of open mics has been mostly foreign to me. My perception was middle-aged guys with guitars playing old blues or country songs. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Mostly occupying the slower weekday nights, open mics in the Truckee Meadows have whittled their way into the standard routine of many a Reno performer and audience member alike. Open mic nights range from the long-running Cat Attack Blues Jam at Dilligas Saloon to the new Artists’ Playroom at the Zephyr Lounge, where pretty much anything goes, from music to poetry to short plays.

One of the busiest open mic nights in the area is at the Great Basin Brewing Co. in Sparks Thursday nights, where audiences flock to see local comedians—and the occasional professional trying out new material—give it a try. Brewmaster and part-owner Tom Young said that some open-mic comedians who started at Great Basin have moved out onto the comedy circuit but nobody has made the big time … yet.

Young said the comedy night started about five years ago, but not in the form it appears today.

“It started when we did a music open mic night,” he said. “Occasionally a comedian would get up, and no one would listen because they were there for music. So we had a few separate comedy nights.”

Young said the night struggled at first, needing direction. He credits former Reno News & Review columnist Mike Price with being able to make the night worth coming to.

Price, who toured with Lenny Bruce before he died, is a veteran comic. Young recalled a night when Price was able to bring in a comedian friend of his, nicknamed the “Grandma from Hell.” What Young expected was not what he got.

“She was the foulest comedian we’ve had up here,” he said, laughing. “She was this 70-year-old, fat grandmother telling jokes about her ‘cooter,’ as she called it. It was one of the funniest nights we’ve had.”

Young said that Price was able to clean up the night, not content-wise, but quality-wise.

It appears to have worked.

During my recent visit, the mostly college-age crowd roared in approval as host Randolph Belmes asked a young woman in the audience to fake an orgasm on stage. Others had done this earlier in the night. The nervous woman, whose name was Dawn, hemmed and hawed, but finally she gave in to the audience’s cheers. On stage, she faked having sex with Belmes, only to turn around and face her fiancé, Jeremy, who was sitting in the crowd. Just as she seemed close to her “climax,” Dawn started yelling: “Not yet, Jeremy, not yet, not yet. Not yet, you fucker.”

She then dismounted Belmes and punched him, obviously not satisfied with “Jeremy’s” performance.

Music has almost always been the big draw for open mic performers, who’ll often chase down the opportunity to play wherever possible. Nick Ramirez, who has worked on open mic nights at the Zephyr Lounge and the Reno Jazz Club, said that open mics have a tendency to get popular and then slowly fade before moving to a new venue, where they are revived with new enthusiasm.

“You see a lot of the same faces,” Ramirez said. “Diligent open mic’ers, and that’s what they do.”

In going to several of the open mics, I could tell Ramirez was right. Many of the same musicians migrate between the bars, wisely not performing the same songs each time.

One such performer is James Wilsey, a 32-year-old ex-Navy submarine pilot who looks like a young, tattooed Elvis but sings like Chris Isaak. Wilsey covers Isaak so well that, if I closed my eyes, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

Wilsey was classically trained in music when he was young, but a move to New York cut short his music career. Wilsey showed up at Tuesday’s open mic at the Reno Jazz Club to play a handful of songs: two by Isaak, John Lennon’s “Imagine” and a few originals. He appeared confident on stage, strumming his way through the performance like he was getting paid to be there.

Then I ran into Wilsey at the Zephyr Lounge on a Thursday, just before the opening set of Metrophobe, a spoken-word group performing for the first time after rising out of the Inversely Poetic open mic night at Esoteric Coffeehouse.

“I quote ‘came out of the closet’ with the whole music thing,” Wilsey said.

I had heard him telling Reno Jazz Club owner Alex Panschar that a contractor friend of his just dropped a piece of wisdom on him about his need to own a microphone.

“You trying to be a musician without a mic is like me being a contractor without a hammer,” his friend had told Wilsey. The advice might have come in handy for Wilsey, since during the previous week the Reno Jazz Club had been microphone-less on open mic night.

Wilsey said one of his favorite open mics in town is at Walden’s Coffeehouse.

“It’s a different crowd,” he said. “You get a really wide variety of musicians. I’ve heard yodeling, Indian flutes—and the owner loves the music. He’s not there for the money.”

Open mic nights are often handy fillers for slow weeknights at some bars and clubs. The bar owners know bands aren’t going to be playing to big crowds those nights, so many refrain from booking weekday shows. Holes like that leave plenty of space for aspiring musicians, poets or comics to take advantage of—and it’s a good opportunity for bar owners to bring in a few more patrons on traditionally slow nights.

But at Walden’s, open mic is a Saturday-night extravaganza. Jeff Wilson, the owner of Walden’s Coffeehouse, said that his open mic is a bit of an anomaly, but he wants people who can’t make it out during the week to be able to hear and perform music and still get to bed at a reasonable time. The Walden open mic gets an earlier start than most, operating from 7 to 10 p.m.

“All walks of life perform,” Wilson said. “We have attorneys, school teachers, geologists, caterers and a lot of students. I have had people play acoustic guitar, mandolins, harmonica, electric fiddle, bass and a Chapman stick.”

Wilson also says that he creates more of a family atmosphere at his coffee shop. While he sells beer and wine, there is no smoking at Walden’s, and he doesn’t allow profanity by the performers.

“I have had grandfathers and grandsons, fathers and daughters, mothers and daughters,” he said. “That’s the type of diversity we have.”

One night, area high school group Jibe placed fliers all over their school. The place was packed with students ordering free waters. Wilson recalled that, while he didn’t make much money, customers had a memorable time.

While open-mic nights might not mean big business for the bars and coffeehouses that host them, they are an important meeting point for the area’s art and music scene. Nick Ramirez said that his first band got its start at an open mic.

“My first band, The Decomposers, was with a guy I met at an open mic,” he said. “We were terrible.”

But Ramirez said that the fact he was up on stage with a band was an important step for him. He has been in several bands since, including Swamp Witch, Phat Couch and his current project, Nick Ramirez & The Astronauts.

He also credited open mics with overcoming his stage fright.

“Playing every week helps you get over stage fright and hone your performance,” Ramirez said. “I’m way more confident at an open mic than at a band show. Only because I know people are paying, where at an open mic it’s free.”

Jen Scaffidi, of the local band The Spark, said that running the Artists’ Playroom, the open-mic night at the Zephyr, gives her a chance to see performers she’s never heard of before. She also hopes the Artists’ Playroom can become a place where artists can create new material.

“I want a place where people can come and play with other performers,” Scaffidi said. “Not just a place to play new material, but a place to make stuff happen.”

One of her favorite aspects of an open-mic night is watching performers progress over the weeks.

“I have seen people, two in particular, who have really come out of their shells,” she said. “We had to shove them onstage the first week, and now they are there before I am, waiting to sign up.”

She also noted a trend in which many of the spoken-word performers seem to be asking musicians to come on stage and play with them while they read.

Open mics give individuals a sense of freedom. But, even better, it doesn’t cost anything to play the star for a few minutes.

“I think it’s good to have free stuff," Scaffidi said. "All you have to pay for is the beer, and [you can] hang out and be entertained."