Why Saving Music Venues Matters
On October 22nd, 2008 my family moved from Boston to Los Angeles. Just like the classic childhood movie story, I left all my friends behind, had to deal with the stresses of starting a new school, and even had my proper “crying on the playground while my mom pulled me away” scene. Except, unlike those movies, mine didn’t have the happiest of endings. I ended up being bullied at that school for the next six years. I was called fat so many times I did my first juice cleanse at age ten. I got made fun of for my thick Iranian eyebrows so much I got them waxed when I was twelve. The one friend I had told me to my face in seventh grade that I wasn’t popular enough to be her friend, and so she completely isolated me in eighth grade. I spent every day sitting by myself, entirely alone. Needless to say, I did not enter high school with high hopes of a glowing social life and acceptance, but just a simple goal: go in, work my ass off, and get into a college as far away from LA as possible.
This goal inevitably became problematic. I pursued my college dreams for survival in the hopes that one day I would land at a place where I didn’t sit alone every day, where people actually talked to me, and most importantly, where I had friends. Every “bad” grade I got was an attack on my survival, and I wasn’t about to lose.
But this is not that story. This is the story of how sophomore year I got so desperate for acceptance, I simply typed, “All Ages Music Venues Nearby” into my search bar. The Smell was the first thing that pulled up.
In my mind, The Smell is the heart of my LA life and experience. Having moved again in November, now more than ever it feels like my true home. It is the place I dream of when I am in search of comfort. It is the one place that has offered me solace when I needed it and that has always, always been there for me when I needed it most.
It isn’t a pristine place, but it’s the most beautiful place I know. If it’s your first time going, you will probably have to follow the sound to find it. You will walk through an alley and pass people smoking cigarettes leaned against their cars. The pavement in the parking lot is torn up and if you kick your feet along, your shoes will get filled with gravel. There are murals of a woman’s face in warm colors to the left, and a seemingly unfitting one of the Pink Panther to your right.
The physical space is calming. It truly feels safe in a way I can’t explain. Inside, there is a collapsed couch in the back where I used to see couples making out and wished I had a boyfriend in a juvenile daydream. There are couch cushions strewn about the floor to sit on if you get tired from moshing. The walls are covered with murals and art made by the people who frequent The Smell, the people who keep it alive. Tickets cost $5 but you can get in for free if you offer to volunteer selling snacks or tickets. There aren’t official employees, except for Jim, who pays the rent and keeps it running so people like me can find our home there.
The people are beautiful too. It’s no surprise to anybody that LA cares a great deal about external appearances, from cars to Botox. This concern for physical appearances permeated my adolescent years as I constantly tried to change myself to please others and fit in. The emphasis on conventional beauty that permeates LA as a whole breeds an emphasis on individuality at The Smell unlike anything I’d seen before or have seen since. The people there really do not give a shit about what you think of them. They wear what they want, say what they want, and act how they want. And it is beautiful. None of them look like each other or like anyone else. They are all individuals in their fullest form, trying to be the fullest and most authentic versions of themselves.
The Smell became my safe haven for years. After a week doing my homework in teachers’ rooms at lunch so the fact I didn’t have friends wouldn’t show, I could not wait for the weekend. Sometimes I would go to two or three shows back to back. When I wasn’t at The Smell, I wanted to be there. I wanted to be in the only space that made me feel safe, the only space where I felt I could be myself without social repercussions, and the only place where I could be happy in my present without dreaming of an uncertain future for survival. The Smell taught me that I am more than the number on the test handed back to me that I had previously held onto as my only hope of finding friends. It taught me that I am one hell of an individual and even if the conformist culture around me doesn’t accept that, I don’t have to change myself at all to make anyone happy. There are people and places who will and do accept me as I am, and these bonds are stronger than anything that exists in a superficial space.
There are lots of stories like my own. While I might be biased and definitely think something about The Smell is uniquely magical, music venues provide people like me with a home. They allow people to form connections through art, music, and emotion. The purpose of music venues is to bring people together, and they do just that. They provide us with homes when our other “homes” are shaky or nonexistent concepts. Music venues matter.
And yet, they are in danger. Of course it is no longer safe to gather in large groups in enclosed spaces. But the result of this is that music venues might not exist in the future. From a purely economic point of view, this will result in a loss of jobs for venue owners and staff, as well as a loss of income for artists who previously depended on playing live shows. For a place like The Smell, it will prevent new bands from having a small venue to gain a following and find their sound in. It is still my dream to one day play a show at The Smell, but I’m not sure if that will be possible in the future now. For the regulars at small venues, the result of them closing is that we will lose a part of ourselves. We will lose the places that feel like home to us. Places that have held us and provided us with a feeling of belonging when no one and nowhere else did.
I wish I had a happy ending here. I wish I could end with a call to action to donate, but the truth is that there are numerous other causes that are far more worthy of these donations. If anything, let this be a call to action to care about both people and music in the world at large. Deep down inside, I know the physical space of The Smell will probably go eventually. What I hold dear to my heart is the community. And I think that is something that even a pandemic cannot take away from me. Even though we are not at shows right now, we have each other and our memories.
PS: But also please let it be a call to action to wear a mask, socially distance, and elect an administration that will take this pandemic seriously so music venues and ALL OF US have a better chance of survival.