Who cares what you wear? Bouncers and bartenders may well give your attire more than a passing thought.
Last Friday, April 22, they instituted a new dress code policy at Havana Nights, a popular salsa scene at Johnston’s Ballybay.
Hosted by La Familia de la Salsa for the past five years, Havana Nights has routinely drawn more than 150 dancers every Friday night to the West End nightspot.
“From this day forth, we will not be allowing baseball caps or hoodies in the bar or the dance hall,” announced La Familia spokesman Brian Bromka last week. “Please tell your friends.”
While minority groups in places such as Kansas City have protested nightclub dress codes as racist, that’s certainly not the case with Havana Nights whose crowds are the most heterogeneous as any in the city, with folks from Harlem, the Caribbean, South America – even Syracuse University – all doing the Rueda de Casino together!
The Havana Nights Latin Dance Party convenes from 9:30 p.m. to 2 a.m. every Friday, at Johnston’s BallyBay, 550 Richmond Ave., at the corner of Sackett Street. Admission costs $5, or you can take a salsa lesson at 8:15 p.m. and pay $10 total; lafamiliadelasalsa.com; 636-7133.
Dress to depress?
Brian Bass, a contributing editor at Nightclub & Bar Magazine, says dress codes are standard at nightclubs because they help bouncers keep out troublemakers.
“Without a dress code,” Bass said, “then it certainly becomes a lot more sticky…You know when people are dressing up, there’s some thought there that they’ll behave better.”
‘No sideways hats’
While La Familia attempts to enforce sartorial standards at BallyBay, a blue-collar bar on the North Side has also established a strict dress code.
A hand-written sign on the front door of the Locker Room and Fire & Ice Banquet Facilities, at 528 Hiawatha Blvd. East., spells it out real clearly:
“No baggy pants.
No hoodies.
No sideways hats – if you can’t wear it straight, don’t come in!
Any questions?”
Jazz Fest forges on
This nefarious never-ending recession has resulted in the dissolution of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra, but another Salt City music institution – the Syracuse Jazz Fest – refuses to succumb.
On Monday May 2, festival founder Frank Malfitano will announce headliners for the 2011 festival apparently set for June 24-25 at Onondaga Community College.
“We’re still trying to raise the money needed to produce a 29th annual edition this June at OCC,” Malfitano e-mailed me last week. “The size, scale, scope and breadth of what we’re able to present will ultimately be determined by how successful we are with our fund-raising efforts over the next few weeks. We sustained huge cuts to the annual operating budget this year from the public sector, and since we’re committed to maintaining jazz fest’s free-admission policy so everyone can enjoy it, we’re hoping the private sector will help us across the finish line.”
Good-bye, Columbus
Former Manowar drummer Scott Columbus died April 4, at age 54. Raised in Sterling, Columbus lived in Syracuse at the time of his death.
Columbus joined the band in 1983 and remained with Manowar through 1990, before rejoining in 1994 to play the “Drums of Doom” until his unheralded departure from the band in April 2008. His heavy-handed skin-hitting is showcased on Manowar albums from the 1980s such as “Into Glory Ride,” “Sign of the Hammer” and “Kings of Metal.” More recent discs were “Louder than Hell,” “Warriors of the World” and “Gods of War.”
He played the so-called “Drums of Doom,” a kit made of stainless steel, because his drumming technique was too rough on standard trap sets which had to be replaced too regularly.
Over the years he often had run-ins with bassist and bandleader Joey DeMaio.
In an interview with Classic Rock magazine, Columbus said, he quit the group in 2008 “when Mr. DeMaio and myself agreed to disagree on a few points of interest…You know what? I had a long and wonderful career with Manowar. I have no regrets. It’s just [that] life moves on.”
No cause of death was released, and services were private.
Citing the drummer’s girlfriend as his source, an Internet poster at heartofmetal.niceboard.com stated that Columbus’ death was a suicide.
A tribute page has been created to remember Scott on Facebook.
