From KUTX:
This Week in Texas Music History is brought to you by Brane Audio.
On April 24, 1992, local punk trio Jesus Christ Superfly took the stage in an old brick building at the corner of Sixth Street and Red River in Austin. The rock club Emo’s was born, an outpost of a Houston venue that would soon become the beating heart of the capital scene.
For the first two years of the club’s existence, patrons of legal drinking age paid no cover to see local bands like the Cherubs, Motards and Glorium, not to mention touring acts like Jesus Lizard and Killdozer. And while economic demands saw the no-cover policy disappear, the all-ages club had cemented its status as ground zero for Austin’s fans and purveyors of noise-damaged rock and roll.
The barn-like club, a former automotive garage, was transformed by visual artists Lindsey Kuhn, whose psychedelic mural of infamous Texas murderers flanked the larger outdoor stage, and Frank Kozik, whose leather-clad Flintstones montage resided next to the smaller indoor stage.
Former manager David Thomson III has said of the club that he hoped they “created … a ‘friendly port’ for all bands and people who didn’t fit in anywhere else … This was the home for all the misfit kids in the world.” Emo’s anchored the developing Red River district of rock clubs in the ’90s and early 2000s, as managers, employees, audience members and artists who learned the ropes at Emo’s established their own venues and ventures central to Austin’s reputation as a DIY rock town.
The downtown club endured longer than the city’s iconic Armadillo World Headquarters, with a similar resonance in the life of Austin’s residents and culture. In 2011, Emo’s left its Red River address and reopened in South Austin, today overseen by Live Nation as a site for prominent touring acts.
