Jump to content

Uncle Sam's Niteclub


TSNBDSC

Recommended Posts

      Nice pic.  Do you have any of the inside?  Spent many a summer Wed in 70-72 there.  At least when Wilmer was playing.

      On Saturday nights they had a fair number of groups that were on their way to greater things.  Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes, Alice Cooper, Paul Butterfield and Chicago Transit Authority (C.T.A) just at the point they were changing their name to Chicago.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

6 minutes ago, Greybeard said:

      Nice pic.  Do you have any of the inside?  Spent many a summer Wed in 70-72 there.  At least when Wilmer was playing.

      On Saturday nights they had a fair number of groups that were on their way to greater things.  Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes, Alice Cooper, Paul Butterfield and Chicago Transit Authority (C.T.A) just at the point they were changing their name to Chicago.

 

Click the arrow to the right of the picture.

 

Or double click photo then click back to album at top left

Edited by tsnbd
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I actually was there when Ted (Mr. Mellow) Nugent and the Amboy Dukes played. IIRC, there was a snow storm heading in and the place had maybe 100 people for the show. I spent the entire night standing right  in front of TN watching and listening. It was quite the night. 

  • Like (+1) 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

that place and stage one..saw some great bands at both places.

 

I don't remember U2 ar Uncle Sams, must not have gone. Weird

36 minutes ago, teef said:

how much coke do you think was inhaled in that place?

I would think not much, was way too expensive then. But I was in high school, so everything was expensive to me. I remember sneaking in beers to Uncle Sams for concerts

Link to comment
Share on other sites

3 hours ago, Tony P said:

I actually was there when Ted (Mr. Mellow) Nugent and the Amboy Dukes played. IIRC, there was a snow storm heading in and the place had maybe 100 people for the show. I spent the entire night standing right  in front of TN watching and listening. It was quite the night. 

        What year did you see them?  I don't remember a snowstorm and I thought I saw them during the summer.  I do remember someone in the crowd yelling "Journey to the Center of the MInd."   Ted yelled back " What do you think this is, AM radio."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Remember the last time I was there.

Took someone  and after me buying her a drink, she said she would go get us the next one.   She was gone for a while {place was busy, so no problem). After a while, I look around for her and find her making out with somebody. I waited  for her by the door until she finally came back and saw me. I then went out to the car  and grabbed her purse (she had just taken her ID and $ in) and threw it across the parking lot at her and said "Here's your  purse  b***h"" and drove away, leaving her there.  I had the sense to not drive away with it as she could have called the cops on me for stealing it. A few weeks later she walked into another bar I was at and she spotted me and immediately turned and left.

Edited by Wacka
Link to comment
Share on other sites

15 hours ago, Greybeard said:

        What year did you see them?  I don't remember a snowstorm and I thought I saw them during the summer.  I do remember someone in the crowd yelling "Journey to the Center of the MInd."   Ted yelled back " What do you think this is, AM radio."

Like I mentioned, I'm not sure I'm having a correct recollection of the day. There were a lot of...ummm....fuzzy nights back then. I could just as easily be confusing that show with another night we were there. I do remember that there were very few people attending that night which surprised me.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/10/2018 at 3:11 PM, teef said:

how much coke do you think was inhaled in that place?

On the second floor.? It was like a Miami Vice episode.

On 1/10/2018 at 2:52 PM, Tony P said:

I actually was there when Ted (Mr. Mellow) Nugent and the Amboy Dukes played. IIRC, there was a snow storm heading in and the place had maybe 100 people for the show. I spent the entire night standing right  in front of TN watching and listening. It was quite the night. 

Was that before 1982 or after '85? If I was living here then that would have been a no miss.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/10/2018 at 2:41 PM, Poleshifter said:

Wasn't this place called Gilligan's before it was Uncle Sam's?

 

I saw Golden Earring and Cat Mother & All Night Newsboys there. I think it was still Gilligan's for those shows.

 

Yes, IIRC Gilligans was owned by the guy who owned the Inferno in glen park Williamsville. He opened  it after the Inferno burned down ( arson?). He was well connected in the booking of up and coming artists. In particular acts playing in NYC and then touring waiting for their break, a lot of them from across the pond. . For awhile at the Inferno Leslie West and the Vagrants were  a house band there. Pre Mountain fame. When he opened Gilligans the list of  up and coming artists playing  there was huge. 

 

Cactus was almost a house band but in reality the Twiggs actually were (later called the Magic Ring). The Bob Seeger system, Canned Heat, Amboy Dukes, Wilmer & the Dukes , Johnny Winter, Butterfield,  Chicago, etc.  Were huge weekend draws. And for most all pre fame.

Chuck Berry would use the Twiggs as his back up band. WITHOUT Even a rehearsal. Crazy times. LUMS a restaraunt next door in front. Had some very interesting clientele during the evenings. In particular when English bands stopped in too eat. Boiled hot dogs may have been unique for them.   Spooky Tooth, The Crazy world of Arthur Brown, Ten years after, on and on they all went through Gilligans. Peter Townshend even appeared as a drunk patron when the Who did a gig at Klienhans and Spooky Tooth  played Gilligans later that evening. Last but certainly not last Moog Music was cross the street. In the crap hole flea market. Where the English bands would on occasion hang until Monday AM for a  tour.

 

Good Times in the Buffalo club scene. Uncle Sams kind of lost that vibe after a year or so. Disco had something too do with that. 

 

  • Like (+1) 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

From the above post, it was across from GEX which became the Flea Marke.t Moog Synthesizers was on the east side of the building. The GEX/Flea market building was torn town a few yeats ago and  Walmart is there now.  The building that housed Uncle Sams is still standing and is a warehouse or a factory.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

42 minutes ago, Wacka said:

From the above post, it was across from GEX which became the Flea Marke.t Moog Synthesizers was on the east side of the building. The GEX/Flea market building was torn town a few yeats ago and  Walmart is there now.  The building that housed Uncle Sams is still standing and is a warehouse or a factory.

Thanks.  I will have to take a drive by next time I'm on Walden.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Today Uncle Sam's is the name of a Buffalo surplus store, but back in the day it was first a disco known for its funky reverse dance floor and later one of Buffalo's earliest punk clubs. Uncle Sam's actually drew some pretty big names, too: Gang of Four, the Pretenders, the Plasmatics and the Ramones. At one point there were several other Uncle Sam's clubs operated by the same management team in Detroit, Des Moines, and Minneapolis – the last of these even made an appearance in Purple Rain.

 

The one in Syracuse is long gone: from Syracuse.com

 

DeWitt, N.Y. -- The former Uncle Sam's night club is going to meet the wrecking ball soon.

The long-vacant building at the northeast corner of Erie Boulevard East and Bridge Street, which also operated at various times as Suburban Park, the Country Club, the Scene and Oliver's, will be demolished at the end of March, said owner Grazi Zazzara.

Zazzara bought the building in 2008 for $500,000. He said he has always planned to tear down the building and develop the site for retail, a restaurant or other commercial use when a tenant could be found. He's said he's still looking for a tenant and is hoping that removing the building and cleaning up the property will help attract one.

"I didn't buy it for the building," he said. "I bought it for the location."

Built in the early 1960s, the building briefly housed a Polynesian restaurant before being turned into a night club. It operated under several different owners and names over the years.

The building has been vacant for about 15 years and has fallen into disrepair. Three bars are still intact inside, but the building's roof is caving in.

Since word got out that he is going to demolish it, Zazzara said he has been receiving calls from people telling him about their many fond memories of the place, some recalling how they met their future spouse there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Was definitely at both U2 shows there in 1981. Also saw the Pretenders, Gang of Four and the BoDeans that I recall. Also the John Anderson for President show with Todd Rundgren, Ian Hunter and Willie Nile. On that last one, on the way to the show 97Rock announced at the last minute that they were broadcasting the whole thing live. I have a vivid recollection of my brother and I on a payphone trying to explain to our mother how to operate the tape deck and record the show. Pretty sure she got it and we got our tape. Pretty great show too.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/14/2018 at 8:09 PM, Best Player Available said:

Yes, IIRC Gilligans was owned by the guy who owned the Inferno in glen park Williamsville. He opened  it after the Inferno burned down ( arson?). He was well connected in the booking of up and coming artists. In particular acts playing in NYC and then touring waiting for their break, a lot of them from across the pond. . For awhile at the Inferno Leslie West and the Vagrants were  a house band there. Pre Mountain fame. When he opened Gilligans the list of  up and coming artists playing  there was huge. 

 

Cactus was almost a house band but in reality the Twiggs actually were (later called the Magic Ring). The Bob Seeger system, Canned Heat, Amboy Dukes, Wilmer & the Dukes , Johnny Winter, Butterfield,  Chicago, etc.  Were huge weekend draws. And for most all pre fame.

 

The Bob Seger System played an incredible show in Dec 68. It was at a place called Psycus (IIRC), an old theater on Seneca Street (probably).

 

A power trio with Bob playing guitar. Pep Perrine had some weird tubular drum amplifiers (or whatever). I was disappointed when they augmented the System with organ and another guitarist.

 

Did anyone here see that amazing show?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 1/14/2018 at 8:09 PM, Best Player Available said:

LUMS a restaraunt next door in front.

OT but I had to smile at the LUMS reference.  When I was in high school my best friend's brother was the late night cook there.  We used to go there after going out, and we'd order breakfast and he'd cook these ridiculous cartoon size portions - pancakes as big as 3 plates etc.. The game was we had to finish everything he brought out (and not puke or "luke").  Good (and bad) times.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

×
×
  • Create New...