El Paso has a colorful history of amazing local musicians, performance venues, radio personalities and recorded music of all types; live music is special. The performance is a place where musician and audience can come together and experience the type of transcendence that has intrigued people throughout time. At this moment several venues have taken up the charge of establishing a support system for a local music scene that continues to make noise nationally. One specific venue that stands out above the rest is The Lowbrow Palace.
“With the opening of Lowbrow Palace, with Tricky Falls coming on and now Monarch, people are feeling inspired to get creative again and get out there and make some music,” says Austin Allen, owner of the Lowbrow Palace. “I didn’t see that prior to four years ago. You would see bands here and there, but now you see groups start to take it seriously and that is nice.”
This notion of taking this music culture seriously really resonates with Allen. It is an important way to respect and foster the local creative impulse. Just as in scientific research, support for creative activity promotes growth and it is this type of support that The Lowbrow Palace provides. Young musicians can get excited about the potential to play a nationally significant venue in town that helps them look and sound better. Allowing musicians to create sound in a way that they can’t achieve otherwise rejuvenates the local scene in profound ways.
A confluence of events, rooted in responding to physical spaces have conspired to shape what is The Lowbrow Palace in Kern Place is today. At a moment when his Black Market venture was experiencing growing pains with respect to live music, Allen jumped on an opportunity to take over the music venue across the street known as Zeppelins. Initially, this move was to be a simple expansion of Black Market, but as they began to renovate, the knocking down of one wall literally opened up to reveal a much bigger room. It was then that Allen began to think bigger about the true potential for The Lowbrow Palace.
With ample space and a serious approach to providing artists tools to achieve a better sound, The Lowbrow Palace was able to capitalize on the live music momentum the neighborhood had been building. “Once the word got out that we were putting in a PA, putting in a minus board, putting EAW Sound system and all the dopeness as far as gear goes,” Allen says, “we started getting attention from local promoters, and we opened up booked. Right away, we had a positive response from local musicians and right away, we started getting attention nationally.”
This kind of national attention has the potential to shine a light on more local bands while also enticing more national and international acts to make El Paso a viable tour stop. This inspiration-growth cycle combined with ample community support create an invaluable recipe for growing culture and music scenes in El Paso. The Lowbrow Palace is a very special place because it offers serious support to local musicians and inspires them to participate in larger musical conversations. An energized engaged community, the stadium seating and the high quality professional equipment all add to The Lowbrow recipe for creating rock and roll magic.
“I don’t know what we’ve done exactly,” says Allen, “but there is just something about being on that stage, being in that room that makes people feel like rock stars.”
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TEXT & ILLUSTRATION: ERIK PARRA
PHOTO CREDIT: HECTOR RIVEROLL ©2014
