7/19/2006: Issues with your Mojito venue

Written to the ownership of the venue Mojito in North Beach:

Hi guys- My name is Davin and I have a few comments
from my first trip to your Mojito venue last week.

First, a little background. I'm an SF resident, a live
music nut, and a huge fan of North Beach Jazz Fest
along with many of the shows you folks produce. Great
work in that regard (especially in pulling off the
Jazz Fest this year!) Thanks for continuing to bring
tons of great music to the Bay Area. I'm such a music
nut in fact that a couple of years ago after demand
from some friends I started doing a bi-weekly SF live
music recommendation email list. It's up to about 120
great show-going people that I know personally, and
I'm proud to say that it's pretty regular that I
succeed in getting folks off the couch and out to see
music.

Having been blown away by their Elbo Room show last
year, I pushed people on my list pretty hard to catch
Grupo Fantasma last week at your new club. Also I had
high hopes for Mojito as a venue, because I'm familiar
with the great music events that Sunset Promotions is
all about. By 10pm I had personally brought no less
than 9 paying (drinking) customers to Mojito,
including myself.

The consensus from each and every one: Great band,
lousy venue. Two friends even went so far as to
(drunkenly) vow never to set foot in Mojito again. I
thought you guys might want to know why.

Layout: Grupo Fantasma is a pretty big band, but they
were swimming in extra space on the ground-level stage
(with the horn section stuffed awkwardly to the side).
Whereas anyone trying to get back and forth across the
venue had to deal with a crazy bottleneck right in the
middle of the place. The narrowest point is between
the stage and the bar, front and center, and it was
annoying the hell out of people trying to dance
without spilling each other's drinks. Move the stage
back, elevate it just a bit, just do something. The
layout makes no sense. A further downer is that utter
lack of character in the decor. There are huge high
ceilings with a humongous wall behind the band. It was
devoid of any artwork, just a big blank space. I felt
embarassed for you guys, there's no excuse for that in
SF. It looked like a loft owned by un-stylish people.
I know a slew of talented artists that would kill to
hang a piece in that spot, but it's just a sad blank
2-tone wall with spot lights on it. I know this stuff
is subjective, but I'm a designer by trade so I have a
bit of experience here. You can do better.

Sound: In such a small room, you don't need much. But
without any elevated speakers that I could see vocals
and horns were totally drowned out. Just elevate the
PA above the crowd, problem solved. Or if you actually
do have elevated speakers there, get a sound guy who
knows what volume they should be at. Look at what the
Elbo Room did, they used to have the worst sound of
any small room in the city. Now they're one of the
best, copy 'em.

Drinks: This might have been the complaint I heard
most. Beers were way too small for full price, what
the hell is with the mini glasses? They were pissing
everyone off that I talked to. And the mixed drinks
sucked too, small and weak was the order of the night.
You might think that after knocking back a few people
don't notice this stuff, but everyone around me sure
did.

So needless to say I'll be thinking twice before
staking my reputation on telling people to go to
Mojito. In fact, with the current state of the joint
I'll be adding a caveat to my descriptions of the
bands playing there, something like "despite the lousy
venue, you should go see this band anyway. They're
just that good." Because the music is good, and that's
more important than the venue at the end of it all.

It doesn't have to be this way guys! You obviously
have the ability to book great acts in a unique and
intimate spot, just improve the venue to match the
quality of the music! Sorry if this whole email comes
off harsh or arrogant by the way, I'm trying to be
constructive. I like your website's mission statement
and I just want to see a small venue with such great
potential not go to waste.

Cheers and stay funky.

-Davin Pukulis (Showy McShow)