down comes the dame
the final demolition of the dame on monday. photo by herald-leader staff photographer mark cornelison.
Mark Cornelison’s front page shot earlier this week of the inevitable but horribly drawn out demolition of The Dame spoke far more than the proverbial 1,000 words.
This was where X played, where Alejandro Escovedo rocked, where Kenny Chesney kept people waiting in the snow and where the Sun Ra Arkestra marched into after a downtown Fat Tuesday parade.
This was where dozens of local bands used to call home. It is now, in the march toward the CentrePointe project, rubble.
“Where the heck is everyone playing now that The Dame is gone?” That was the one-line email I received from a understandably miffed Louisville concert promoter last weekend. My replay: for now, nowhere.
I am a native Kentuckian and freelance journalist who has been writing about contemporary music for the Lexington Herald-Leader since 1980. I have not a lick of honest musical talent myself, just a pair of appreciative ears for jazz, folk, blues, bluegrass, Americana, soul, Celtic, Cajun, chamber, worldbeat, nearly every form of rock 'n' roll imaginable and, when pressed, the occasional tango and polka.