I think my grandfather opened it in ‘59/60. We haven't changed the title of this page because that would lose the amazing string of Facebook comments.Ģ023: Sam Bussey wrote to say: ' My father and grandfather owned the club in the 60s. Whatever the relationship between these two similarly-names clubs may have been this does seem to be evidence that the Wardour Street Whisky-a-Go-Go existed in January 1965.Ģ021: Rob Prince wrote to say: 'The Whisky A Go Go club was launched in 1959 (per London phone directory for that and subsequent years) and was always spelled 'Whisky,' without the 'e.' ' Which indicates a leaning towards the Scots rather than the Irish. When closed it measures 2.5' X 3.75'.Ĭonfusingly the address of a Manchester club is printed on the back but inside the Wardour Street address is printed. It is stamped Jan 1965 and has the personal info of the individual on the inside. Evidently, if the establishment was a school or associated with learning they didn't have to pay royalties to play the music on their jukeboxes in their clubs. The sales blurb includes: “From the research I have done it appears this 'Passport' and the stamp inside saying 'Students United Social Association' indicate that this club was attempting to get around the royalty laws in England at the time. We can’t find any site that gives a date when the Flamingo became the Whisky but on eBay we found a mock British Passport (the old blue hardback with the window for the number) for the “Kingdom of Whiskey a’GoGo”. Can anyone confirm that?Ģ017: Following a comment from Kate Cackhanded Viscardi, who remembers being in the Whiskey-a-Go-Go in the 1960s (and her husband says he was there in Feb '63), we did some digging. We know nothing about running a music club but we'd guess that the Flamingo and Whisky shared premises, using them on different nights. The name was adapted from the 'Whiskey a Go Go' club in Hollywood. It opened in the 1970s (or 1959 - see below), in the premises once occupied by the Flamingo Club. Lucy Casado, matriarch of Lucy’s El Adobe Cafe and an L.A.Former nightclub. Marilyn Lewis, Hamburger Hamlet co-founder who is credited with creating the gourmet burger, dies at 87 Bruce Hampton dies after collapsing onstage during 70th birthday concert on May 28.įor tips, records, snapshots and stories on Los Angeles music culture, follow Randall Roberts on Twitter and Instagram: Email: musician Col. A public memorial will be held at the Rainbow Bar & Grill at 1 p.m. Maglieri is survived by his wife of more than 70 years, Scarlett his son Mikael and grandchildren Mikael, Cheryl and Gina. Even the guys coming up, they get an E for effort.” Asked what his favorite era for music was, he replied: “Every year. They’re good guys, but they get out of hand.”Ī music fan his entire life, Maglieri didn’t play favorites when it came to genre - though he said Sid Vicious and other nihilist punks annoyed him. The rowdiest? “Oh, Guns N’ Roses! I had to put them out I don’t know how many times! They’d get rowdy and throw bread at people. “Every time they were in town, they’d party in the middle booth. He chided Jim Morrison of the Doors for his drug use.Īsked in another Times interview about the earliest rocker regulars at the Rainbow, Maglieri cited Led Zeppelin in the 1970s. A Times profile from 1993 described Maglieri talking world politics with John Lennon outside the Roxy and buying Janis Joplin one of her last bottles of Southern Comfort. John Belushi ate his last meal at the Rainbow before overdosing at the Chateau Marmont. Through it all, Maglieri witnessed rock ’n’ roll excess and inspiration firsthand - though he said he’d never so much as smoked a joint himself. Maglieri’s son, Mikael, continues to own and run the club. When grunge killed that scene, bands including Soundgarden, Mudhoney and the Melvins landed at the Whisky. In the ’80s, the Whisky helped drive the nascent metal movement that propelled bands including Guns N’ Roses and Motley Crue. In the 1970s, as the hippie scene wound down and the Troubadour a few blocks south became the center of the singer-songwriter movement, punk rockers began invading the Strip with bands such as the Germs, X, Black Flag and Minutemen. As artists performed, go-go dancers shimmied above for all to see. Sandoval described the Whisky as “the first real club” catering to the ’60s generation.Īt the Whisky’s peak, its stage supported acts including Buffalo Springfield, Jimi Hendrix, the Mothers of Invention, the Doors and Van Morrison’s band Them. Full obituary (Tina Fineberg / Associated Press) His informed yet accessible prose led many laymen to read his books as their introduction to religions of the East and West. It was reissued as “The World’s Religions” in 1991 and has sold about 2 million copies. A scholar of world religions, Smith is best known for his work “The Religions of Man,” first published in 1958.

Whiskey a go go