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Minneapolis Travel Articles
- Prince Ruled, Music Still Rules
Minneapolis still likes to think of itself as an oasis of cool in the artistically staid steppes of the upper Midwest. Certainly, the city's visual arts, theater and filmmaking action could justify its denizens' unwavering self-perception as being much more than a cold Omaha. But the backbone of the area's counterculture remains the music scene.
No doubt Minnesota has something fundamentally tuneful going for it: The state has produced the painterly intensity of Bob Dylan, the drunken brilliance of the Replacements, and the Trashmen, a '60s surf band with a major cult following.
And despite Minnesota's unremitting whiteness, black music has long supplied the local music scene with heaps of vitality. Hands-down, the chief architect and proprietor of Minneapolis' rocking soul sound was Prince. But just as significant over the long haul has been the work of Jimmy Jam Harris and Terry Lewis, former members of Prince protégés the Time, now proprietors of the area's hit-making Flyte Tyme Productions studio. The likes of Janet Jackson and Mariah Carey come here seeking the Jam-and-Lewis team's platinum touch, though their efforts remain almost exclusively invisible, tucked away in their area studio.
The still-beating heart of the music community remains First Avenue, as reliably well run, innovative, and vibrant as ever. A big old bus depot in the middle of downtown, the club is really a two-for-one deal: its annex is the Seventh Street Entry, a hole-in-the-wall that started hosting underground bands back when hardcore and punk were new-the first time. Between the two of them, First Avenue and the Entry regularly offer 30-odd jazz, blues, international, but mostly rock bands each week.
The 400 Bar, located in the heart of the earthy-crunchy West Bank, is another venerable venue. Its regular crowd of foreign university students gives way to grungers some nights, neo-hippies on others, and longtime devotees of the local folk scene about once a week. Close by, the low-key Cedar Cultural Center is a P.C. (no smoking/no alcohol) kind of place that's intriguingly if infrequently booked.
Five blocks up Cedar, the Cabooze is a sturdy old biker blues bar that's become the reggae and Phish crowd's territory. The Quest is hosting an increasing number of national acts. Other smaller venues have burgeoned in recent years, filling various niches and garnering their own loyal subjects. Places like the venerable faux-wood-paneled Lee's Liquor Bar and the Foxfire Coffee Lounge, both downtown; the Terminal Bar in near northeast Minneapolis; the Turf Club in St. Paul; and the Blue Nile in South Minneapolis, among others, have added their flavors to the melange that makes Minnesota extra musically tasty.
If you visit the Twin Cities in summer, you'll catch the indie music scene in full post-spring-thaw tilt. Walker Art Center sponsors a low-key, grassy Monday night series of music and movies in Loring Park. Cedarfest, in August on the West Bank, is a packed, joyous outdoor gathering featuring buckets of hip acts from near and far; and the Mill City Music Fest is a multi-day, multi-stage blowout that takes over Minneapolis' Warehouse District for Labor Day Weekend.
For a break from the music, you might wander down the eclectic row of bars on the West Bank: Red Sea, the 400 Bar, Five Corners Blues Saloon, Whiskey Junction, and the Cabooze are within a mile of each other along Cedar. Or head over to South Minneapolis to visit the genuinely hip Bryant-Lake Bowl -- if there isn't something uniquely, pleasing wacky going on in the theater (as there is more often than not) you can always drink expensive, delicious beer and throw a few games.
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