| Two very different
teen clubs satisfy their patrons’ demands for safe fun
and serious systems.
By Elisabeth Gibbons
Rocketown, Nashville
A not-for-profit with sound to burn.
Who would think that a Christian music artist would be behind
one of the most impressive teen clubs in the nation? In 1994,
singer Michael W. Smith founded a teen club called Rocketown,
in an effort to provide a safe and nurturing place for young
people to gather. The original venue closed in 1997, but a
new site in downtown Nashville reopened with the same name
in 2003, with an impressive upgrade. We’re talking high-end
professional systems at a non-profit venue, for kids who have
never seen the inside of another nightclub in their lives.
 But
Rocketown is more than just a teen club. They call it “an
entertainment destination,” comprised of three elements:
the Empyrean Coffee Bar, a 14,000-square-foot indoor skatepark,
and a 10,000-square-foot nightclub. Empyrean serves light
food and non-alcoholic beverages, and has an acoustic stage,
a retail shop, and an isolated DJ lounge (The Deep) with 7,000
square feet on two levels. The skatepark features a retail
outlet, vending, and lounge facilities, and two private party
rooms. But the jewel of this venue is its 10,000 square-foot
dance/performance club.
For the Kids, By the Kids
But what’s really important to the Rocketown staff is
their crowd. Manager Roger Thompson says that the goal is
not just entertaining teens, but involving them and helping
them develop into healthy adults. The club has a four-part
mission it calls “ABCD” – being a great
Attraction for youths; Building relationships with them; Connecting
them to resources; and helping them Discover their dreams.
This directive is what keeps the club going in more ways than
one: Since it’s non-profit, Rocketown relies heavily
on donations, and it’s their community service angle
that keeps them afloat.
Sound more like community outreach than entertainment? Maybe
so, but the club attracts over 1,000 patrons a week. On Saturday
night, the club’s most popular, all the programming
is generated and performed by the kids. Though he says they’re
“still learning how to promote,” Thompson attributes
Rocketown’s strong draw to the fact that the kids feel
more involved in the club, and bring their friends along to
watch and participate as well. Plus, the cover is kept very
low (around $5).
Danny’s Toys
Non-profit considerations aside, Danny Griffin, the club’s
tech guru, really wanted Rocketown to have a Funktion-One
speaker system. “When it came time to put a sound system
in the club, there was really no other choice for me, because
I had heard it before. We’re a non-profit, and the president
of our board had some questions about Funktion-One, only because
he wanted to know if we could go cheaper, which is what you’re
supposed to do, but I really wanted this,” he says.
“I said, ‘Look, I’ll put lamps on that stage
if we can’t afford lights, but the sound is just really
important.’ And Carl [Taylor, from Q of Nashville] gave
us such a great price.”
But it wasn’t as easy as just putting the system in
there. The room had to be prepped for it. Griffin recalls
the first time he walked into the space: “It’s
an all brick room with a poured floor, so when we first got
the building you could hear a conversation you had about a
week ago in the rafters. I didn’t know how we were going
to turn it down.” They ended up putting carpet on the
mezzanine, spraying the ceiling with acoustical treatment,
adding bass traps under the stair landings, lining the stage
with insulation, and putting insulation-filled barrels on
the dancefloor.
The Funktion-One F-218 double 18-inch subs are stacked under
the stage, and the cabinets are hanging from big orange beams
that stretch across the ceiling. All the amplification comes
from QSC. This place means business, and Griffin couldn’t
be prouder. “It sounds incredible. We have an Infrabass
sub, and it’s 6000 watts; it only picks up 70dB and
under. People come in and their jaws drop. I get really stoked
about it.”
The sound gets compliments from the kids, the DJs, and the
bands. “The kids don’t know what the Funktion
One is,” says Griffin. “It’s a little bit
of overkill, but bands love it when they come in here.”
With the teen crowd, it’s all about hip-hop, therefore
bass is of the utmost importance. Danny claims that with the
Funktion-One you can hear everything – “the bass,
the highs, the mids…it’s just as clear as it can
be. It’s like wearing headphones!”
Club Done Good
Rocketown has been a resounding success, as a teen club and
as a community center for youth. “We drew a lot of support
from the community,” says Thompson. “It’s
a phenomenal facilty, the best facility in Nashville. We’re
leading this idea. And it’s a whole new model when you
go the non-profit route.”
And by all accounts, Rocketown can hang with the big boys,
and Thompson couldn’t be happier. “I constantly
read Club Systems International, and I love to keep up with
what the other clubs have,” says Griffin. “I’m
so proud of what we’ve got. I feel like it’s the
best kept secret, and once it gets out it’ll be huge.”
Rocketown
401 6th Avenue South
Nashville, Tennessee
www.rocketown.com
Fusion, San Diego
A teen club older than its patrons, with similarly aged workhorse
systems.
Fusion is San Diego’s only nightclub for the under-21
crowd, and has been for 20 years. In a world where some clubs
don’t last longer than a few years, owner Stojan Mitich
has managed to keep Fusion open and hopping. He started the
club right out of high school, and attributes its success
to hard work, on everything from promotions to music programming.
When promoting Fusion, Mitich gets ‘em where they live:
the schools. He has a mobile DJ business that grew out of
the nightclub, and uses it as a tool to give the kids a taste
of what they might be missing if they don’t hit up Fusion.
“We have a mobile system, and we do a lot of school
dances. It promotes the nightclub,” he says. They also
rely on the tradition flyer route, and radio spots. With teens,
Mitich says, “you’ve got to hit them at every
angle. You have to look all over the place. Talk to the kids
at the schools, talk to them in the street. You have to be
out there, all over.”
And once he gets the kids in the door, the battle to keep
them continues with delivering the kind of sound and lighting
they demand: simple and powerful.
Keep It Simple
Fusion is a big place, with an oversized dancefloor, stages,
and an outdoor patio for a second DJ spread over two stories.
And while their gear list is rather short, it delivers a big
punch.
The lighting is simple, but with teens, Fusion’s found,
“the darker the better.”
“I’ve been dealing with Mitich now for almost
20 years,” says Tony Mirador of The DJ Store, the lighting
designer for Fusion. “He just let me do what I thought
would be best. He wanted a bit of the old rave scene. The
kids like more of the rave look, really dark colors and lasers
shooting through.” Mirador’s system includes six
Martin Professional Pro 218 Roboscans, four High End Systems
Dataflash strobes, an LPD Q-Beam (a 300mW laser), and a fog
machine. It’s all hanging on trusses, one rectangular
and one square. The system’s just enough to create different
scenes and moods, and is pretty self-sufficient. Mirador says
his biggest challenge is keeping the laser up to code.
Old Reliable
Mitich boasts that his sound system is “probably one
of the best in San Diego,” based on the principle that
“kids demand a stronger sound system than the adults.”
We take that to mean loads of bass.
“There’s actually one big main super-large system
that’s kind of like a concert stack, and then there
are four perimeters around it that service the whole dancing
area,” explains Dave Volz, owner of Sonic Systems Interface,
and sound tech for Fusion. “And then there are 14 bass
bins in stacks of clusters at each end.”
In Volz’s estimation, this system is “about a
5,000-watt bass system, and then another 2,000 for the mid-top.
We are one of the bigger bass systems in our area.”
Fortunately, Fusion is in a rural spot, so that bass doesn’t
bug the neighbors over a mile and a half away. “I never
thought it would be the case, but I checked it out myself
and you can barely hear it,” says Volz.
What’s surprising is that this booming sound comes from
pieces that are older than the patrons they service. “It’s
an old system – a lot of pieces are from the ’70s
– but surprisingly it almost never fails,” says
Volz. “The speakers are newer, but the amplifiers, the
BGWs, are from the ’70s. They are better than some of
the new junk out there now. That’s the amazing thing
about this system, is that it’s an older one and it
keeps up with all the newer ones. It will cook along with
any of the other clubs in the area, that’s for sure.”
Making the Grade
Musically, it’s not easy to keep up with the fickle
mind of a teenager. “Our DJs have to keep up with the
music,” says Mitich. “They’re in record
pools, and they stay on it. Right now we’re doing house
and techno, but that’s going to change to underground
hip-hop.” It’s a constant battle to find out what
the kids are into, because it changes so frequently. But the
one thing that’s consistent is their love of the dark,
and their need for the bass. And that, Fusion delivers.
Fusion
775 Metcalf Street,
Escondido, California
www.fusionlaser.com
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