Linda Falkenstein
Christensen of The Bur Oak: “Talking to each other, brainstorming ideas and advocating to local and state government was very empowering.”
When Ben Churley throws open the doors to in-person crowds at Liquid and Ruby for a friends and family celebration on Sept. 10, it will be the first time he’s done so in more than 500 days. That’s how long it’s been since COVID-19 shut down the EDM- and DJ-focused University Avenue music venue. Shortly after things went dark in mid-March of 2020, Churley, the club’s manager, had to lay off all 30 of his employees.
“It was an extremely difficult decision and one of the most depressing moments of the entire pandemic,” recalls Churley.
Farther east, The Bur Oak, the small music venue on Winnebago Street, shut down the same week Liquid did, after hosting a show featuring Dave King and guitarist Julian Lage. The Bur Oak’s reopening has been more gradual, beginning with a comedy show in May. But the club is only now beginning to return to something resembling a normal schedule of events.
“Luckily, we made it,” says Toffer Christensen, the promoter who handles booking at The Bur Oak through his production company T-Presents. “We’re open and struggling. But being open is the most important thing right now.”
While the latest surge driven by the Delta Variant is producing new problems for music venues everywhere, the good news is that most of Madison’s music venues found a way to survive the first round of the pandemic, though they certainly didn’t emerge unscathed.
“There comes a point where you have to ask yourself, how much of your own savings are you willing to put in?” asks Christensen. “There were conversations had, to be sure.”
Churley credits Liquid’s survival to a supportive owner and to its involvement in the National Independent Venues Association (NIVA), a group that formed during the pandemic and was instrumental in lobbying for the Save Our Stages Act that Congress passed in December of last year. That piece of legislation created the Shuttered Venue Operators Grant (SVOG) program, which eventually put thousands (and in some cases, millions) of dollars into the hands of struggling venue owners as well as bigger corporate music entities.
“All the indie venues, nationally and locally, coming together is part of the reason we’re still here,” says Christensen. “Talking to each other, brainstorming ideas and advocating to local and state government was very empowering.”
Last September, Churley contacted Madison’s NIVA members, a group that included Christensen; Steve Sperling, owner and general manager of the Barrymore Theatre; and representatives from venues like Communication. Over the next eight months, the group, which eventually expanded to include other Madison indie businesses, held Monday Zoom meetings to commiserate and strategize.
“If there is any silver lining to this pandemic for Liquid, and for me personally, it has been the relationships that we have formed through our involvement both locally and nationally through NIVA,” says Churley. “We found a tight-knit community that has always existed, but [we] hadn’t fully realized it yet. Now that we have, we can continue to grow together and help each other for years to come.”
That group helped spur the creation of the state Department of Administration’s COVID-19 Live Music and Entertainment Venue grant program in October 2020. The Bur Oak, applying as the Frameshift Arts Cafe LLC, received $20,449, and while the grant didn’t arrive until January, Christensen is grateful for it. (He describes it as “a Band-Aid for fall.”) Christensen’s promotion company, T-Presents, received $34,000.
The SVOG application portal didn’t go live until April 8 of this year — and the website crashed immediately, not reopening for nearly three weeks. The Bur Oak didn’t receive acknowledgement of its grant until June.
Fortunately, The Bur Oak has some advantages that Liquid did not — namely, the ability to rent its interior kitchen space to the restaurant Ahan, which opened there in August 2020.
Liquid eventually received more than $416,000 through the SVOG program, while The Bur Oak, again applying as the Frameshift Arts Cafe LLC, received just over $177,000. T-Presents received just under $276,000. While both Churley and Christensen are grateful for the assistance, it pales in comparison to the $10 million awarded to FPC Live, the Live Nation-owned group that operates larger Madison venues including The Sylvee, The Majestic Theatre, the High Noon Saloon and the Orpheum Theater. The Overture Center Foundation received more than $8 million.
“SVOG grants saved a lot of people,” says Christensen. “But it benefits larger businesses more.”
Now with COVID cases rising again, most venues, including all the FPC venues, Liquid and The Bur Oak, are requiring patrons to wear masks and provide proof of vaccination or a negative test to enter shows. In response to the recent Dane County public health order that mandates indoor mask use for both patrons and performers, a handful of music venues began canceling shows in late August. Neither the Bur Oak nor Liquid has been forced to scrap any shows yet, but it’s not out of the question. Nor is having to shut down again if the infection numbers continue to trend in the wrong direction.
“I feel optimistic that won’t happen,” says Christensen. “But we have started to talk about ‘What if?’ Right now we’re paying our bills with the shows we have. We’re getting through it.”
[Editor's note: This article has been corrected to note that Liquid Nightclub and Ruby Lounge now go by the name Liquid and Ruby.]
