An OU student of the ’80s bypassed the line formed on Court Street outside of Swanky’s, Athens most popular bar and bastion of drug activity in the liberal-hippie-homestead of Southeast Ohio.
A doorman stands stationed out front of the bar, not to check for IDs — everyone 19 years of age can drink — but instead to regulate the flood of people to fit the maximum capacity of the bar as if it were a big-city nightclub.
Thick smoke layers the room as the owner overlooks the open use of illegal drugs in the establishment. But panic settles in as Athens City police make their weekly run through the bar.
Patrons hide lit joints under coats and tables as the officers look for another guilty victim for their weekly arrests.
The bar burned down from an electrical fire, and the owner served time in prison for drug-related charges, but Brenen’s Coffee Cafe sits in the bar’s former location as a reminder to old and new Athenians alike that the Uptown scene has changed significantly throughout time.
Today, many students go Uptown because each bar represents a certain scene or typically plays a specific genre of music. However, Jonathan Holmberg, chairman of the Athens Clean and Safe Halloween Committee as well as a 1984 graduate of Ohio University, said the scene has not always been this way.
“There may be a certain crowd that hangs out at the bar, but (when I went to school), I think any student would feel comfortable at any bar in town,”
Holmberg said. “When they changed the drinking age, bars had to find a reason to come Uptown because you go from 80 percent of your population being able to drink legally to 20 percent.”
Matt Urminski, bassist for MoJoFlo and former Athens band Elemental Groove Theory, said the bars that people choose depend on whether they like live music or not.
“Every bar pretty much has its own personality,” Urminski said. “A lot of us (in the music scene) went to The Union. … It was, and still is, kind of a metal, punk, hardcore crowd, and then we started playing there, and the types of people that went to the bar shifted.”
Rock and funk groups such as Elemental Groove Theory and Sassafraz have frequented the bar, as well as hip-hop artists such as Hil Hackworth, who hosts the Hip-Hop Shop at The Union Bar & Grill once a month.
Holmberg said The Union has been in Athens the longest under the same name and was well-established as a metal bar before he came to Athens for his first time in 1975.
The Union was able to bring in some big-name acts such as The White Stripes. Other Uptown venues such as The Dugout Lounge, now Ski’s Teases & Collectibles, operated as a small basement venue that brought in artists such as Jorma Kaukonen and Phish.
However, many longtime locals believe the demand for live music has dropped noticeably with the popularity of DJs.
“It’s hard to get a show that fills the place up anymore,” said Junebug, an employee at Jackie O’s Pub & Brewery and an Athens musician since the ’90s.
“The kids are more interested in going to Mill Fest and High Fest and drinking copious amounts of shitty beer, and they don’t care to pay a cover.”
Holmberg attributed some of this change to the influx of greek life in Athens since he went to school, which he said was at its lowest point when he went to OU in the ’80s. Hackworth even described it as the “debauchery of the middle bars,” referring to the party bars on Court Street.
Bars have always been, at their core, a social place to hang out with friends.
“Everyone’s got a regular bar. It’s where you know bouncers, bartenders or where all your friends go to,” Hackworth said. “With the Athens bars, it is what it is, it’s always been and will always be.”
wh092010@ohiou.edu
