About the Book
La Cave: Cleveland's Legendary Music Club and the '60s Folk-to-Rock Revolution

Long before the days of arena and stadium concerts, before the Eagles and mega-tours, even before (and during and after) The Beatles redefined pop culture, live music was consumed in small venues in front of oftentimes smaller crowds. At the Café Wha? in Greenwich Village and Coral Gables' Flick Coffeehouse back east, or at the Troubadour in Los Angeles and the hungry i in San Francisco out west, folk (and later, rock) music fans could sit mere feet from an unknown David Crosby or an equally anonymous Lou Reed, Joni Mitchell or Judy Collins, unconcerned that they were living through historic times in likewise historic places.
They were there for the music.
But of those countless clubs, only a couple handfuls survived and prospered long enough to become iconic venues. One such club was Cleveland’s “House of Folk Music,” La Cave.
In the mid-Sixties, Billboard Magazine – the bible of the music biz – called nine such clubs “trend-setters.” Of the nine, seven were on an east or a west coast, and only two were marooned inland. One of those two clubs was La Cave. What Billboard noticed in real time was the prescience and persistence of these clubs to recognize, sign, nurture and promote the temporarily unknown superstars-to-be of modern popular music – often before the unwashed masses had even heard of them.
There was no template for success, no “how-to” business model to be followed. What was needed for success couldn’t be taught or learned. It took luck, timing, a few bucks, and most of all, an innate sense of where musical tastes would be in the near future. These clubs, and the men of vision who guided them, became the vanguard that alchemically turned musical lead into gold records. And along the way, an entire generation grew up with new values, wisdom, and an abiding love for the music that was chosen for them by these visionaries to serve as the soundtrack for the explosive societal change of the Sixties and beyond.
Highlights from La Cave

Lou Reed, The Velvet Underground
Lou Reed gave credit where credit was due. In 1989, Lou said, “When we were in The Velvet Underground, we practically lived out in Ohio because, you know, La Cave. Like, between La Cave and the Boston Tea Party, those two clubs supported us for about three years, so I feel a real nice thing about out here in Ohio.”
Later that same evening, from the stage of the Palace Theater on Euclid Avenue in front of an SRO crowd, Lou followed that interview with this remark: “Maybe you remember a group I was in called The Velvet Underground (thunderous applause ensues). We used to play out here at a place called La Cave (the decibel level increases). They supported us for about three years, lemme tell ya, so I have a real love for this [city].”

Tom Shipley, Brewer & Shipley
