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Fire in the Water, Earth in the Air: Legends
of West Texas Music
"Indeed, Oglesby's introduction of more
than two dozen musicians who called Lubbock home should be required
reading not only for music fans, but for Lubbock residents and
anyone thinking about moving here. On these pages, music becomes
a part of Lubbock's living history."
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Chris Oglesby Interviews
Chris: How was South Plains College helping? Mike: They were loaning us equipment. Pat McCutcheon from South Plains College played a big part in it; Pat heads up their Music Department. He was there at every show; a great help. So we just issued a press release saying that we were gonna produce a live music show based on Austin City Limits called "Live at Tommy's Place." Before we had any kind of budget, before we had any kind of real ideas about it; We went ahead and issued the press release. William Kerns at the Avalanche Journal wrote it up. It hit the Lubbock paper; then it was picked up by the AP, and it went around the world! So here we are; We’re basically five people who has sat around a table and come up with an idea of a whole bunch of "Want-To" and not a whole lot of "How-To." Chris: So what was the plan?
Chris: Is that building still there? Mike: Yea. It’s known as 4-Bar-K, now. They just rent it out for parties and stuff. Tommy Thompson built 90% of it. For this show, we went in and we did a lot of remodeling. We basically built a whole new stage and a whole new backdrop; Ol’ Norman Neavey of Jungle Studios donated a 32 channel soundboard for the show. And Jimmy Mason came in and did probably 90% of the show. Don Caldwell did maybe 4 or 5 shows, and then he bowed out. He was too busy and the show took up a lot of time. Chris: How many shows did you end up doing? Mike: I would say at least 24 shows or so; I’m not sure on that, because we had a complete season of shows, and I don’t know how many weeks in a season was. There was a lot of film that was edited out and on the cuttin’
room floor, just for the time factor. And nobody was getting’
paid; Everybody was just devotin’ their time and effort;
Some things were sacrificed because people who were working on
it had to say, "I haven’t gotten any more time to do
this." So we were always limited by that factor. Chris: Who were the performers? Mike: We did...
Oh, hell. There was a bunch more bands that we did - dadgum - I’m still not touchin’ on 'em all. We’d shoot two bands a week. Chris: Is there any record of them? Mike: I think Jimmy Mason’s still got ‘em…We got all the tapes on one inch video. There’s huge amount of tapes. Actually, they belong to the musicians. The way we wrote the contract was after a certain period of time, the tapes would default back to ownership of the musicians that had performed the show. Basically, nobody ever picked ‘em up. [Laughs.] There’s mountains of good Lubbock stuff in there. But anyway, after that first press release was written - and
this is kinda what spurred us on - We
hadn’t even put up a show yet; And suddenly we’re lookin’
at our names in the Australian press, the London Times, New York...I’ve
had papers with my name in it from all over the world, just because
this show was from Lubbock, Texas. Chris: It’s amazing, how "Big-in-Europe" all the Lubbock artists are. Cary Swinney told me he has sold more records in Europe than he has around Lubbock. Mike: Well, nobody here recognizes it. When it’s here, it’s so avante garde that only a few people are able to see it. But that’s what catches the eye of the rest of the world: Something that’s new. Not necessarily does the place where it originates catch on. And it’s originated from Lubbock, Texas, the home of the Bible-Belt, basically. We’re talking about Rock-n-Roll and real good Country music. It’s all got its basis in the church because that’s where most people learned how to play music. But then it graduated out into something much more. It’s a struggle between whatever forces it is; Where their roots come from, And then it’s also your "questioning your life." Y’know; "What is talent and what’s not talent?
What is art and what’s not art?" Some people choose
to go one way and some people choose to go the other. Chris: That’s one thing about Lubbock; It does cause you to make a choice. Mike: Where it all happened - I mean, where I got my
dose of Lubbock music was from My brother Jack’s wife used to run the door at the Cotton Club. That’s how I got turned on to Joe Ely. "Come on out! We’ll get you in free!" The Cotton Club was a great place. Chris: How do you mean, "It was pure freedom"? Mike: If you were not able to quite afford the bar - which most of the bars at that time were private clubs - the Cotton Club was "bring your own bottle." And we mighta been a little young to get in sometimes but we’d have a case of beer with us... That was mainly to go see the Maines
Brothers. They were the dance band out there. I had a
girlfriend who liked to dance to them; and that’s why we
went. And towards the ‘70s, I was goin’ out there to
see Joe Ely. You'd carry
your own beer in, and dance like the dickens. And if you got
a little drunk and fell on the dance floor, then people just
danced around ya’.
Mike: I saw Los Lobos at Fat Dawg's for two dollars! On a Tuesday night! The Nelsons - Donnie Allison, John Sprott and Kevin Mackey - They won MTV’s amateur band "Basement Tapes" contest. MTV put the Nelsons on national tour, and Los Lobos traveled with ‘em. Both of ‘em toured the nation together, driving Dodge vans or something…[Laughs] The night that Los Lobos played Fat Dawg’s; I hadn’t never heard of ‘em but it was one of the all-time best concerts I’ve ever seen in my life. And it was two dollars! And the house was not full. Stevie
Ray Vaughn played in Lubbock, Texas, so much during the
‘70s... Chris: Where was that? Mike: Over in the "Tech Ghetto." Chris: You’re right, Everything dried up there for awhile. Do you have an opinion on why that happened? Mike: Well, what first happened is; In the early ‘80s, you had "Ladies’ Nights." And that’s where all the women could drink free. That presented the biggest club scene in Lubbock, Texas, probably. Because if you’re givin’ it away to the women, the men are comin’ in and, basically, they’re payin’ for both sides of it. Well, they change the liquor laws right about then and stopped that from happenin’. They started makin’ laws that shut down "Ladies Nights." That changed the whole goddamn deal, right there. What happened towards the end of that scene; there was a few
die-hards like us who lived around "live" music. But
really, as far as anybody makin’ any money in the music
business…It just wasn’t happenin’. Paul Bullock was Doug Smith’s
manager at the time. Doug played the entire summer down there
at the Depot Beer
Garden and had a tremendous summer. Basically, Ronnie
come to me and said, "I know you know all the musicians
in town. Start bookin’ bands." I was cuttin’ meat for The Depot and bookin’ bands down there for ‘em; That went on for about three years…. Well, I learned where I-27 was comin’ through Lubbock, and made mention of that to Ronnie Thompson - that he probably needed to get more serious about this. He pulled Stubb in as a partner at first and started that other Stubb's over there by the highway. That’s kinda how the whole Depot District got started, right there. Chris: Yea. That was a good idea. Mike: I basically pulled out of the Depot at that time; Our negotiations broke down on our music business. And that's how it happened that I got involved with Tommy Thompson on Tommy's Place out there. That was probably about ‘88 or so. The TV show really started takin’ place in about '89… -End-
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| Copyright
2007 Chris Oglesby All rights reserved |
Mike Burk does not claim to be a musician or an artist;
unless you consider meat butchery an artform. However, Mike and
his beloved brother Jack Burk long have been the best
friends to the community of musicians in Lubbock. Whether promoting
outstanding musical events, working the door at the Cotton
Club or Fat Dawg's, revelling backstage at 
Mike: We were
gonna do this TV show with Live music at Tommy’s
Place which had a beautiful stage in there. Had plenty of space;
Three stories…I mean, just a beautiful place. The place
had magic in it...Not that it ever made any money. But that place
had a lot of magic.
