History of Taipei Bars and Music Venues

Taiwan Living in Taiwan
1

I am writing an article on Taipei’s modern era bars and music venues. I guess that would be around late 80’s to present. I am looking for information and ideas for my article, but I also thought it would be fun to look back at some of the “hot” places and what was going on back in the day.

Here is a format you can use, but feel free to add anything you like in whatever way you like.

(photo linked from Poagao’s site)
DV8
Dates: (1989? anybody know the exact time?) to 2007
Location: Jinhua St.
Music: Classic Rock, Jazz, all over the place
Description: In 1994, this was the place to go almost every night for many expats. It would run until around 3 or 4 in the morning at which time, the customers would run over to Spin. DV8 would “hire” djs by providing 3 beers and a pizza. The downstairs area was mainly for pool, but at one time or another hosted raves, bands and pool tournaments as well. Some regulars went there literally every night. Almost every foreign journalist was there at one time or another. The place was never the same after Michelle, one of the bar owners, went on a long vacation to Europe.
Funny moment: I met a guy in China before I came to Taiwan from Holland. He had a scar over his eye. After I hung out with him for a few weeks, I asked him how he got the scar, he said, “I got it from the bar owner of this bar, DV8. He hit me in the head with an ashtray because he thought I was talking about him in Dutch.”

Some of the places I would personally love to hear about include the combat zone bars, Buffalo Town, Buxiban, Birdland, Scum, AC/DC, Twilight Zone, Wooden Top, Tom’s, Rock City, or any place that actually had people playing music. My article is focusing on venues that played rock and jazz, but feel free to share anything you want on the clubs and bars that were hot when you first came to Taiwan or at any other time.

2

I went to the buxiban a few times. All I remember was being extremely careful walking down that steep flight of stairs…wondering how many people had fallen down it.
Had never gone to Buffalo town but a friend of mine met his wife there.
What about Roxy? The first one on Heping…not far from Roosevelt road. I think they sometimes had live music. And up the road a few lanes off of Roosevelt there was a place in a basement–I forget the name of it now AC|DC? Green something?..and in the opposite direction another bar called Man, Dog and Ant.
I thought the pizzas at DV8 were really good. One night not too many years ago a local guy pulled out a pistol and was waving it around.

3

DV8 looks almost clean, and where’s all the chalk?

HG

4

I was attacked by Michelle’s husband at DV8 one night, too. Evidently my motorcycle was too noisy at 2:30 in the morning, so he comes running out with a steel pipe and starts wailing on my motorcycle. I went back the next day and he apologized and paid for the damage. After that we were pretty good friends.

I remember the Buxiban being run by a foreigner named Rob from Wisconsin for awhile and then by Dutch guy later.

I think that place in the basement you mentioned was “Tops”. It was across the street from Guo Yu Ri Bao off of Roosevelt Road. It was a disco I think partly owned by Marco (the same Marco that owned the first Roxy). There always seemed to be a lot of weirdness going on there, but it was a blast. It became a gay bar right before it closed.

Buffalo Town has always been kinda a blur.

5

I was heavily into macrame and crochet at the time, so I can’t help you. Sorry. Never been to any of those places mentioned above. Especially not Buffalo Town or Tops. Or Whiskey a Gogo, or Club Foot, or that jazz place Lingwei had in Gongguan for a while. Or Kirby’s. Or any of those nasty rude places.

6

Oh boy, I’m certainly clearing out some cobwebs in my brain for this one. Here’s what I remember…

Whiskey-a-Gogo (later called Sex-a-Gogo) – across the street from Tai Da on Xin Hai Rd. It was actually made from shipping containers. Apparently, Wu Bai and China Blue played there a lot before they were signed. The funniest thing was that they had an in-ground swimming pool shaped like an Absolut bottle. Nobody used to swim in it–everyone used to piss in it. I spent my 25th birthday there in 1994 (chewing tobacco, if I remember correctly). I heard it was shut down in '96 or '97 after someone got fatally knifed there.

In Between – On Shi Da Rd., right near the present-day Roxy Jr. Cafe. There was some live jazz and rock, but I can’t think of anything weird about it.

Cheers – In the basement at the corner of Shi Da and Roosevelt, in the same building as Oldie Goodie and Blue Note, this place was a very friendly neighborhood foreigner hangout. My band Swampus used to play there, and the stage was so cramped that we band members had to kind of move out of the way if someone wanted to go to the restrooms at the back. Ahh, great times there… It later became a gay place called “Zip,” which was very short-lived. We played “Zip” once, but it wasn’t quite the same…

Scum – Scum had a few different locations. I remember Roosevelt Rd just south of Heping and a huge underground space on Tong Hua St. My band th Cash Cows played there, and it was certainly a weird atmosphere. There were a lot of young heavy metal kids there–misfits kind of, like young overweight girls with black lipstick. They would just sit there, drink Appli Sidra, and let the heavy metal sound just pound at them.

Boogie – Named after heavy metal bassist (?) Boogie and financed by his parents, this basement heavy metal bar off Zhong Xiao (Sec 5 or so) was probably not open very long, but I played there with the Cash Cows for Halloween 1996. About ten people came. Boogie himself was a nice guy–more about him later.

Man, Dog, and Ant – On Hangzhou S. Rd. near CKS Memorial, the sidewalk still reads “MAN DOG ANT” where the place used to be. (It’s now a garage.) Boogie’s heavy metal band “Assassin” used to play there, as did a band called Nice Vice. (Love that name!) Interesting side note–when Bon Jovi came to Taipei in 1993, those two bands were picked to open for them. I met my first girlfriend there in Oct. 1993. She told me a kind of sad story. There was another band that used to play there called Jack and Beans. The lead singer was killed in a car accident on the way back from a gig in Taichung. When people heard about it, they all went to Man, Dog and Ant and had kind of impromptu wake.

Branco – This one was not too long ago–about five or six years. It was a jazz place on Civil Blvd. just west of Dun Hua. The bartender/owner was a friendly Taiwanese guy (whose name I can’t remember) and he used to smoke weed right there behind the bar…and pass it around a bit…

B-Side – This place is still a bar (B1?) on Aiguo E. Rd. across from the gas station and near the Mormon Temple. This was Lin Wei’s pride and joy as a live venue. I played there many times with Swampus (once with girl punks Ladybug opening), where there would always be about hundred drunk, fired-up foreigners and where a guy called Ardo used to get wasted and fall onto the stage. I also played there twice with the Cash Cows as opening acts for Mayday. Once we played until about 11:30 and then they came on and said announced that they could only play two songs because they had to stop at midnight because of noise issues. We felt horrible, as we had taken all their time for performance. We apologized, and they were really nice about it.

That’s all I can remember right now. I’ll write more if I think of it.

7

Bars and clubs I remember from 1990:

The Doors (on Fuxing S. Rd., south of Heping)
“The Top” or “Tops” (somewhere near Guoyu Ribao)
Kiss (Dunhua N. Rd.) - too glitzy and pricey for my tastes
The Ploughman (near Zhongxiao/Dunhua)
The Wooden Nickel (down the street from the Ploughman)
DV8 (it was great back then before they remodeled it several years later; I believe it closed this year)
The original Roxy (in a wooden building on Heping between Shida Rd. and Roosevelt)

8

I remember seeing ads around 1994 or 1995 for a place in Taipei called Heaven & Hell. It was divided into two sections: Heaven was upstairs, and was a mellow bar with mellow music where you could eat, drink, relax and have a conversation; Hell was a loud dance venue in the basement. Their catch-phrase was “You can spend an evening in Heaven or you can go to Hell”. I never went there, and it didn’t seem to be open long.

9

OK… Some more…

Pig & Whistle II – At the corner of Dun Hua S. Rd. and He Ping E. Rd., above Burger King. This was a fairly bland live venue run a by a foreigner, and I did a Sunday afternoon gig there once. I heard it was later the site of a small bombing–the work of pissed-off gangsters. However, that didn’t become a big news story for some reason…

Kiss La Bocca Disco – In the now-demolished Magnolia Hotel on Dun Hua N. Rd. near Chang Chun Rd., this mammoth place was a flashy, gaudy place to be seen. I once heard that it was one of the largest discos in Asia (1992 or so), though that seems hard to believe even for that time. It was huge though–enormous Roman-forum-style main room where Filipino bands used to play, and another disco space all decked out in mirrors. With Malaysian Airlines flight attendants, models, and juice-sipping office ladies, it was a lot of fun indeed…

Hard Rock Cafe – This is what you get when you combine the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame with TGI Fridays. It’s first location in Taipei was on Min Sheng E. Rd. just west of Dun Hua, and later it moved to Dun Hua near the Asia World Hotel (now Holiday Inn). Local people never really cared that they were eating under Gene Simmons’ bass guitar or Prince’s purple shoes. (I used to get weird looks when I treated it as a museum…) A few big names came–saw Joan Jett and the Blackhearts there in '94 or '95 at the old location and John Taylor from Duran Duran at the new location in 2000.

This last one is not so much a bar, but it’s a weird story. There used to be a sports arena of a place on Nanjing E. Rd. sort of across from the new arena. (The space is still an idle construction hole…) Duran Duran and other bands played there in the late 80s early 90s…until a fireworks show put on by Asia World actually caught the place on fire and burned it to the ground! Still nothing rebuilt there…

10

[quote=“Buzzardo”]OK… Some more…

Pig & Whistle II – At the corner of Dunhua S. Rd. and He Ping E. Rd., above Burger King. This was a fairly bland live venue run a by a foreigner, and I did a Sunday afternoon gig there once. I heard it was later the site of a small bombing–the work of pissed-off gangsters. However, that didn’t become a big news story for some reason…[/quote]

I visited that place soon after it opened (around 1994 or so). I liked it - very mellow. I wondered what happened to it!! (In 1990, the upstairs and what’s now Burger King were both occupied by a restaurant called “Dong Lai Shun”.)

11

Wow. Memories…sort of fuzzy ones

I never understood how DV8 didn’t die…

Anyone remember:

  • Roxy I, II, or IV
  • Kirby’s
  • BAM
  • Talk of The Town
  • Ku Kung (sp?)
  • Hard Candy or Rock Candy

The Whiskey A-Go-Go with the pool was the 2nd or third iteration. It once had those light-up floors and VIP booths on the second floor.

12

So which of the venues still exist today? What’s the history of The Wall?

How about Valvet Underground…? what happened to that place?

damm finding a drummer is so hard…

13

[quote=“Nicya”]
I think that place in the basement you mentioned was “Tops”. It was across the street from Guo Yu Ri Bao off of Roosevelt Road. It was a disco I think partly owned by Marco (the same Marco that owned the first Roxy). There always seemed to be a lot of weirdness going on there, but it was a blast. [/quote]

Yeah, that was the name of it. But I think towards the end it changed names…something to do with Green…
I remember one night I met some Philippino guy there and he got me smoking ice all night long in several bars. Gave me his number when we finally decided to end the party…in case I wanted to buy from him. I still remember the day after, laying in bed all day paranoid. Threw his number in the garbage.

Anyone know the name of an American guy…I think from Seattle?.He was obcessed with playing the guitar and did some gigs in a few of the bars mentioned. Tall, lanky, with red hair…maybe long and tied in a pony tail. He eventually married and went back to Seattle.

Can’t even remember any of the bar names in the combat zone way back. I went a few times in 85 and it seemed mainly an area to pick up bar prostitutes and you couldn’t walk down the street without someone asking you every minute…“You want girl?” Some years later, Montana’s, My Place, and the Farmhouse opened. The Farmhouse was pretty good for live music…The Diplomats band?

14

How about Circus? Wasn’t that on Roosevelt south of Hoping?

And there was a tiny heavy metal place in 1995, about as big as a Western bathroom, in a basement, full of tall bar stools and long-haired, leather-clad locals headbanging while sitting down on their chairs. But I can’t remember the name or the location, just the leather.

Rock Candy, was that on Civil Boulevard, with the second one opened up later? That place was very bright, I recall.

And was Sex-a-go-go the place with the tall blond pole dancer who danced near the bar above the crowd in a cage? There was a place where I remember ALL the guys wore very tight white t-shirts and jumped and down blowing whistles, not sure if that was Sex-a-go-go or some other place, location seems to be the same.

B-Side was great fun, Swampus and Ladybug are two bands I remember well.

SPIN, of course everyone has a memory or two from SPIN. My first week in Taiwan it was being hit by a flying beer crate, caught in the line of fire in a fight between a local guy and a Western guy and all their buddies. Later it was my 65-year-old father losing his hearing aid after wrapping it up so he could jump around to the music, and the bar staff voluntarily dumping the entire night’s trash out of the bags to search for it at 5:30am. We never found it.

15

Wait a fuckin minute here…Swampus was my band…

Nice bartenders at Cheers…I married one…

16

Wait a fuckin minute here…Swampus was my band…

Nice bartenders at Cheers…I married one…[/quote]

Yeah but I dated her first before you got your meat hooks on her.

How about the DJ Pub near Shi Da run by a great guy named Rabbit who has a pub in Tai Chung now and the before mentioned Robert from the Bushiban.

One night some foreign guy ,(cough) :smiling_imp: rode his motorcycle into the door and through the place.

17

There is a new band out of San Diego that ripped off your name.

The new Swampus is a “slopcore” band that formed from the remnants of Dirty Finger, Open Trench, McJesus and Gizzards. If they hit it big, prepare to ask for royalties.

z

18

Damn! I can’t believe Open Trench have split up

19

Awesome replies so far, especially Blizzardo. So many bars I haven’t heard of and a few I had forgotten about. Moving on…
Let’s get a little obscure.

Elvis bars
?-2005
Location: One off Daan Rd. and one near the National Palace Museum
Music: Elvis music and rock
Description: The Elvis bars were owned by a dude name Horb who was a junk or jewel dealer. I don’t know if they were ever regularly open and had normal customers. The insides of both places were covered in flourescent paint, black lighting and velvet Elvis paintings. The Daan location had a giant inflated Santa Clause or something on the roof. The national palace one was in the basement of a swimming pool so you could see the pool water through the windows. The Pocket Monkeys (featuring David Chen) played there for a while a few years ago.
Horb could play every instrument and taught his friends to play and they would have jam sessions. One funny thing about the Daan location is that it had a secret back room with a bed and a fridge. I never saw a girl in either of the bars so I guess it was for secretly passing out drunk.

20

I just missed that one. I heard Horb sold bits of either real or fake Rolexes and was once robbed of a stack of said bits while driving out of some US airport, which I think was around when the bar closed.

HG