Earlier today, I had an interesting conversation with Pete Romero while I was working at the shop. Pete drinks banquet beer which is cool. Most Coors drinkers get caught up in the hype/drinkability of the Silver Bullets that they often forget about the quality/taste of an ice cold Banquet. Pete dabbles in longshore life and punk rock music, hell of a combo if you ask me but then again I might be a little bias being that I do the same dance. Pete plays in a band, San Pedro punk rock, Plan A. The band has not made the switch over to FB but still have a dinosaur page up on MY_____ if you want to check out some of their anthems. Plan A is playing a show at the Whiskey in a couple weeks. I'll be rallying the troops to support local music. See ya in the pit!
I had planned on blogging about this whole experience but...well let's just say I got caught up in the process. But this just wasn't any process, it was more like a challenge, to plan the greatest party EVER at the modern location of Utro's in San Pedro, CA. What is this Utro's you speak of? Well, Utro's Cafe was established in 1976 by my father, rather than go into the vast details of the history let's just say I have been carrying the torch for the last several years and yes this is probably the first time I have mentioned it publicly on the Cavotu blog. For the longest time I chose to keep certain aspects of my life separate but as I get older, I realize that everything I do really defines who I am and where I'm going in life. Ok so I run a restaurant. That in itself might explain why I tend to lag in the fashion apparel biz. But thats no excuse.
So back to the lecture at hand....this musical tour was a brilliant concept, 3 bands travel by train to 6 US cities. And yes they chose San Pedro as the location for the Los Angeles show. San Pedro is not known for a place where the hipsters gather for live music so the town really had no idea of the magnitude of this event. No one prepared, no one thought to capitalize on the fact that 6,000 people would be coming to this sold out concert. I saw the opportunity from the moment the tour dates where announced on the radio. BAM! Sure the fact that my restaurant was located directly adjacent to the concert venue had a lot to do with my motivation but in the end it was a really great idea.
Thanks to all the folks who attended the party. Thanks to the folks at San Pedro News Pilot for filming the video below. My hope is that the promoters will consider us again for another outdoor concert in the future. San Pedro is in desperate need of more youth and outsider money spent in our shops and restaurants. I pretty much summed it up best by saying "this is how you bring town's back to life" in the video below.
