For those of you that aren't my myspace friend, or you just don't read the bulletins, one has been going around the last couple days about how the Ranch Bowl, an icon on 72nd street since the first time mullets were cool (and arguably mullets were always in style at the 'bowl) is being finally demolished to make way for the Wal Mart Supercenter that should further fuck up the already dodgy traffic in that area.

This is sad on so many levels for so many reasons that I can't begin to list them. But the myspace bulletin asked people to recount their Ranch Bowl memories. Here was my entry:

Marv - I saw so many spectacular (and quite a few crappy) shows at the bowl, not to mention some heavy drinking and light bowling. Some highlight shows: Jonathan Richman, the Barenaked Ladies before they broke huge, Matthew Sweet (three times), Jellyfish, the Ogden Edsel reunion show, Timbuk 3 and above all an intimate evening of holiday music with Mojo Nixon. He was touring with the Toadliquors on the Horny Holidays world tour and it was the night of a huge ice storm in Omaha. Being an ardent fan I braved the sleet and ice and saw a genuine rock n' roll maniac have a full-scale rockabilly freak out with about 15 other people in attendance. It probably sucked for Mojo if he got a cut of the door, but it was a wonderful intimate performance for me and the rest of the audience that night. Ah... sweet, skanky Ranch Bowl, you will be missed. To commemorate it, I'm going to drop a cleveland steamer in the parking lot of the Wal Mart they're building in its place. Truly depressing.

Complete Lunatic: Mojo Nixon

And it's true. The Ranch Bowl was filthy and hot and crowded and loud, but I saw some of the defining bands of my generation there. And certainly some of the bands that helped me define myself with their music.

Here's the fucking Wal Mart that will be built.
I'll be able to tell future generations of rocking out in that parking lot when it was a bowling alley.

I'm not one to get all gooey and misty over stuff like this, but I will forever have a smoky, dirty, sticky void in my heart that will be in the shape of the Ranch Bowl.

Huzzah.