Battle of the Giant Outdoor Concert Spots
The battle of the outdoor music venues heats up considerably as of June 1, with the opening of the World Music Theatre in southwest suburban Tinley Park. The $23-million World Music Theatre is the brainchild of a group of Tinley Park real-estate developers and Tinley Park Jam, a company separate from but related to Chicago’s Jam Productions. With undercover seating for 11,000 and lawn seating for an additional 16,000, the World Music Theatre will be larger than either Poplar Creek or Alpine Valley, and it will add appreciably to Jam’s already-considerable clout as a midwestern pop-show promoter. Insiders are watching to see which venues get what acts this summer. “I don’t know how much overlap there will be,” says Jam’s Jerry Mickelson. “It could be that some acts will only play one venue, while others decide want to play all three.” But, the people who run Poplar Creek, the New York-based Nederlander Organization, seem to be assuming that they will have to play hardball to get the acts the want. “I think it’s going to take an education process to convince acts they can play more than one facility,” says Poplar Creek spokesman Chuck Gessert.
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The Disneyesque entertainment facility that was to have been Billy Lee’s may never make it. Planned to include an array of shops, restaurants, and rides under one roof, the mega-amusement center at 622 W. Fulton closed abruptly at the end of January, perhaps for good. Though developer William Spatz says he is shooting for a reopening around April 1, other sources close to the project seem less certain about Billy Lee’s prospects. One observer compares the fiasco to Old Chicago, an amusement-shopping center in suburban Bolingbrook that failed dismally some years ago. Sources say Spatz is negotiating with. another partner to infuse upward of a whopping $1 million into Billy Lee’s, which appears to have run out of money before its various components were operative. Negotiations with that unnamed prospective partner are said to be proceeding at a pace “slower than anticipated.” Should they fall through, Spatz might try to sell Billy Lee’s as is. “Spatz has got too much money sunk into the property just to back out,” says one source close to the development.
Avalon Anniversary: Survival of the Quickest
For clubhoppers in the mood to toast a survivor on the club scene, Avalon is throwing a third-anniversary party on March 8. The celebration will feature four bands–Downtown Scotty Brown & Co., Maybe/Definitely, Seven Simons, and Dangtrippers. Avalon is run by brothers and co-owners Scott and Tod Brown. The former, a club enthusiast and musician, lured the latter, a former General Motors systems engineer, back from Detroit to handle the club’s business side. “I was bored with computers,” admits Tod. But he hasn’t had time to get bored since Avalon opened. “It’s a seven-day-a-week job. The toughest part is trying to stay ahead of the trends. A club has to keep changing to succeed.”
