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Born in Austin, Matthew left soon thereafter and finally made it back after years of paying his penance wandering the earth. Before coming to Austin360, Matthew co-edited Austinist.com, worked as an advertising copywriter and led tours of the Roman Forum, among other things.
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The entry titled "Your A-List: Best Open-Mic Night."
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2008 > February > 13 > Entry
By Matthew Odam | Wednesday, February 13, 2008, 05:37 PM
There’s seemingly a venue on every corner in Austin where you can get up and play your guitar for the masses (or your two friends), but the opportunity to get up and try and make people laugh is a little bit harder to find. But when you do work up the nerve to try and tickle Austin’s funny bone, it’s apparent you love the Velveeta Room, winner with 36 percent of the vote of the Your A-List poll for Best Open-Mic Night.
Besides being a home to some of the best stand-ups in town, the Velveeta Room on 6th Street opens its doors each Thursday to pros and amateurs alike, who have the opportunity to try and squeeze as many laughs from the audience in their alotted three minutes. Sometimes it is painful, sometimes it is brilliant, but it is almost always entertaining to see people experiment with the idea of what makes people laugh.
The Velveeta Room itself has a long and sordid history dating back to the slightly more sketchy days of Sixth Street in the 70s. For a somewhat complete (if not hazy) retelling of the history of the Velveeta Room, Esther’s Follies and Sixth Street of old, check out the history section of the Velveeta Room’s Web site.
The Velveeta Room [site]
521 E. 6th St
469.9116
Others receiving votes
- Ruta Maya, 21 percent
- Poodie’s Hilltop Cafe, 18 percent
- Cactus Cafe, 5 percent
- Hill’s Cafe, 5 percent
- Ego’s, 3 percent
- Cheatham Street Warehouse, 3 percent
- Trophy’s, 3 percent
- Artz Rib House, 2 percent
- Flipnotics, 2 percent
- Neo-Soul Lounge at Club Illusion, 2 percent
Write-ins: Punchline at ColdTowne Theater and Sam’s Town Point
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By youknowme
February 13, 2008 11:23 PM | Link to this
the vote just shows that austin comedians have less of a life that musicians and poets and can spend hours of time voting for themselves to increase the size of their perceived importance.
open mics are not about the hosts or the venues, they are about the community they foster.
By Stozzel
February 14, 2008 11:57 AM | Link to this
um, while youknowme’s comment may have something to do with the velv’s victory (or that the competing musician vote was split among the other venues while fans of comedy had only one vote to cast), i think the fact that comics and their fans care enough about the venue in question to take a few seconds to vote means that the comedy community being fostered here in Austin is strong, and by youknowme’s logic, that means the velv as a venue or as a community is deserving of its place atop this A-List.
And on the vote splitting theory, why not a dedicated comedy open mic poll? Velv vs. Cap City vs. Coldtowne Theatre?
By Rikki
February 14, 2008 12:48 PM | Link to this
Good points, Stozzel. I’d also like to add that to say Austin comedians have “less of a life than musicians and poets” is extremely unfair considering that a vast majority of us lead double, sometimes triple-lives as musicians, writers, artists, thespians, lawyers, full-time day-jobbers, parents… the list goes on and on. We’re hardly a group of slackers that only get out of bed at night to go to a comedy club and back to bed immediately after. Comedy certainly doesn’t pay the bills (if you’re lucky it might cover a bar tab or tank of gas) - but despite that, Austin is home to one of the strongest and fastest-growing comedy scenes in the entire southwest. Why? There are two reasons that I see: 1) We don’t do it for money and 2) we have an unbelievably close and resourceful community which entails both comedians and people that appreciate and support live comedy. People at The Velveeta Room know the people at Cap City who know the people at Coldtowne who know the people at The Hideout… etc, etc. In addition to working the clubs and theaters, Austin comedians also work very hard at what they do, collaborating to set up their own shows at alternative venues and even traveling out of town to play for little if any pay just for the opportunity to find a new audience. Sound familiar? If you’re an artist in any capacity, it should.