The Death of Kings from 521studies on Vimeo.
I got a couple of text messages on Sunday afternoon of folks asking at what time slot the Death of Kings short film documentary would show at filmSPARK at Artspace. Sadly, I didn’t know the time or did anyone I knew. It seems that the schedule hadn’t been arranged and/or published and many folks couldn’t commit three hours to the event but desperately wanted to see this documentary by local filmmaker Tim Kiernan.
It seems that Tim Kiernan also received a bunch of requests himself. Many folks who missed the film have emailed asking how to see the film if they missed it. Mr. Kiernan is cucrently on tour with the Rosebuds in China and has uploaded the film to the web for us all to see. Chatting with Tim today about the film’s online life, he stated “Every other video publishing site is firewalled here in China except vimeo, I guess they don’t know about this one yet.” We in Raleigh say Thanks to you Vimeo for hiding from the Chinese long enough for us to catch the film online.
This film documents the last night of Kings Barcade which used to be on McDowell Street next to Poole’s Diner, in Raleigh, NC.
“If you were there that night, then you remember being drunk – epic drunk – and laughing and crying and the dust and the boys kicking in the walls, tearing the sheetrock down, destroying the club we all loved from its insides. And for some reason that was necessary.” – Kelly Crisp of The Rosebuds
See Tim’s blog at 521 studies
homepage image by Abbyladybug
Entertainment , Other posts by Jedidiah.
I miss King’s! Raleigh really needs another place like that.
I was there. That was me dancing on the pool table. Those were my cowboy boots. And I still have my piece of sheetrock.
More from King’s Last Night:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/abbyladybug/sets/72157622426950170
Mike Dillon’s Final Rap: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzsglZ9H738
R.I.P. Kings.
What an amazing music scene we had. Our fair city misses you dearly.
I miss Kings too, but I don’t understand why everyone is so doom and gloom about the loss of the building. I did have some of the best nights of my 20’s there, don’t get me wrong, but it was a concrete block box with a steel-supported composite roof and a concrete floor. The hard perpendicular surfaces didn’t do much for the place actually sounding that great. There was nothing significant about the building at all. To me, Kings was ALL about the people inside the building. Those people (most of them) are still with us, and there are more coming of age all the time!
Good post, Micah.
Seems the hipster scene in Raleigh has migrated not so much to other music venues in town, but rather to Raleigh Times. Ironic since Empire Properties is the villain in this movie and, thus, the downfall of King’s.
Thanks for putting this up. This film screened along with the rest as time allowed. Because of certain constraints on the days leading up to the filmSPARK screening, I was unable to publish the exact schedule.
Each filmmaker was given their recognition nonetheless and we regretted missing Tim at the screening!
DaveB -
I’m not sure how Empire is the villain of anything…they didn’t own the land - Bobby Lewis/Raleigh Development Co did. The building encroached a whopping 7 inches on land owned by Wake County, upon which they built their parking deck - Empire had nothing to do with it. The only role they had is that they were selected, among other bidding developers, to wrap the parking deck in a “skin” of mixed-use space.
Take your grievance to Wake County or, more appropriately, to Bobby Lewis, a land speculator, who made the decision to tear the building down. Empire is about as anti-teardown as they come…and has done much to nurture a creative class in a downtown that is about as vanilla as they come.
somebody needs to put on a show where kings was, right in that empty lot.
set up the bar, set up the stage and relive kings as an outdoor venue.
i bought the last dos equis, and came home with a piece of tamborine….
gotta be plenty of empty buildings along Capital Blvd that could be the new Kings?
the thrift shop inbtween the N&O and the Raleigh Times have huge back room that would make a great music venue…
I don’t think the video implies a grievance with Empire so much as a lament that something interesting was replaced with something much less so.
Jeez. Just go to Slim’s and stop crying.
It wasn’t CBGB and, frankly, the video made King’s look pretty dull and not at all special. Ooooo, hipsters sitting on a couch. Wait, are those The Rosebuds? *GASP* IT IS THEM!
I played Kings Twice over the years, and had a fun show both times.
The last time was shortly before it closed. A guy took me into a big backroom w/ a drumset so I could warm up and smoke pot. The guys running the place were super nice & laid back. Even the soundguy was cool & thats as rare as a Dodo egg. We opened up for Double Negative and they kicked plenty of ass live. I played Lincoln Theater & Volume11 as well, but Kings stands out. I would love to have seen Regraped & Rebar opening for Confessor @ Kings, but I just made that show up, so too bad for me. One of the club owners let us stay at his house, and made us a great brunch the next day. Hell Yea…The place had loads of charm. If Raleigh is anything like Richmond, you will never see the likes of it again….Ever
me bone down with box turtle in back room one night,me was sloppy wasted on pbr and vodka.turtle was good sport,took it like any scared little forest creature would and then some.me shat myself on way to bafroom and made big mess in floor got kick to curb….good time goodtime.
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