I sat down with Club 603’s owner, Scott Vieth, a few weeks ago to talk about his house shows in Baltimore.  For those of you who do not know, Scott has been hosting intimate living room shows for the last 9 years.  David LaMason, a fellow photographer and friend, introduced me to this amazing experience last year. (David LaMason’s incredible photo is featured as the lead photo for this post) Scott invited me into his home, Club 603. We sat in his dining room (which transforms into a “merch booth” on show nights), shared a drink, and talked about music.  Enjoy the write up and feel free to listen to the entire interview at the end of the post!

Scott started hosting shows in his living room back in 2010.  He has already hosted 85 shows and has two more shows coming up, April 6 and May 11.  However, hosting shows in his living room wasn’t really something he planned initially.  I asked Scott what inspired him to begin hosting living room shows and his response was that it just evolved from one unexpected event.  Scott recalls his first living room show:

Will Johnson of Centro-matic and Anders Parker of Varnaline were joining up to do a living room tour.  They sent out an email blast to fans saying, “Apply and send a pic of your living room to be considered.”  When I looked at the city listing, I noticed that the list did not include Baltimore.  Baltimore always gets skipped over for D.C. and Philly.  Since these were two of my favorite artists, I reached out and said you should do a show in Baltimore because we have a better music scene that D.C….

Bob who runs Undertow Music [organizes house shows] responded right away, “Thank you for your submission”.  A week went by and I emailed him back to find out where the show was going to be because it sounded like a pretty unique opportunity and I didn’t want to miss it.  He said, “I’ll send you details tomorrow about your show”. 

Now, I hadn’t told Jean, my wife, yet… so I say, “Hey, how would you like to see Will Johnson and Anders Parker play together in Baltimore?” She’s like, “They’re playing together and they’re playing in Baltimore?  Where?”  And I said, “Uhhh… in our living room”.  And She’s like “No, really.  Where?”  I said, “In our living room.” 

They played here and even spent the night.  That is a big risk and trust thing because “we don’t know you and you don’t know us”, but they stayed the night. We had a good time.  Got to know them a little bit.  We put word out to our friends.  We never thought there’d be a second show. 

That first show, led to another show, Vandaveer which was an album fundraiser for the band and a celebration for Scott’s birthday.  Then Vandaveer and Will Anders asked to return. Then after 4-5 shows, Scott and his wife started to think about how they could make this into something more purposeful.  Scott shared with me his “unwritten mission” (not anymore!) which is,

“We want to bring artists that we love to Baltimore and expose our friends and community to those musicians, and we want to promote Baltimore as a cool place to play to the music world” 

Scott and his wife are doing just that.  Scott said that people who come to perform at his house often say they have never played in Baltimore before and now they seek him out.  He added that, the most difficult part of hosting these shows is having to say no.  He can only do about 10-15 a year.  It can be a juggling act trying to have your favorite artists return but also getting new acts in to perform.  He said he is getting better about saying no, even though it’s hard to turn down shows.  He shared, “If we do too many, we’ll exhaust ourselves, and it’s also hard to sell tickets when you have too many shows.”  I agreed with him.  With less shows, each one is more special.  Followers of his Facebook page eagerly await the announcements of his next show. 

One thing they did that helped with shows was branding themselves.  However, he admits that it was all his son’s idea. They made the sketch for the idea and their friend, who is a graphic designer, put it all together.  Now, people can recognize them more easily.  In addition, the sign hangs in their window during performances, making for an excellent photo opportunity for marketing.  He shared that the name came about as a joke at his first show.  A friend said, “What is this like Nightclub 930 but Club 603?” (because that’s his house number).  Scott said, “For better or for worse, it stuck!”

Scott and I are both music lovers, so we chatted about our favorite artists. I asked him that tough question, “What are your favorite bands or musicians” that I, myself, have difficulty answering.  Believe it or not, when you love music, you end up listening to so many artists that it’s nearly impossible to pick a favorite. However, Scott was able to list some of his favorite artists for me.  In high school, his favorite band was The Who.  He shared with me that he always had a vision of them playing in his living room when he was younger, maybe a bit of foreshadowing as to what was to come… However, he said that his vision was always of him being alone in his living room and that was all wrong because it’s so much more enjoyable sharing music with friends or fellow music fans.

In addition to The Who. Scott named American Music Club, Centro-matic, Steve Wynn of Dream Syndicate, The Hold Steady, Pedro the Lion, Wussy, and Hallelujah the Hills – all of which have been favorites of his for years.  He also acknowledged that members from these bands have all played in his living room.  He admitted, “Sometimes you have to step back and say, that’s amazing.  It doesn’t seem incredible because you’ve become friends with them and they’re just people.  But when you step back and think about… it’s pretty incredible.” 

We shared stories about new artists that we couldn’t get enough of when we first heard them.  For him, it was Richmond Fontaine. He shared about how he went down a rabbit hole for 6 months listening to their rather extensive catalog.  He said that he was “late to the game” when finding Richmond Fontaine and sadly, they broke up right after he had discovered them.  The lead singer, Willy Vlautin is also an author and does book tours and Scott admitted that he would love to have him do a book reading at Club 603.  

The conversation moved on to artists Scott dreams about seeing perform in his living room.  He shared, “One interesting thing about the living room shows are the one’s that are un-amplified. That’s not something you get anywhere else.  To hear a voice or guitar un-amplified, you don’t get that in a club anywhere.” Also, he mentioned some artists he would have loved to hear un-amplified, such as Joni Mitchell or Jackson Browne. We also shared our love of Neko Case and how great her voice would sound in his living room, and he added Miles Davis and Television to this wish list. 

Being persistent and patient is a key to securing performers to play at Club 603.  He said, “Sometimes you just have to wait.  I ran into Alejandro Escovedo 2 years ago in a hotel and made the pitch to him.  He was very interested, but it’s been hard to get past the booking agent. But you never know.”

Finally, we ended our conversation discussing Scott’s favorite part of hosting performances in his living room.  His response? “It’s the sense of community that we’ve created among the artists, among the fans.  That’s the thing I think we are most proud of – building a community. We don’t feel like this is OUR thing, we feel like it’s a collective thing.  We couldn’t do this if people didn’t show up and they couldn’t come here if we didn’t provide a show.  It happens to be at our house, but it’s not our show.  We share it with everyone who comes here.  We are all in this together.”

If you have never been to one of the performances at Club 603, follow their Facebook page and make a point to get to one!  I will warn you though, his shows fill up quickly!  So, don’t wait on buying tickets once he announces the next performer. 

If you would like to read more about this experience, check out Matt Ruppert’s outstanding “Artist Spotlight” featuring Club 603 and a recent show, here. Also, I had the pleasure of seeing David Wax Museum at Club 603 back in January, and you can read that review here. Enjoy the full interview below:

All photos courtesy of Club 603’s Facebook page.