A couple had rented out the venue the next day for a wedding and had to cancel because it was still trashed.” “Our buddy who was the care-taker and was supposed to clean everything up got drunk and passed out in the broom closet.
The venue restricted him from selling beer so instead he sold mugs and allowed concert goers to fill up the mugs with free beer. “We didn’t tell them it was for a show, i think we said it was a meeting of the Cal Poly Pomona Ski Team,” he recalled. Kevin Lyman, founder of Van’s Warped Tour said he saw the story on the Denny’s show and thought of his early days promoting punk shows in Pomona, California, including a night-time gig for the band Chardon Square at the city-owned Taylor Hall to raise money for a ski trip. Hosting a concert and misrepresenting your intentions to the building’s owner is an important rite of passage in the music business. “The general rule is that a minor cannot have a contract enforced against them,” Seville says, adding it was likely any contract Del Valle signed could “probably be voided.”
While Del Valle is not shirking from his responsibilities and plans to pay everything he owes, he’s not clear what was on the document he signed and tells Billboard he wasn’t given a copy.Įven if he did sign a rental contract for the space, it’s not likely enforceable in California because Del Valle is a minor, attorney Michael Seville of San Francisco law firm Seville Briggs Law tells Billboard. In 2013 a band in Houston performed a metal show at a Denny’s but the spokesperson said the restaurant had been abandoned and was not a functioning location.ġ0 Weird Christmas Songs You Probably Haven't Heard “Pretty amazing if you ask me,” he told Billboard. “What do they say? Lit AF? Hard AF? Something about ALF? Whatever that term is that’s what he is.”ĭel Valle tells Billboard that Denny’s didn’t ask many questions when he rented the space, but a spokesperson for Denny’s said no one has ever done anything like this before and the restaurant’s staff was surprised that he was planning to throw a concert. “After every early day show I promoted we would stop at Denny’s afterward for hours, dissecting what happened.”ĭan Berkowitz with CID Entertainment, who works with artists like Phish, Sturgill Simpson and Luke Bryan was also impressed with Del Valle’s DIY ethos. “Fenders was where I learned so much,” Tollett said of the club owned by John Fender that hosted shows by Guns N’ Roses, Jane’s Addiction, Black Flag, Bad Religion, No Doubt and Sublime in the mid-to-late ’80s. “Wow, this is so great,” said Coachella co-founder Paul Tollett of Goldenvoice, who got his start promoting punk shows in Pomona and Long Beach at the now defunct Fenders Ballroom.
Video from the crazy set and the GoFundMe immediately went viral and was shared by fans, bands and SoCal promoters #punk #punkguitar #rocket77 #r77 #ilmpunk #wilmingtonnc #diypunk #diy #wackodennys #dielaughiingrecods #fucktrumpĪ post shared by Rocket 77 on at 4:43am PST has proven to me that all shows should be at a Denney’s!!. And they tell me the special tonight is Wacko.”Īpparently we were at the wrong show this weekend. One of the band members’ dad’s introduced the group, telling the audience, “I came for the senior citizens special. (A Denny’s spokesperson told Billboard the manager assumed Del Valle was renting the space for a meal “which is the room’s intended purpose”).īy the time show started, the ballroom was way beyond the 50-person capacity. “All it took was some initiative,” the high school senior told Billboard, partially shocked by his own moxie and the lack of scrutiny from a Denny’s manager when Del Valle paid a $100 deposit to rent a room in the back of the Santa Ana restaurant for four hours on a Saturday night. The 17-year-old from Costa Mesa had been going to punk shows around Southern California for about a year and had an epiphany that if he found a unique-enough venue, he might be able to work with his favorite band, Wacko.Īnd hence the viral Denny’s punk show riot of 2019 was born. Bryson Del Valle had never promoted a concert before when he signed a paper reserving a restaurant ballroom in Orange County, California.