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January 9, 2007
Buddy's blues
I read on the news wire that Buddy Guy's Chicago club has lost its lease and will have to move by June. The owner of the building where Buddy Guy's Legends operates, Columbia College, wants to use the space for a student center.
Not that it matters, but I could've sworn I heard this before. Wasn't Legends supposed to have made way for the student center years ago?
I guess the reasons this holds any interest for me is a) I'm a huge Buddy Guy fan; and b) I actually went to Buddy Guy's Legends.
It was back in 1998 when my cousin and I went driving around the Midwest to check out baseball games in Chicago, Milwaukee, Detroit, Cleveland and Pittsburgh (and Columbus, Ohio, for a minor-league game, too). I took charge of planning the trip and, not coincidentally, we just so happened to be in the Windy City during the weekend of the annual Chicago Blues Festival with Ray Charles, Pinetop Perkins and Guitar Shorty the headliners.
On the way to Grant Park for the festival, we stopped at Buddy Guy's Legends for lunch and, though the food wasn't great, it was still pretty cool being there and soaking in the atmosphere, which included a large painting of a blues Mount Rushmore with (if memory serves) Robert Johnson, Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters and B.B. King.
I bought a T-shirt on the way out and wore it proudly and often, until a washing machine incident left it in the pink, literally.
The club doesn't plan to close - it is rather successful - and plans to find a new location close to its present spot. I hope so, because I plan on getting back to Chicago soon and grabbing another bad meal . . . and another T-shirt.
Posted by Sean on January 9, 2007 5:57 PM
