The beach rules. Don’t look for any arguments here. But what do you do after you’ve returned the snorkel gear and showered off your Goldfinger-like suit of number-137 sunscreen? Watch TV in your room? Or go catch Charo in the non-stop Polynesian follies at the Hilton (Don’t worry: she has a contractual clause allowing Joan Collins to step in if she gets too old to perform her duties).
I like Hawaii during the annual International Film Festival, in mid- November, but when some die-hard urbanites switch cities, they find cinema-going too passive, preferring an environment which serves up live music with a decent daiquiri. The Don Ho virus is rampant throughout the islands -- years of forced "hospitality" and a sentimental strain in their traditional music have made the Holiday Inn croon endemic to even the best Hawaiian singers -- but it’s possible to step off the tourist-trampled path and find a vital, if slightly undernourished, alternative music scene in Honolulu.
To answer your first inevitable question: yes, plaid has come to Hawaii! While surfwear still dominates club-going garb, it’s not unusual to see leather jackets, flip-flops, and a knee-length lumberjack shirt on the same college-age person. (This isn’t as absurd as the tropical climate would suggest, considering how frigid the buses and restaurants are kept. Which seems to suit Doc Martens-togged 20-year-olds who peer out their windows and, at the first hint of rain, dream of exotic Seattle.)
I was surprised at the number of name acts in town: Ladysmith Black Mambazzo, KRS-One, Fishbone, and the Violent Femmes were gigging at small-hall or outdoor concerts. Suicidal Tendencies was at After Dark, an industrial-style club on the Nimitz Highway; and C-5, on isolated Sand Island, had scored Babes in Toyland. Still, I wanted to check out the local angle.
Much of the obvious nightlife in Honolulu is centred in that thumb-shaped lozenge of hotel towers and fluffy white beaches called Waikiki -- familiar to millions, if only from reruns of Hawaii 5-0 and Magnum P.I. Waikiki is cut off from the rest of the city by the Ala Wai Canal, and its choicest hunk of real estate, smack in the middle, is still inhabited by the U.S. military (standing ready since 1893). This makes for a rather hemmed-in stroll for trinket-hunting visitors; after a few days, it’s easy to feel like fish in a large circular aquarium. There are no footbridges across the canal, and this is most certainly a tourist-corralling device. But most of the beachfront entertainment is of the hotel-lounge variety, and if you want to get away from the Pukalani Brothers’s slack-key version of "Feelings", a good place to start is the small university district.
The number 4 bus zigzags across the canal and winds uphill to the University of Hawaii. The stop across from the Varsity Theater (the film fest’s flagwaver) lands you in front of Moose McGillycuddy’s, a dark-wood, top-40 joint much like college suds-barns everywhere. Notably, though, it hosts a once-a-month, all-night blowout with about a dozen local bands.
I prefer a few at a time, and about two long blocks west on main-drag Beretania Street is Anna Bannana’s. A beat-up club with an amiably split personality, its lower level is a classic biker’s bar, with pool tables, surly bartenders, and Bud on tap; upstairs, a coterie of local bands, like Melodious Thunk and the metalheaded Poynt Blankk, play for students. The night I went, multi-race/gender house favourites Pagan Babies were holding forth with their impressively versatile (if slightly synthetic) blend of world beat, funk, and jazz-rock styles; the cluttered, multilevel room was rocking with serious dance-itude.
Found far west down the ocean-side Ala Moana Boulevard, at the end of a nondescript mall-strip known as Restaurant Row, is the Blue Zebra, an airy, L-shaped room with good acoustics and a reputation for encouraging class jazz acts. My first encounter, though, yielded a rather desultory blues band, complete with hats and shades. When Dan Aykroyd didn’t show up, I took off, but a few nights later, the club hosted a sparkling piano trio (there were international jazz acts at the nearby Honolulu Academy of Arts, which also features local classical and new music events).
Ironically, the most fun I had was around the corner from my hotel, at the Wave Waikiki. A steamy, windowless box only a few blocks from the beach, the Wave is frequented by guys in Gold’s Gym tank-tops, and the odd pack of miniskirted women practising their model pouts as they make a bee-line for the washroom or mezzanine above the stage.
I went on a Tuesday, which offers local favourites, and I was lucky enough to encounter two great bands: Elvis '77, a Soundgarden-type noise trio driven by a twin-pigtailed drummer; and the Love Gods, an exceptionally tuneful quintet boasting inventive, REM-ish songs from frontman James Figueira and g-spot guitarist Porter Miller — they were the one group I saw with breakout potential. Of course, my judgement could have been flawed, since Tuesday is also "bucket night"; I didn’t realize my scotches were actually triples until a waiter politely asked me down from my bar stool, adding that I could stop cheering the band -- the house had already been playing videos for five minutes.
Access
The best way around Waikiki is on foot or better yet, by bicycles, widely available for rental. Buses are cheap, if not quite plentiful enough, at 85 cents a ride — less for students! Taxis are needed for Restaurant Row, Sand Island, and other outer limits, and are reasonable by mainland standards. Here are some venue locations (808 is the area code for the whole state):
Moose McGillycuddy’s Waikiki, 1035 University Avenue, 944-5525
Anna Bannana’s, 2440 S. Beretania Street, 964-5190
Honolulu Academy of Arts, 900 S. Beretania Street, 532-8768
The Wave Waikiki, 1877 Kalakaua Avenue, 941-0424
For event listings, listen to KPOI 97.5 FM (The Edge) and KIPO 89.3 FM (Hawaii Public Radio, which actually plays CBC news on Sundays), or pick up the Honolulu Weekly, Metropolis music magazine, and Artbeat, a hip bi-monthly newspaper.
