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Official Announcement From System Soundbar
Well as most of you have heard by now, System Soundbar is shutting its doors just short of seven years on December 31st 2005. It has been an amazing ride.
I’ve gotten a couple of calls asking why the club has not made an official announcement about the closure yet, well that was made for me by several people and most of the information is at least partially true so as opposed to anything official I figure I’ll just tell you some stuff about System that you might not know and in the process answer some questions.
When we opened up this club I knew next to nothing about electronic music. I was also not overly familiar with the rave scene, my only real experience with the format was when I managed Lime Light (PURE Wednesdays) and what I’d heard or read in the paper. The first year was both scary and exciting, (who knew that people were not going to be drinking that much but would have other party favours to keep them happy, not I) but really there was very little work to be done, we had two of the best if not the best promotion companies in the city working with us - Life Force & Metro - and we were the newest and had a lot of hype surrounding us. The real work started a year later when Life Force decided to leave and open up Turbo, followed shortly afterwards by Metro.
Now a few of you have heard me say in the past that a huge reason for the success of this club is that I feel I have the best staff in the city. I’d like to explain that now. When we look for people to work here we don’t concentrate on the usual things that most bars do. The first thing we look for is personality, after that has been established we move onto the more obvious characteristics that make up bar staff. We’ve given a lot of people a chance who might not have otherwise had an opportunity to work in this business. Well when we slowed down (we went from averaging 1250 ppl down to 400 ppl) those same staff exhibited tremendous loyalty and I am proud to say that even during the slowest times we had only one staff member leave the club to go work elsewhere (he’s unemployed now) . Realistically people had no other reason to come to the club other than the staff made them feel comfortable. Half my staff has been here for five years plus, and a few from the very beginning. Most places people don’t last a year.
The next thing that happened when our promoters left us (and took all the Dj’s with them by the way) was it left a huge void which needed to be filled. Well this is when several people, most of them relatively unknown Dj’s and promoters stepped up and saw it as an opportunity. Shortly there after Breathe and BANG were born. There was a whole bunch of stuff that happened in between but suffice to say that many competitors have since come and gone, and for many people BANG and especially Breathe will always represent what was great about partying in this city.
Over the years I’ve heard the criticisms that have been levelled at System (and yes I know that some of them were justified), at first I used to be upset but in the last few years I’ve come to realize that I don’t need to take it personally, for some people it is just not their cup of tea, some people have reason to bad talk us – maybe they feel slighted or they might work for another club. Some people are bored, some people were boarded (sorry about that btw). Others felt that we should not do Hip Hop, or Retro, or Foam Parties. It always amazed me that people felt so strongly about what happened at a club on a night that they did not attend, feeling somehow that it would affect the night that they did attend (I guess this is a good thing) but this is a business after all, and although it does not happen very often downtown anymore, the goal of any good business is to be opened and making money as much as possible, to diversify it’s clientele in order to maximize its profits. If that’s not what its doing, well then it is not being run properly.
When we opened System we decided that it was going to be a truly underground club, I think we achieved that. Now almost seven years later, there is no other club that has brought more electronic music to this city, no club has debuted more new talent, no club has been home to more local talent, we’ve featured everything from Trance, Techno and Hip & Hop to Progressive House, Drum N Bass and Breaks. There are bigger clubs and there are more legendary clubs, but neither of them has brought more talent to this city on a Friday AND Saturday on a consistent basis, as a matter of fact all of those other clubs featured Hip Hop on Friday nights. So when I hear the criticism, I really have to wonder if you’ve really given it enough thought. Then again someone once told me it’s only a problem when they stop talking about you.
Lastly to all of you who have graced our doors over the years, old and new, past and present, I say thank you. Those of you, who have vehemently defended us to your friends and on message boards, thank you. Those of you who drive way too far and for way to long to get here, we thank you. To the incredibly large number of you who have dropped by and told us about how you met your partner, best friend, wife or husband here and you will never forget us, thank you. To those of you who will always be a part of the System family (even the drunk uncles and the crazy cousins) we thank you. For those of you who I’ve gotten to know over the years, that have become more than customers, thank you. To those of you who have been coming for years and years but never got any special treatment, never got on a list, but paid your cover charge anyway, thank you. To those of you who don’t come here anymore but have emailed, called or dropped by just to say bye, we thank you. And for those of you who actually read this long ass sentence (I know, no grammar skills) thank you.
I hope to see some of you on New Years Eve….
Orin
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Thanks for the memories.
