SPORTS: The Kansas baseball team defeated Missouri Western 10-7. Page 9.
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
VOL.102.NO.118
THE STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
ADVERTISING: 864-4358
THURSDAY, MARCH 11, 1993
(USPS 650-640)
Lawrence's musical underground
The Outhouse provides the pulse of alternative music's local vein
Kansan staff writer
NEWS:864-4810
By James J. Reece
hey call it the pit.
they can hit the pit
It's a dance floor like no other in Lawrence — a place where adrenaline is king.
where elbows pump, shoulders bump and bodies collide in a frenzy of shredred drumsticks and unraveled steel guitar strings. Where beer- and sweat-soaked dancers stumble away bleeding or are dragged away unconscious.
The pit is under the flat roof of The Outhouse, a 60-by-40-foot blue cinder block shell of a building four miles east of Lawrence.
Forget fraternity and sorority members bopping to ahappy-faced disc jockey. Forget basketball players in snake-skin boots two-stepping in a cowboy bar. This is the Outhouse. This is the local vein of live, underground music. This is the bad side of town.
SUA plans trip to Panama City
less of name, the music is what has given the secluded Outhouse a notoriety unmatched by other Lawrence venues.
noble. She leaves the Outhouse is a testing ground for new bands in Lawrence. It also showcases older bands. It catches some, like Nirvana, before their crushes into mainstream music. Others, like Fear, the early 1980s punk band that recently reunited, appear on reconstruction tours. The Outhouse catches still others, like Ice T's Body Count, in mid-swing.
it's not the most cushy of accommodations," says Shelle Rosenberg, assistant editor of The Note, a Lawrence-based music and entertainment periodical. "但它 serves a purpose as a home for alternative music."
The recent Body Count and Fear concerts had both the music and the politics that fuel the fire and fights in the pit.
In January, the "Cop Killer" singer himself brought a taste of Los Angeles to the
Florida beach offers a change from the 'usual'
Traci Carl
Special to the Kansan
"Padre was getting kind of old." Gura said.
"It was just time for a change. I guess."
Mary Gura, St. Louis junior, has been to South Padre Island, Texas, for the past two spring breaks. He's ready for something new.
"It was just time for a change. This year Gura will be one 120 KU students and an estimated half million college students who will forsake other popular beach areas for the panhandle city of Panama City Beach, Fla.
Beach, people of Panama City Beach are ready for Guira and the other 499,999 students, said Patty Weathers, an employee of the Beach Chamber of Commerce.
"We want them all to come and enjoy our sugar-white beaches," she said in a telephone interview. "In fact, I've got my 'We have a great beach attitude' T-shirt on right now."
Student Union Activities is sponsoring the KU group's fourth trip to Panama City Beach. The trip costs $185 and includes two meals and condominium accommodations from March 19 to 27. Students provide their own transportation.
"We got in early and secured a luxury condo," said Sue Morrell, SUA manager.
cando, said Sara. Most students will car pool for the 17-hour drive, which is six hours shorter than the drive to Daytona. Gura said he planned on taking a trip road with about 20 of his Sigma Nu fraternity brothers.
They decided on Panama City Beach because they had heard a lot about it, he said.
"I've heard it's the new place to go for spring break," Gura said.
spring or fall. Panama City Beach, which used to be called the "Redneck Riviera," is changing its image.
Morrell said that the first year the group went, in 1990, there seemed to be more "snowbirds" than students. Snowbirds are Canadians and northeasterners who usually spend the winter in Florida.
"It was not a spring break haven," Morrell said. "If it was, it was for the locals."
ty Video Countdown.
Now, most of the snowbirds leave at the beginning of March and then the students take over. Weathers said.
said, it was a hive of activity But by 1991, the beach was so popular that MTV was tapping footage for their Top Twenty Video Countdown.
said.
But if the students don't get an invitation to dinner, they'll probably be at Spinners or Club Lavela, two hangouts that claim to be the world's largest beach bars.
The few snowbirds who stay don't seem to mind the students, though. Morrall said.
"It's not uncommon for these snowbirds to invite the kids over for dinner at night," she said.
world's biggest backyard
Both bars feature pools, waterfalls, and
stages, said Jim Brodiss, president of Bay Media Inc., an affiliate of the radio station that persuaded MTV to visit Panama City Beach.
"You can get lost in these clubs," Brodiss said. "One has 80,000 square feet of deck space. You walk out the back door and you are on the Gulf of Mexico."
The bars provide the talent and the outdoor amphitheater, and MTV does the taping, he said. MTV will be there March 5-7.
The looftie room
Pool parties, nightlife, club activities, parasailing and bungee jumping are some of the activities MTV has taped in the past, Bordiss said.
said. MTV will will air March 12-14
The footage will air March 12-14
said.
"Last year we took them deep sea fishing," Bordiss said. "We try to de-emphasize the beer aspect. We try to show the diversity of the beach."
the beach with the two beach bats, seven other bars are along a 10-mile stretch of the beach. "Each catches to a segment of spring break," Bordiss said.
Bordeaux. Besides the bars, Panama City Beach is popular because it is closer and cheaper than other popular spring break spots like Davana, Weathers said.
It also is cleaner and safer. That attracted SUA, Morrell said. Driving or pitting tents on the beaches is prohibited, she said. Kegs and glass containers also are prohibited.
"It's probably one of the most beautiful beaches I've seen in my life," Morrell said.
beaches I've seen here in Tampa. Brodiss said he thought students liked Panama City Beach because the people and the police were friendly.
"I don't think the police here are overzealous," Brodiss said. "They understand young people."
people.
Brodiss said Police Chief Lee Sullivan worked well with the students because he appreciated their business.
"He realizes that tourism is our biggest industry and he realizes that the reason Fort Lauderdale lost a lot of their tourism was because of the way they treated the young people," Bordiss said. "If you treat them with respect, then they act respectful."
respect, therethere was work for the Panama City Beach police for 24 seasons said the biggest problem that they had was that people would pass on the right.
that people would pass off to that last three or four years have been great," Sauls said. "We pour out a lot of beer and whiskey, but we don't have many arrests, not for the amount of kids we have here."
here.
Emily Elmore, Leawood sophomore, said she chose to go to Panama City because she thought the crowd would be older and more mature. She went to South Padre Island last year, but she wanted something different this year, she said.
"It was a lot of fun, but it was kind of teenybopbill," Elmore said. "It was a younger crowd."
crowd.
But Lance Brown, graduate adviser for SUA, said he thought the trip still would have the traditional beach and bikini elements.
"I think it'll be your typical spring break, the typical college stuff," Brown said. "Use your imagination."
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March 10, 1993 * K-you * SPRING BREAK '93
Beer bill concerns merchants
By Ben Grove
kansan staff writer
Kansas liquor store representatives yesterday asked state legislators not to take away a vital part of their livelihood — the sale of certain types of beer.
That is what would happen, they said, if the House passed a bill that would allow grocery and convenience stores to sell "strong beer." Such stores now only can sell beer with 3.2 percent alcohol or less. Only liquor stores can sell beer with greater alcohol content, and liquor store owners are worried the legislation would rob them of much of that market.
iquor store owners told the House federal and State Affairs Committee at as much as half of their sales are beer sales.
"I am incensed as a sole proprietor a retail store that the big chains hoil hundreds and thousands of ems feel that they must take 50 percent of my beer business to show a coft," said Patricia Oppitz, a Topeka store owner.
A Wichita liquor store owner point out that liquor stores are permitted gale to sell only alcoholic beverages and that beer was only a small part of other stores' total sales.
john Webb,网宝 of Webb's Fine
Lives and Spirits,800 W,23rd St, was
e last of the 12 bill opponents to
break.
"When they take our one item it could be devastating." Carl Mitchell id. "It's like asking us to run a race, en cutting one of our legs off and knitting us to be competitive."
I'm in a college town," Webb said. "s a young crowd. Young is beer."
After the hearing, he said his business also would be hit hard by the legislation because beer made up about 1 percent of his total sales.
Discussion during the hearings also salt with the social issue of making ver with higher alcohol content available at more locations.
It was stated that the amount ofinking stronger beer would notgrease — that it was simply a matterwhere it was bought," said FrancisOdid, a state and national Christian imperance Union volunteer. "I disree.Availability is the key here. If shandy, you buy it."
other bill opponents warned the presentations that if grocery and convenience stores got 5.0 beer, the gislature would soon see a glut of convenience store requests to sell any ses of liquor
The Pandora's box will be open," id Richard Ferguson, president of usas Retail Liquor Dealers Association.
Proponents of the bill spoke on esday. No action was taken.
ections
The candidates
*PCUSS: presidential candidate; Edward
Watson, Olia teacher and engineering
science. Vice presidential candidate; Jeff
Russell, Olia teacher and president of the juni-
niship.*
UNITE: presideen candidate. John Shoah topper. Teokju junior and liberal arts and sciences senator. Wor president candidate. Teokju junior and Nunhee senator.
NUNGANSAH: presidential candidate:
margaret Cox, Patricia, III, junior, Vice
presidential candidate; Charles Frey, Brockport,
Y., junior.
A.C.T.I.O. N.:II; presidential candidate
Tommy Macintosh, Tulsa, Okla.; senior and
lib arts and sciences senator. Vice presi-
ential candidate: Tommy Romero, Topeka
nobil and off-campus senator.
President Senate Elections Commission
KARAWAI