Danation: See you later, Alligator

(Credit: FPG/Davidson Taylor)

Alligator Alley is gone now. The place held its final night of music this past Saturday, with local act Stonefox closing out the bar. Alligator Alley's obituary is a tough one to write. For seven years, the Alley, situated near the corner of Dixie Highway and Commercial Boulevard, was the only place for local music between downtown Fort Lauderdale and Boca Raton. Proprietor Carl Pacillo ("Kilmo" to his friends. And his enemies, for that matter. Hell, I imagine even the dude's mother didn't call him Carl) carried the torch and held it high when no one else would. With the passing of his place — which produced some of the best and worst moments I witnessed in local music in the years that this space was dedicated regularly to a music column, as opposed to the music/politics/sports/whatever-issue-of-the-day-upsets-me catchall it now serves as — the music scene has grown significantly darker. Indeed, with the death of several of the aforementioned places in Boca — the Surf Cafe springs immediately to mind, though there are others — the number of venues specifically dedicated to local bands playing original music in South Florida could probably be counted on two hands.

Of course, the dearth of live music venues isn't the only reason to mourn the passing of Alligator Alley. Kilmo's gator ribs were so good, they merited a visit from the Food Network. His gumbo was unrivaled this side of Louisiana. Indeed, back when Fort Lauderdale held its similarly gone-but-not-forgotten Cajun/Zydeco Crawfish Festival, Kilmo's gumbo regularly won the gumbo cookoff attached to the festival. As I recall, there was one year in which the man did not win, and rumors swirled that the judges gave it to someone else simply because they didn't want to keep giving it to the same guy year after year.

In fact, it was the food that worried me most, not the music, when I arrived just in time to see Stonefox. I ordered up a Bud Light and a Trois Pistoles — two of the very few beers left in the place, which had sold out of just about everything — and asked Kilmo what he planned to do next.

"Voodoo Fest is the first thing up," he quickly responded, explaining that, after years of running the bar and restaurant, a trip to the Halloween weekend festival in New Orleans was long overdue. This year's lineup includes Eminem, Ween, Kiss, Jane's Addiction, Gogol Bordello, Widespread Panic, the Flaming Lips, Jello Biafra with his new band the Guantanamo School of Medicine, and many, many others. So Kilmo's enthusiasm — along with his need for a break — was very much understandable.

But where would I get my gumbo?

The man offered to make some at a house party sometime, and hey, that's great for me, but what about you, dammit? What about the City Link Metromix.com reader who will shrivel and die without regular doses of award-winning gumbo?

I started to explain to Kilmo that he should bottle and sell this stuff. "Kilmo Gumbo, they can call it," I said as I drained another Trois Pistoles and began a glass of Maker's Mark that some rotten provocateur had handed to me. "Or Gumbo Kilmo. Whatever. The marketers will figure that part out."

But right about then, Stonefox slammed into its set, singer-guitarist Jordan Asher screaming fire into the mike amid a crash of feedback and drums. It was a high, unholy sound, a suitable death knell for Alligator Alley. Kilmo headed into the crowd to deliver the final po' boy of the Alley's life.

Later, after several more glasses of bourbon and after Stonefox's set had ended, this thought stuck with me as I reeled toward the door. Someone shouted a goodnight toward me — SunSentinel music writer Sean Piccoli or ex-Marilyn Manson guitarist Scott Putesky. I couldn't be sure, but it came from the area where they had been hunkered down all night.

"Po' Boy of Death!" I muttered in answer as I stepped out into the night.

A couple of days later, I called Kilmo to check up on the man's post-Voodoo Fest plans.

"Look, I'm a musician by trade and I've been supporting music my whole life," the man said as he talked by phone while dismantling Alligator Alley's PA system. "So I want to create a music venue similar to here, but bigger — a 150- to 200-head venue. Bigger and better sound than I've had here, bigger and better lights. The idea is to create a nonprofit organization so I can solicit donations and grants. It's going to be a very neutral space — punk, indie rock, jam bands, possibly some hip-hop. I want to support everything across the board, so the folk society, blues society, jazz society and promoters can use it. But no cover bands — no 'Mustang Sally' or anything like that."

So local music fans need not fret. The Alligator Alley name may return, but in a slightly different form and definitely in a different area. "The straw that broke the camel's back for me was the city of Oakland Park charging a $2,000 tax to stay open after midnight. I mean, 80 percent of my business is between midnight and 2 a.m. When the city did that, they just taxed me out of business. I would basically have had to work a month for free."

As for the delicious gator ribs and world-class gumbo, Kilmo may still have a few fingers in the food business, but you'll have a much better chance of scoring his food in your own back yard than you will at the new venue. "I'll cater, but if you want to be a chef, you really need to dedicate to that. And if I had to choose one or the other, music is my thing," Kilmo said. "So I'll create a catering company and if you want to pay for it, no problem."

Kilmo hopes to open the new music hall by early spring, near downtown Fort Lauderdale. "I want to be downtown, near the commercial areas," he said. "I hear a lot of people say if we only had a place close to here that didn't have all the commercial stuff, and you don't have to pay for parking and worry about tickets — I mean everyone from the O'Hara's crowd to the Poor House crowd says that. I want to create that space to bring everyone together."

But that, of course, will come with the spring. The season of renewal. For now, Kilmo is free. "I haven't fished or golfed in seven years! I'm gonna do all the stuff I haven't been able to do for the past seven years. I feel literally like a guy getting out of prison."

Send gumbo to Dan Sweeney at dfsweeney@citylinkmagazine.com. For more of Sweeney's stuff, visit Huffingtonpost.com.