The Kneecappers
By Gary Lupico
Whew, Fitzpatrick's "Rainbow", what a place for memories. Somehow the Backdoor Men convinced Fitz to start booking punk shows there, 78 or 79, I guess. The place might have been the biggest dump in the flats, back when every joint in the flats was a dump. There was a trough urinal in the men's room that, in lieu of actual plumbing, emptied out into a 5 gallon bucket underneath. On a good night, the piss would spill out from under the door and into the club. A literal pisshole.
One particular Kneecapper night, things got out of hand. At the beginning of the set in front of our usual sparse crowd, Russell's amp got smoked. The logical reaction for Russell was to smash his bass (a real cool Mosrite that would probably fetch enough to pay for an entire CD today), and the games began. Yarmock began ripping the 2x4 railings off the stage and tossing them around. The half blind violin player who we called "Jean Luc Wally" crawled under the stage and was throwing his clothes out. The band let loose with an all out verbal (and in Yarmock's case, physical) assault on the "crowd". Pieces of bass and the stage were flying everywhere and some guy with a big red afro was picking up tables and chairs and hurling them around the club. A river of piss streamed from under the shithouse door, washing away bits of wood and broken teeth. At the end of this very successful evening, Fitz accosted us and was yelling "I run a nice place here, you'll never play in the flats again!" We reminded him that the bucket needed changing and left. On the way out I saw Big Red Afro guy and said "Nice job, man, next time bring your friends." He said "I would, but I tend to repulse most people." We had the greatest fans.
As a postscript, a couple of years ago I saw Fitz waiting tables at an Indian restaraunt in Cle Hts. We've all come a long way.
