Historic Venue Spotlight: Cadillac Lounge

The Cadillac is not simply a car, and hasn’t been for a long time now. The name itself conjures up irresistible nostalgia, specifically an America that may not exist anymore: one filled with white t-shirts and blue jeans, greasy pompadours and beehive hairdos, hip-flask whiskey and late night make-out spots. It’s a vehicle capable of acting as a time machine, bringing passengers back to a time when cigarettes weren’t so dangerous yet and you and your best friends could get in a fistfight with another gang of guys and make it out. In short, the Cadillac is a symbol of original, true rock ‘n’ roll America, and if that world indeed still exists anywhere, it may only be in places like The Cadillac Lounge. And places like the Cadillac Lounge only exist because of people like owner Sam Grosso. Sam, born and raised in Kensington Market, looks like Bruce Springsteen if you doubled him in size, soft-spoken, clad-in-plaid, with massive hands and a natural, blue-collar air about him. Either people like him exist because of rock ‘n’ roll, or rock ‘n’ roll exists because of people like him. He opened the Cadillac Lounge in June 2000, 14 years ago, and it just so happens that when Noisey sits down to talk with him on Aug. 16, it’s the 37th anniversary of Elvis' death

“Which is also my first girlfriend’s birthday, so I have to call her and wish her a happy birthday. And that’s the only reason I remember her birthday,” Grosso laughs. The way the bar is decorated speaks to that type of one-track mind. There’s a Cadillac grill and headlights overlooking the small stage, and another one propping up the beer taps. Springsteen’s tough-muscle tunes romanticizing cars blast through the speakers in the dim-lit bar: “Spare Parts,” “Cadillac Ranch,” “Pink Cadillac.” There are hubcaps and old guitars on the wall beside magazine covers and photos of some of pop culture’s most legendary rebels, like Johnny Cash, James Dean, Bob Dylan, and of course, Elvis Presley. “I’m a big Elvis fan, and, you know, Elvis with the Cadillacs, when he got famous he bought his mother a Cadillac, so I just thought it’d be cool,” Grosso explains about the name. “And it sounds a lot better than the Smart car Lounge.”

While the carefully curated atmosphere may kick up visions of youth, the reality is The Cadillac Lounge is a bar, by definition for adults, and specifically those looking to relive some goodtime memories, or the younger set who are still keeping old school rock ‘n’ roll alive. The night before, the Cadillac hosted the reunion of and anniversary bash for Luke & The Apostles, a ‘60s Yorkville band, where the 50th anniversary crowd proved it doesn’t matter how old you are if you’re young at heart. “I thought they’d be gone by like, 11, but they were still here at midnight, drinkin’ and havin’ a good time,” Grosso says.

The bar’s small stage has seen some huge names, not just in rock ‘n’ roll or roots circles, but the world over. “We had Blue Rodeo, which was very early on, maybe February 2001, and they played until the wee hours,” Grosso says. “Wanda Jackson comes just about every year for the past six or seven years, and she’s amazing. Robert Gordon, Burton Cummings. Burton Cummings was amazing, a good partier. But just a lot of great local bands as well.”

Photo by Brett Caswell

The Cadillac Lounge mainly books rock ‘n’ roll, country, rockabilly, and Americana, all genres that have either experienced renaissances, developed subcultures, or been considered highly out-of-style at different times. But the important thing to note about all of them is that they’ve all, without a doubt, endured. And The Cadillac exists less as a nostalgia factory and more as a vehicle to celebrate timeless music, whether it be with a 70-year-old grandpa tapping his feet to a Beatles tribute band or a 20-something kid who can’t get enough of his dad’s Jerry Lee Lewis records. All while cultivating that atmosphere of a simpler time, when there really was nothing but the music, the thing that keeps the Cadillac’s engine running, and maybe the only way Grosso knows how to keep it tuned up. “It’s always been about the music. Ever since I was a kid.” Some things never change.

Matt Williams owns approximately zero Cadillacs - @MattGeeWilliams