We've Got The Power To Rock This Funke' Joint!

Flyer designed by Malcolm Aaron.

Club Zen

Club Zen was the joint. Featuring early morning sets by legendary DJ's like Darin Johnson. Of my two favorite memories of the place, both from around the spring of '91, one was seeing a performance there of an incredible play produced by Quince Marcum about AIDS. The other was taking over the dancefloor one afternoon for a retro 70s photo shoot that accompanied an article Kyle York Spencer wrote as a campus stringer for the New York Times about the rebirth of disco. The powers that be shut down Club Zen once the dance night crowds eventually got too black, too gay, too integrated, and overall, too funky.

On Sunday nights, local bands would play.

"(Monica Swisher, former Local 506 co-owner) later worked at Club Zen in Chapel Hill (above Ye Olde Waffle House), a dance club that featured local bands every Sunday night. "All the people from Pepper's Pizza, everyone would come up," she remembers, as bands like Superchunk, Teasing the Korean and others played some of their very first shows."

- End of an Era? by ANGIE CARLSON, Indy Weekly, 8/22/01

I never attended this particular gig, but the poster hung on my walls at the Pink House (and probably the MOVE office) for years. In this photo, circa Spring '93, it's visible near the upper left corner.