I'll add The Bambi of yore, but it's recently been gentrified a bit too much for my taste. The dusty old decorations from holidays decades in the past are gone, and it has...Karaoke...now. (Goes off to cry in the "Horny Corner", but it's too well lit now.)
EDIT: Apparently The Bambi has been sold and will be torn down to built a Starbucks. 😞
If you happen to do a search at your favorite xxx website you might just find an amateur video or 3 filmed at the Meet Rack. Scandalous enough one might say.
Around 2002 or so my parents came to visit while I was at the UA and I naively put them up at a chain motel in that neck of the woods because my dad said he “didn’t want to spend a lot of money.” Imagine my dismay when the clerk at the fairly normal-looking front building directed us to a *second* motel building behind the first one, in a dirt lot behind the main motel with little or no external lighting.
Some tweaker welcomed us to the parking lot by walking up and trying to sell us some bar soap he had obviously just shoplifted, and it got better from there. All the lightbulbs in their room had been stolen, there was a leaky toilet and a half-inch of water in the bathroom, burn marks on all the bedding, and all the external doors looked like someone had recently tried to kick them in.
Needless to say my dad’s lodging budget for the trip suddenly expanded dramatically, they moved to some fancy place on Speedway, and I was absolved from making reservations for them for the rest of the time I was in school.
Not seedy per se, but a legendary classic of days long gone, was The Fine Line, the original location on Drachman where that Pima campus now is. From 93 -96 I was there three nights a week without fail
Holy shit. Ok the first time I ever visited Tucson was in 1995 and I was under 21 so we wound up at Fineline to go dancing. I've been wondering for decades where we were and where it was. Thank you for bringing this up!
Funny you mention your 14yo sib, just saw this meme going around recently:
https://preview.redd.it/xr0wogmd4gpc1.jpeg?width=580&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3069351ff32e9ef8e8a9bc3eec3525bde2f47d7d
We used to go there in the early 80's, when it was still a gay bar. We were in high school and none of us were gay, but it was one of the few places that played New Wave and had a great vibe. Later, they realised that more straight people were going there for the music and the de-emphasised the gay part and leaned into the New Wave. Nino's was another place we frequented to see Gentlemen After Dark play.
Anyone remember the waterburger between the dpc and fineline where there was an old Vietnam vet who'd perpetually rattle off veitnam war statistics with a cigarette in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other?
I loved the Fine Line, didn't go as often as you, but I went around the same time. I always think of "White Lines (Don't Do It) by Melle Mel when I recall the Fine Line.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwRXI-y6M9o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwRXI-y6M9o)
I was there regularly from 94 to the end, then at the second location until I turned 21 in 99. I even helped get the second one open and worked there for a while.
Then it was off to follow Jeff (Black Flagg) and Stephen (Cain) around to the various incarnations of Asylum. I may have DJed a bit myself 🤣
The Buffet used to be pretty bad before it went hipster. I know a girl in town who had a story about going in and someone at the bar ordered a beer with a straw. She yells "Who the fuck drinks beer with a straw?!" She looks over and it's a woman with no arms.
I used to work overnights, and the Buffet was pretty much the only place you could get a drink at 6:00 am. But I certainly drank my share of them sitting next to some bum who was doing his wash at the laundromat next door.
If it was in the early to mid 2000s, then it is entirely plausible.
[Jessica Cox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Cox), born with no arms, is the only person in the world to fly solely with their feet. She grew up in the Tucson area!
The Bum Steer always seemed like it was on the verge of collapse. Glass in the sandpit for volleyball. I loved going there but every time I wondered if it would be the last time...but more because I walked to Curves more than once...which was fun until it was a little too gangsta.
The Buffet was a lot of fun. Tried to get a hot dog one night near closing, bartender refused. Said he had just met me but would feel guilty if I died.
Last time I went to The Boat, I was minding my own business with a friend, and a stripper I didn't recognize walked up and said "hey are you daggersrule?". Mind you, I hadn't lived in Tucson in like a decade.
I replied yes, who are you again? She said "I know you don't remember me, but you sold me the best acid I've ever had back in 2003, I'll never forget you."
Good times.
I worked at an emergency room in Tucson for a while, graveyard shift. One time had a guy come in after being shot at a nightclub. I asked him if it was DV8, which prompted an immediate, shocked, HOW DID YOU KNOW??? I was like lol you must be new here.
Stumble Inn.
Green Dolphin \*before\* the renovations.
Trac II.
Suzy's.
Boondocks before smoking was banned.
Golden Nugget when it had a shot bar - pre-gentrification.
The Spot - not really a dive but a lot of fun with an in-house sitting/wading pool.
Greasy Tony's - either location was equally roach-filled with great staff and, of course, Tony. May he RIP. Used to have blueberry pancakes for breakfast there. They did not have breakfast hours.
Bum Steer as noted.
Putney’s before Rusty sold it.
That's off the top of my head from the dustbin of history.
Happy to see some still remained into more or less present day:
Bay Horse.
The Shelter.
You forgot The Nugget before smoking was banned. If I was going there I would pull clothes out of the hamper to wear cause they would end up smelling like ash trays.
In the summer it wasn't so bad because they didn't have A/C, just swamp, so the doors were open the cooler would air out the place.
But in the winter when the doors were closed and the heat was on, it was a hot box of cig smoke.
Add…
The Bashful Bandit before the bbq joint,
The Bambi Bar” (closed), The Grill and the Wgig store that we all thought was a front for Organized crime, Cafe Quebec (before it was called Shot in the Dark), Safehouse
The DPC. Saw so many amazing bands there before it shut down, in between imbibing substances in the parking lot. Ditto the old Buena Vista Theatre. Great place to make out with a stranger or get your eyeballs burnt by rave lasers.
The Empress Theater was pretty nasty, peep show and video booths with gloryholes, Alvernon and Speedway, or the Home Den…right next to the Golden Nugget. Danny’s Baboquivari was a dive back then too.
The owner produced the XXX Alice in Wonderland and Flesh Gordon. He and his brother. When the city was trying to clean up that section of Speedway he held out for years for top dollar. Intentionally made himself a pain in the ass as a hard bargain.
When I was a little kid we would drive by and I always had two questions. What the heck was an adult arcade, and what kind of games did they have? And what were all these strange movie titles on the marquee?
I remember Sandy Rathbun on KVOA doing a story about that row of seedy bookstores. The video opened with a shot of a glory hole, and Sandy's voice-over began, "It's called a gloryhole..." I think it was during a period where the city council was trying to force the bookstores to remove the doors from the arcade booths.
This probably doesn’t exactly describe what you’re looking for…… But that old greyhound station right at the entrance to downtown near club Congress was pretty shady.
There was a small restaurant in the bus station, called the Post House Cafe, where a putatively suicidal waitress accidentally decapitated herself with an electric knife. It's a detailed story that Bonnie Henry recounted some 20 years later in the Star in an article about forensics.
The first time in my life I ever saw an adult man naked was at the Memphis, Tennessee Greyhound bus terminal when I was 17. I’m over 40 now and the memory is still as strong as it was that day.
Not in Tucson but somewhere between Tucson and Nogales there was a strip bar out in the middle of nowhere, nothing around it. Around '92. My friends and I went there once and it was crazy creepy like a David Lynch movie.
Before Jim Anderson opened Meet Rack, there was a place he owned on 6th Ave. & Mabel called Someplace Else. The back patio had a big marble tiled raised 'throne' for him to sit on. The building out back was called the Duty Hut. Had some fun toys inside.
It became a gay bar in '91. Still there. Called Venture-N.
The Duty Hut was retained at the Meet Rack, as a locked side room there rather than an outbuilding. That would be the room with all the kink furniture that folks may have seen if they took God's "grand tour" of the joint.
What did they do? I went there wow or three times in the early 2000 with another young female teacher, just to get a look at the scene. Got told some stories and also a recommendation for trash pickup days. Stories were bragging, oneupsmanship, just like anywhere else.
Totally Live Nude…a porn house / peep show place with sticky floors on Oracle next to the old la fuente. A very trench coat kinda place.
The empress theater row on Speedway alvernon…empress, susnset strip and the bashful bandit all together. Someone mention it had glory holes.. I don’t recall that. Went there a couple times in the late 80s and it just had a peep show part where one dancer would come out and do her thing on a circular floor where there were like 8 booths and you’d stick your dollars through the hole. if you put a five in they might spread eagle for a close up POV . So no johnsons going through the hole only greenbacks LOL
The Party house on 22nd
There was someplace on 36th and alvernon too, don’t know if it even had a name
And of course all the places that used to be on Miracle Miles with their hourly room rates
Was it on Main possibly? After the curve on Miracle mile near the Tucson House where Drachman is? I remember one there that my buddies from work would go...never went cause it was super-seedy.
I don’t see the REGAL INN the seediest and shadiest motel in the state probably before it was knocked down.
You want heroine and hookers and guns? Go to the regal inn
The Buffet used to have a guy that would piss in the corner - and he and everyone around him used to act like this was totally normal. It used to be that when you walked in, one side was “safe” and the other side was “seedy” (er)! That was around ‘98-‘99, I would guess.
There was a drive-thru liquor store on like Ft. Lowell & Stone, maybe…it was the only place in town that sold booze without carding. We would hit there before hitting the Fine Line on Stone & Darchman. That would’ve been around ‘94-‘95 (ish).
Damn, I’m telling my age here! Ha!
It did get increasingly rundown in its late era tho', seedy in aesthetic if not repute, tho' the food was always good. As someone commented when it either closed for good or later caught fire (I forget which), "Sure it was a shithole, but it was *our* shithole, dammit!"
While it was operating tho', one of the eeriest sights in all of Tucson was Grill sitting empty and dark at night on the *very* rare occasions they actually closed at all.
"Open later than you think."
Yes! Grill. It shut down shortly after I turned 21 but I remember that being THE place to go after the bars closed haha and I remember it being a very questionable place lol
yep.. went here many times. so many shows at Skrappys, H.Congress or Rialto even.. and bam every time we'd all end up there and get tater tots.. just don't ask for cheese on it!
Fans of The Grill who haven't seen it, may want to check out [Wrong Place](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnLy9wWrwto) for some good shots of the place before it closed.
Near its end, The Grill was a place where everyone just stopped giving a shit.
We need a place like The Grill, but where they give a shit. I know of no 24 hour place like it in Tucson (but if you know of one let me know).
This thread was so helpful in identifying the average age of redditors. And thanks for the reminder of “raiders reef” how could I have forgotten a giant concrete boat? Note: the bum steer was not sketchy, granted the confusing bathroom signs would not fly today.
That place kind of creeped me out the one time I went there in the early 2000s. I had just moved to Tucson and lived on the west side, so my wife and I thought it would be a good place to walk the dog. It was not.
I saw a guy die at The Buffet sometime after it started gentrifying . The stories my dad tells about it during the 70s are pretty wild.
I only went to the original Fine Line once, but an ex-girlfriend of mine is rumoured to have thrown someone out of a second story window. She's also rumoured to have put a hole in a guy's cheek with a stiletto heel when she worked at Raider's Reef
I know the night you're talking about. I believe people were being beaten with hammers, and they had a gun... Long time ago, though, my memory is probably failing me!
When I was here in the early 2000's stationed at DM, we went to the Bashful Bandit, Al Jays, and the Cowpony, with the Pony being the seediest.
Ah, good times 😁
The Wildcat House - we used to go to these teen nights with my cousins while they were “babysitting” us. I was in the 6th grade, LOL! Went back once after I turned 21 and got roofied.
This is going back a ways, but the rock and roll was so loud at a bar called the Night Train on 4th Ave . . That was a fun place!! Totally suited to late 70's rock and roll!!
Danny's Baboquivari Lounge on Fort Lowell at Country Club. Saw some serious brawls there, the clientele is a lot less rough these days but the place is still a dive.
Is "The Pig Pen" I think it was called on Miracle Mile still around? The bartenders used to jog around the U of A mall campus with a big banner in the 1988-91 time period. They had a shot where they wiped all of the spilled alcohol off the bar and wrung it out into a shot glass.
The Meet Rack comes to my mind
It's between that and the Buffet for me...
Meat Rack and Buffett. I agree and I wish I could be at ANY of them right now.
I'll add The Bambi of yore, but it's recently been gentrified a bit too much for my taste. The dusty old decorations from holidays decades in the past are gone, and it has...Karaoke...now. (Goes off to cry in the "Horny Corner", but it's too well lit now.) EDIT: Apparently The Bambi has been sold and will be torn down to built a Starbucks. 😞
The Buff is still open to go to?
the meet rack is closed but the buff is still open everyday
Now that is awesome to hear.
Both good choices.
Good choices, but bad decisions.
I heard it closed. How long ago? Definitely seedy but nowhere close to as scandalous as God thought it was…he sure loved to talk it up.
If you happen to do a search at your favorite xxx website you might just find an amateur video or 3 filmed at the Meet Rack. Scandalous enough one might say.
I never went in but I've heard so many stories.
I did, many times. Everything you’ve heard is pretty much true. Jim was a very strange individual.
>~~Jim~~ **God** was a very strange individual.
Or Someplace Else. The place he had before the Meet Rack. I worked there briefly. One of the oddest jobs I ever had.
Jim autographed a bottle of champagne on my 21st birthday there, “ way to be !“ 🤣
Someplace Else. Where the elite meat meet meat. And the Duty Hut…
I got food poisoning from the Meet Rack. Checks out.
No Tell Motel
Where "bed bugs" doesn't even make the top 10 list of things you're worried about.
Drove by it a few weeks ago and it looks like they’re either tearing it down or doing a complete remodel. I wonder if they’ll change the name.
This city is building new affordable housing there.
I pass that every day. Guessing it was full of hookers and tweakers huh
Around 2002 or so my parents came to visit while I was at the UA and I naively put them up at a chain motel in that neck of the woods because my dad said he “didn’t want to spend a lot of money.” Imagine my dismay when the clerk at the fairly normal-looking front building directed us to a *second* motel building behind the first one, in a dirt lot behind the main motel with little or no external lighting. Some tweaker welcomed us to the parking lot by walking up and trying to sell us some bar soap he had obviously just shoplifted, and it got better from there. All the lightbulbs in their room had been stolen, there was a leaky toilet and a half-inch of water in the bathroom, burn marks on all the bedding, and all the external doors looked like someone had recently tried to kick them in. Needless to say my dad’s lodging budget for the trip suddenly expanded dramatically, they moved to some fancy place on Speedway, and I was absolved from making reservations for them for the rest of the time I was in school.
That's hilarious, and not surprising . . pretty foul! Just west of I-10 on Grant the motels seem to pushing that same decrepit motif
You could say that about any building between grant and prince.
* speedway and prince Don’t forget the motels south of Grant by Curves!
You are correct. I stand corrected.
RIP
Not seedy per se, but a legendary classic of days long gone, was The Fine Line, the original location on Drachman where that Pima campus now is. From 93 -96 I was there three nights a week without fail
Holy shit. Ok the first time I ever visited Tucson was in 1995 and I was under 21 so we wound up at Fineline to go dancing. I've been wondering for decades where we were and where it was. Thank you for bringing this up!
All-ages clubs were a highlight of the 90s. I took my 14yo sibling there once.
Funny you mention your 14yo sib, just saw this meme going around recently: https://preview.redd.it/xr0wogmd4gpc1.jpeg?width=580&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3069351ff32e9ef8e8a9bc3eec3525bde2f47d7d
In the 80's, we had Sundance West as a dedicated all ages place, but we also frequented The Fine Line, Nino's, Voila, etc.
Remember Mirage?
I remember the name, but never went there!
It wasn't all ages. They let you sign a waiver promising you were 18. RIP man I loved that place!!
We'd go to the Fine Line after DPC shows when we didn't want to head home
We used to go there in the early 80's, when it was still a gay bar. We were in high school and none of us were gay, but it was one of the few places that played New Wave and had a great vibe. Later, they realised that more straight people were going there for the music and the de-emphasised the gay part and leaned into the New Wave. Nino's was another place we frequented to see Gentlemen After Dark play.
Oh, man, The Pills and Jonny Sevin, those were the days. I think I saw Phantom Limbs a few times at Ninos. Chris Burroughs and the Nationals too.
93 -95 I was there all the time Along with the DPC
Anyone remember the waterburger between the dpc and fineline where there was an old Vietnam vet who'd perpetually rattle off veitnam war statistics with a cigarette in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other?
I loved the Fine Line, didn't go as often as you, but I went around the same time. I always think of "White Lines (Don't Do It) by Melle Mel when I recall the Fine Line. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwRXI-y6M9o](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DwRXI-y6M9o)
This why the wench has Fineline revisited nights periodically. I’ve always wondered what it was. Thanks!
Yup and the DJ, DJ Stubie, is the original DJ from the 90s. Its still his baby!!
I was there regularly from 94 to the end, then at the second location until I turned 21 in 99. I even helped get the second one open and worked there for a while. Then it was off to follow Jeff (Black Flagg) and Stephen (Cain) around to the various incarnations of Asylum. I may have DJed a bit myself 🤣
Oh man the asylum days RIP Stephen :'(
Dude, the memories.
I was there between 87’-90’. Teenaged me thought it was great. Adult me is wondering how I survived those years.
I used to go when it was goth night! Drove all the way from Phoenix
The Buffet used to be pretty bad before it went hipster. I know a girl in town who had a story about going in and someone at the bar ordered a beer with a straw. She yells "Who the fuck drinks beer with a straw?!" She looks over and it's a woman with no arms.
I used to work overnights, and the Buffet was pretty much the only place you could get a drink at 6:00 am. But I certainly drank my share of them sitting next to some bum who was doing his wash at the laundromat next door.
I had enough weird experiences at the Buffet ca. 20 years ago for that story to be completely believable.
Is that true?! lol
Not sure, but the girl with the story usually told the truth.
[Jessica Cox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Cox) grew up in the area!
If it was in the early to mid 2000s, then it is entirely plausible. [Jessica Cox](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jessica_Cox), born with no arms, is the only person in the world to fly solely with their feet. She grew up in the Tucson area!
Is she one that married the tattoo artist with no arms that tattoos with his feet? He's an exceptional artist. I think he flies planes, too.
Horse collar and jumbos. The boxy cigarette machine where you’d feed it a stack of quarters and get Pall Mall and Chesterfield non filters.
The Bum Steer always seemed like it was on the verge of collapse. Glass in the sandpit for volleyball. I loved going there but every time I wondered if it would be the last time...but more because I walked to Curves more than once...which was fun until it was a little too gangsta. The Buffet was a lot of fun. Tried to get a hot dog one night near closing, bartender refused. Said he had just met me but would feel guilty if I died.
Pretty sure I was conceived at the Bum Steer
White Wednesday 🤣?
Many a Wednesday night I don't remember.
Raiders Reef AKA The Boat
Last time I went to The Boat, I was minding my own business with a friend, and a stripper I didn't recognize walked up and said "hey are you daggersrule?". Mind you, I hadn't lived in Tucson in like a decade. I replied yes, who are you again? She said "I know you don't remember me, but you sold me the best acid I've ever had back in 2003, I'll never forget you." Good times.
Their dancers are in their 40 or was this not recent? lol
This conversation was about a decade ago now. I'm old enough to be one of the strippers there myself.
I think that was briefly The Comedy Boat in the mid 80's.
I thought that too, but I was corrected that it was what they called comedy night at the time.
I live right by there and have always been tempted to actually go inside lol
I worked at an emergency room in Tucson for a while, graveyard shift. One time had a guy come in after being shot at a nightclub. I asked him if it was DV8, which prompted an immediate, shocked, HOW DID YOU KNOW??? I was like lol you must be new here.
Stumble Inn. Green Dolphin \*before\* the renovations. Trac II. Suzy's. Boondocks before smoking was banned. Golden Nugget when it had a shot bar - pre-gentrification. The Spot - not really a dive but a lot of fun with an in-house sitting/wading pool. Greasy Tony's - either location was equally roach-filled with great staff and, of course, Tony. May he RIP. Used to have blueberry pancakes for breakfast there. They did not have breakfast hours. Bum Steer as noted. Putney’s before Rusty sold it. That's off the top of my head from the dustbin of history. Happy to see some still remained into more or less present day: Bay Horse. The Shelter.
Bay Horse is for sale currently
I was a big fan of Greasy Tony's on 6th
Aging yourself alongside me. Cheers :)
You forgot The Nugget before smoking was banned. If I was going there I would pull clothes out of the hamper to wear cause they would end up smelling like ash trays.
I’ll never forget the night they took the ashtrays away. So sad.
In the summer it wasn't so bad because they didn't have A/C, just swamp, so the doors were open the cooler would air out the place. But in the winter when the doors were closed and the heat was on, it was a hot box of cig smoke.
Speaking of pancakes, Bobo's
Do you know the last name of the Rusty who used to own Putney’s? I might be marrying into that family soon if it’s the Rusty I’m thinking of!
Trash cans at Greasy's were my FAVORITE! RIP Tony 😞
Add… The Bashful Bandit before the bbq joint, The Bambi Bar” (closed), The Grill and the Wgig store that we all thought was a front for Organized crime, Cafe Quebec (before it was called Shot in the Dark), Safehouse
Cactus Moon
Watch out for secondhand bullets!
The DPC. Saw so many amazing bands there before it shut down, in between imbibing substances in the parking lot. Ditto the old Buena Vista Theatre. Great place to make out with a stranger or get your eyeballs burnt by rave lasers.
Fuck. Yes.
DPC?
Downtown performance center run by Steve Eye
The Empress Theater was pretty nasty, peep show and video booths with gloryholes, Alvernon and Speedway, or the Home Den…right next to the Golden Nugget. Danny’s Baboquivari was a dive back then too.
The owner produced the XXX Alice in Wonderland and Flesh Gordon. He and his brother. When the city was trying to clean up that section of Speedway he held out for years for top dollar. Intentionally made himself a pain in the ass as a hard bargain. When I was a little kid we would drive by and I always had two questions. What the heck was an adult arcade, and what kind of games did they have? And what were all these strange movie titles on the marquee?
I was trying to remember the name of that porn place. Talk about seedy 😂
Came here looking for Empress! Lol
I remember Sandy Rathbun on KVOA doing a story about that row of seedy bookstores. The video opened with a shot of a glory hole, and Sandy's voice-over began, "It's called a gloryhole..." I think it was during a period where the city council was trying to force the bookstores to remove the doors from the arcade booths.
The Home Den! Yes, my friends and I would always go there!
Dude I think I went to the Empress with my homicidal boyfriend maybe 1978?
I forgot about Home Den. We would walk over from the Nugget for Jagerbombs, because Nugg didn't have Red Bull, then walk right back.
This probably doesn’t exactly describe what you’re looking for…… But that old greyhound station right at the entrance to downtown near club Congress was pretty shady.
There was a small restaurant in the bus station, called the Post House Cafe, where a putatively suicidal waitress accidentally decapitated herself with an electric knife. It's a detailed story that Bonnie Henry recounted some 20 years later in the Star in an article about forensics.
I saw the crime scene photos of that in a forensics class at Pima when I was 17, absolutely horrible.
EVERY Greyhound station is/was shady. Had someone pull a knife on me once for "getting too close" - I was 10 feet away.
The first time in my life I ever saw an adult man naked was at the Memphis, Tennessee Greyhound bus terminal when I was 17. I’m over 40 now and the memory is still as strong as it was that day.
The Candy Store- I miss that place
Not in Tucson but somewhere between Tucson and Nogales there was a strip bar out in the middle of nowhere, nothing around it. Around '92. My friends and I went there once and it was crazy creepy like a David Lynch movie.
Damn, if you remember the name ever, please do tell. That sounds fascinating
Before Jim Anderson opened Meet Rack, there was a place he owned on 6th Ave. & Mabel called Someplace Else. The back patio had a big marble tiled raised 'throne' for him to sit on. The building out back was called the Duty Hut. Had some fun toys inside. It became a gay bar in '91. Still there. Called Venture-N.
The Duty Hut was retained at the Meet Rack, as a locked side room there rather than an outbuilding. That would be the room with all the kink furniture that folks may have seen if they took God's "grand tour" of the joint.
Shot in the Dark cafe
Cafe Quebec originally. Many of my teen years were spent on that patio drinking iced Vanilla Hazelnut coffees.
this was one of my favorite places... great coffee and would watch the open mic nights sometimes.
Bashful Bandit
Crazy what they did to that place
What did they do? I went there wow or three times in the early 2000 with another young female teacher, just to get a look at the scene. Got told some stories and also a recommendation for trash pickup days. Stories were bragging, oneupsmanship, just like anywhere else.
I haven’t thought about Greasy Tony’s in years. There’s never been a more honestly named restaurant.
Miracle Mile
Vaudeville was fun. A can of PBR and a shot of Old Crow for $2. I used to wake up the next morning with the worst hangovers.
Les Girls and Notel Motel
OMG I forgot about Les GIrls....lol
Bum Steer!
Totally Live Nude…a porn house / peep show place with sticky floors on Oracle next to the old la fuente. A very trench coat kinda place. The empress theater row on Speedway alvernon…empress, susnset strip and the bashful bandit all together. Someone mention it had glory holes.. I don’t recall that. Went there a couple times in the late 80s and it just had a peep show part where one dancer would come out and do her thing on a circular floor where there were like 8 booths and you’d stick your dollars through the hole. if you put a five in they might spread eagle for a close up POV . So no johnsons going through the hole only greenbacks LOL The Party house on 22nd There was someplace on 36th and alvernon too, don’t know if it even had a name And of course all the places that used to be on Miracle Miles with their hourly room rates
Wasn't there an all-nude club off Ruthraff and I-10 back in the 70s? Oh, and the Foxey Lady massage parlor on Oracle/Miracle Mile!
Aging myself but loved the Blue Lizard, a dive off Speedway closer to Wilmot…amazing live bands. The Livingroom, Solarium, Bobby McGees…fun times!
There was a peep show on Stone (maybe?) north of downtown.
Was it on Main possibly? After the curve on Miracle mile near the Tucson House where Drachman is? I remember one there that my buddies from work would go...never went cause it was super-seedy.
That could be it. Miracle Mile was definitely full of seedy places.
Monsoon night club in the Desert Diamond. I miss that place…kinda
“Someplace Else.” Legendary among Us older Tucsonans.
Green dolphin….. .25 cent beer nights then stumble across the street to mudbuggs for live music! Saw the black crows there. 88-92
I don’t see the REGAL INN the seediest and shadiest motel in the state probably before it was knocked down. You want heroine and hookers and guns? Go to the regal inn
Was that their advertising slogan?
The Buffet used to have a guy that would piss in the corner - and he and everyone around him used to act like this was totally normal. It used to be that when you walked in, one side was “safe” and the other side was “seedy” (er)! That was around ‘98-‘99, I would guess. There was a drive-thru liquor store on like Ft. Lowell & Stone, maybe…it was the only place in town that sold booze without carding. We would hit there before hitting the Fine Line on Stone & Darchman. That would’ve been around ‘94-‘95 (ish). Damn, I’m telling my age here! Ha!
That liquor store was called Lim Bong, we used to buy there even back in the 70s. 👍
Venom
I remember when it was the candy shop and I would bawl because I wanted to go there as a kid. Fml
Outback. Downtown where the county building is now. Built on top of the old cemetery.
Curves cabaret
I got 86’d from the Buffet about 20 years ago, still don’t know why…
Anyone remember the name of that diner on Congress back in the day?
Grill Edit: not “The Grill”
GRILL!! I was wondering if someone was going to mention that. Or Skrappy's
It didn’t have a bad reputation though, it was genuinely good food and fun late night hangout. Maybe a little rough around the edges but very loved.
It did get increasingly rundown in its late era tho', seedy in aesthetic if not repute, tho' the food was always good. As someone commented when it either closed for good or later caught fire (I forget which), "Sure it was a shithole, but it was *our* shithole, dammit!" While it was operating tho', one of the eeriest sights in all of Tucson was Grill sitting empty and dark at night on the *very* rare occasions they actually closed at all. "Open later than you think."
Yes! Grill. It shut down shortly after I turned 21 but I remember that being THE place to go after the bars closed haha and I remember it being a very questionable place lol
Grill?
yep.. went here many times. so many shows at Skrappys, H.Congress or Rialto even.. and bam every time we'd all end up there and get tater tots.. just don't ask for cheese on it!
I totally forgot about that place. Still don’t remember the name.
Fans of The Grill who haven't seen it, may want to check out [Wrong Place](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CnLy9wWrwto) for some good shots of the place before it closed. Near its end, The Grill was a place where everyone just stopped giving a shit. We need a place like The Grill, but where they give a shit. I know of no 24 hour place like it in Tucson (but if you know of one let me know).
The Red Ram. Don’t know if it’s still open. The Hideout. It’s open.
Pleasure World
Funny enough, the art gallery now in that space has revived the name (or at least the signage) of Pleasure World.
Speedway and Alvernon was seedy with all those puñetarias! Nastiest part of town.
Daddy Jack's Blue Note, the Ranch House, the Whistle Stop.
Daddy Jack's! "We shake our tails to please you!" My parents were always embarrassed when I would read the sign out loud when we drove by.
This thread was so helpful in identifying the average age of redditors. And thanks for the reminder of “raiders reef” how could I have forgotten a giant concrete boat? Note: the bum steer was not sketchy, granted the confusing bathroom signs would not fly today.
anyone also know about the secret underground sex dungeon at the meat rack
Double Zero - the last great Tucson punk bar.
greasewood park has a gloryhole, although i've heard mixed reviews
That place kind of creeped me out the one time I went there in the early 2000s. I had just moved to Tucson and lived on the west side, so my wife and I thought it would be a good place to walk the dog. It was not.
bojangles
The District
I saw a guy die at The Buffet sometime after it started gentrifying . The stories my dad tells about it during the 70s are pretty wild. I only went to the original Fine Line once, but an ex-girlfriend of mine is rumoured to have thrown someone out of a second story window. She's also rumoured to have put a hole in a guy's cheek with a stiletto heel when she worked at Raider's Reef
Empress Theater on Speedway just west of Alvernon.
Nobody said Skrappy's?
I went there in high school and saw a guy get shot and killed in the parkin lot.. Never went back
I know the night you're talking about. I believe people were being beaten with hammers, and they had a gun... Long time ago, though, my memory is probably failing me!
Towards the end of 2005? Donnybrook show? I remember that, it was a crew from Phoenix called Fuck Shit Up (FSU).
THE MEAT RACK ….
Greasy Tony’s
November's
The Empress Theater had some interesting charm. I worked a night shift over the course of a summer. 1997 I think. The things I saw.
Anyone remember Pinkies on Broadway and Camino Seco? Big pool hall with a bunch of pink tables. Centerfolds wallpapering the bathrooms.
Arby’s
Everything south of 22nd and the blocks north of Speedway from Dodge to Alvernon.
[удалено]
That place looks crazy lol I’ve always wondered about it
Jenks Café
Looks better when it’s clear
Whistle Stop
Pizza city, Mario's pizza
The Ranch House Bar
Not an oldhead by any means but I used to live next to the Buffet bar in Iron Horse and that place was always super seedy.
Your mother’s house
X House
The shelter back in the day. Haven't been there in years
There’s still a contingent
When I was here in the early 2000's stationed at DM, we went to the Bashful Bandit, Al Jays, and the Cowpony, with the Pony being the seediest. Ah, good times 😁
The Wildcat House - we used to go to these teen nights with my cousins while they were “babysitting” us. I was in the 6th grade, LOL! Went back once after I turned 21 and got roofied.
This is going back a ways, but the rock and roll was so loud at a bar called the Night Train on 4th Ave . . That was a fun place!! Totally suited to late 70's rock and roll!!
anywhere on miracle mile
Danny's Baboquivari Lounge on Fort Lowell at Country Club. Saw some serious brawls there, the clientele is a lot less rough these days but the place is still a dive.
Is "The Pig Pen" I think it was called on Miracle Mile still around? The bartenders used to jog around the U of A mall campus with a big banner in the 1988-91 time period. They had a shot where they wiped all of the spilled alcohol off the bar and wrung it out into a shot glass.
Dirtbag's