Columbia Closings   What’s not in Columbia anymore

Well, the once mighty Blockbuster chain continues to implode, and this store at The Crossings shopping center on the corner of Clemson and Hard Scrabble finally went under earlier this month.

I was surprised that it hung on as long as it did, especially after the closing of the adjacent Food Lion last year. Of course, I'm a little surprised now to see any Blockbuster still open -- It's kind of like going fishing and reeling-in a trilobite.

Commenter Joey points to this story about the store closing and if I recall correctly, commenter Andrew pinpointed the exact date in a comment I can no longer find.

(Hat tips to commenters Joey & Andrew)

UPDATE 18 October 2012 -- Commenter Andrew notes below that this storefront was wrapped in butcher paper and marked "Top Secret". Well, by the time I got by there, the secret was out: It's to be a gym:

I couldn't help but notice this biker friendly bar, the The Ramble Inn, on US-19 just South of Necklace Warbler Road in Hernando County Floridy recently as I drove past.

Obviously, the place had seen better times, and google reveals that it burned down on 15 August 2010 and that arson is suspected though it does not appear that anyone was ever arrested.

Originally, as I recall it, this was simply the Columbia Mall Theater, and opened about the same time as the mall itself. Compared to some of the other theaters in town, I don't have any really strong memories of the place. I know I saw what was pretty much the last 70s style Disney live-action movie there: The North Avenue Irregulars as well as one of Disney's periodic re-issues of The Jungle Book and the first run of The Rescuers Down Under. (Yeah, I like Disney). I also remember trying to go there for a James Bond flick, one of the later Moore ones, and finding it sold out, a pretty rare experience back then.

At some point after I moved out of town, the Mall started to decline, and the theaters actually went under (along with the nearby Capitol Centre Theater). After that, a company called Phoenix Theaters re-opened the theater, which was sort of their shtick "phoenix from the ashes"/"new theater from old". I can't find out a lot about them because every google search turns up theaters in Phoenix Arizona, but this might be their web site. If it is, they have downsized considerably. At any rate, I don't think the Phoenix incarnation lasted too long here in Columbia. I recall seeing one movie under that regime (they had the latest showtimes) and not being too impressed with the theater (or the movie as I can't now recall what it was).

After that, I think the theaters closed again, and remodeled along stadium lines, which was the latest gimmick several years ago (and is an improvement, I have to admit). I'm struggling to think of any movie I saw there after the conversion, and I don't think there is one -- by that time, I had switched mostly to Richland Mall and Forest Drive as my default theaters.

I've lost the hat tip for the commenter who pointed out this closure, and when they said it happened, but if you look closely, you can see a poster for The Darkest Hour a movie which opens on Christmas Day 2011, so it was very recent, and we can assume somewhat unexpected if they thought they would be showing that one.

UPDATE 3 July 2012 -- As the pictures below show, the place is now open again as Columbia Place Stadium Cinemas.

Getting ready to re-open (28 May 2012):

Open again (29 June 2012):

I wasn't sure when I took these pix that Locals on Harden Street next to Sharky's was actually closed, but driving by this evening (15 December) confirmed that the place is dark, and that the windows are now covered over.

I am way older than the college bar demo, and really never hit them when I was in it anyway, so I never went to Locals. It does look like the rooftop area would be a nice place to hang out and people watch over Five Points..

The web site is still up, though the latest photos seem to be from September 2010.

College Bar Scene says

Deserves a bigger crowd than it gets.

which may be some indication of what happened.

(Hat tip to commenter Jordan)

UPDATE 3 March 2012 -- Now open again as Pinch. Some of the flatbread pizzas on the menu look pretty good:

OK, you know the drill by now if you've followed my State Fair posts from previous years: I like what I like, and I like to take pictures of it, so there's nothing new or astounding here, just old friends like the Buxom Beer Girl, The Cotton Candy Stands and the ducklings, but I enjoyed being out and about amongst the neon and greasy delights as usual. I took the tripod, but really couldn't get into setting it up to try for HDRs this year, so I just got one, which is not as good as those from last year (2010). I did take a few videos this year, in particular the one above (which has some issues with light spikes, but is quite watchable) and one below the jump.

Meet your party at the (Time Warner) rocket!

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The House of Blues at (The bankrupt) Barefoot Landing in Myrtle Beach seems to make a policy of booking major "legacy" acts into its rather intimate space. In the past, I've seen Boz Scaggs, Cyndi Lauper, The Beach Boys (Carl Wilson was visibly failing), and Blondie there.

The only problem I have with the place is that while they have a reserved seating area, the tickets don't seem to be available on the standard web site, and standing up for two hours gets old pretty quick for me nowdays.

Steve Miller has, of course, been around forever, but scored his greatest success in the mid 70s with the "Fly Like an Eagle" and "Book of Dreams" albums. Supposedly he has never allowed a recognizable picture of himself on an album cover, and at the peak of his fame, could ride his bike around venue parking lots without being recognized. He has never had what you could call a "great" voice -- it's a very servicable reedy tenor, and the fact that it's never been perfect means that it hasn't dropped off much either: he was in good vocal form for Saturday's show. The Steve Miller Band is now apparently a six-man outfit. Two guitars, a bass, drums, keyboards and a (very flamboyant) second vocalist.

As you'll recall, when I saw The Doobie Brothers in North Charleston, and Al Stewart in Newberry, I was surprised at how lax the venues were about cameras. In the past it almost seemed like places would break your kneecaps before letting you in with a camera, but apprently, as in school, the Battle of the Cell Phone has been lost, and other cameras reap the benefit. Since I regretted not taking the closing-cam to those shows, I checked on the HOB ticketing site, and non-removable-lens cameras are allowed, so in it came.

The curtain opening number was "Jet Airliner" (with the synth prologue [mostly missed here] playing before the curtain dropped), and Miller went on to play pretty much all of his hits and well known songs: "Jet Airliner", "Abracadabera", "Wild Mountain Honey", "Serenade To The Stars", "Swingtown", "Dance Dance Dance", "Take The Money & Run", "Jungle Love", "Space Cowboy" (dedicated to William Shatner), "Livin' In The USA", "The Stake", "The Joker" (acoustic), and "Rockin' Me". He also played a few blues numbers (it was originally "The Steve Miller Blues Band") that really let the second vocalist shine.

In short, it was an excellent show, and if you get the opportunity to catch him, do.

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Chateau Gentlemens Club was the follow-on operation for the building which formerly housed Touch of India, and you can still see the Indian motifs in the arches along the rooftop (though I suppose in this context you could see them as something else as well).

Garner Lane is the I-20 frontage road which you can only reach by taking the I-20 Eastbound on-ramp at Broad River Road. It's a somewhat difficult place to get in and out of, and somewhat difficult to figure out how to do that as well. I don't know if that had anything to do with this club lasting for a rather short period: It's only listed in this year's phonebook (Feb 2011), so I'm guessing less than a year.

It's listed in the phonebook as Chateau De Lamour, a name I'm pretty sure was on the I-20 visible sign at one point as well. I'm guessing that was too ambiguous to draw traffic.

The name of this little plaza has changed as well. Last year, it was Volaty Plaza, now it is S&B Plaza.

UPDATE 11 November 2011: Located the two pictures I took while the club was in operation, and added them as the first two above.

UPDATE 30 July 2012: Commenter badger suggests this was Julie's and then Chicago Smokehouse. I think he's right so I'll add those to the post title. I ate at this Julie's once long ago, but don't remember anything about it other than it did not give me food posioning like the one on Garner's Ferry.

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Maybe there is no such thing as a recession-proof business...

On the other hand, this WPDE story speculates that perhaps Wal-Mart put some pressure on this Garden City strip club to close as they opened a new SuperCenter across the street. Certainly, the coming of Wal-Mart seems to be what closed the nearby Krispy Kreme (though the building is still standing so far).

I believe The Pink Pony building started life as a steakhouse, though the WPDE piece says the club had been there for a dozen years.

UPDATE 4 May 2011: Added Western Steer to the post title based on the comments.

The Swimming Pool Qs played the Rockafellas Reunion at The Tin Roof on Senate Street last Saturday. I saw them first at Bell Camp and then at Rockafellas back in the day, and a number of times since then. (Most recently at Doc's Gumbo Grille, just a block or so from the Tin Roof).

I'm afraid I did not stick around for any of the other bands' sets though I'm sure they were great.

The Qs played a fairly short set Saturday (somehow I missed the fact that they were at Wet Willie's on Friday), hitting both The Deep End and the A&M era, but not 2003's Royal Academy of Reality.

The sound was pretty good for an outside venue. The rain had stopped about an hour before, and the sun finally started to come out about the time the Qs took the stage. I have to admit the crowd was pretty sparse, but both the audience and the band seemed to be having a good time.