Texas Pelican Club
Status: Closed
Parish: Calcasieu
Location: Vinton/East Orange
From http://www.texasfreeway.com: “On past Cemetery Road, as years passed, were built the Pelican ClubÉ” Johnny Allan played there several times from 1985-1987.
Status: Closed
Parish: Calcasieu
Location: Vinton/East Orange
From http://www.texasfreeway.com: “On past Cemetery Road, as years passed, were built the Pelican ClubÉ” Johnny Allan played there several times from 1985-1987.
Tim Granger
Was the place to go for teenagers back in the 60’s and 70’s. Located on the Texas and Louisiana in Vinton LA. You could get in the club at age 14 and could buy mix drinks and beer at age 16. Drinking age was 18 in Texas so we Texans would drive to The Texas Pelican Club. They had live bands and a rotating stage. One band would play for an hour then the stage would rotate with another band set up. They would also play for an hour then rotate back to the previous band. Wonderful place to go back in the 1960’s and 70’s. Saw Fats Domino several times there.
David Allen
Yep – I used to go when I was 14. The drinking age was “Son, you got money to pay for that?”. I had forgotten about the rotating stage but I sure remember the neon sign.
Koko McHugh
Is it still open many years ago my place to have good tim
Batman
Damn …. I remember that place. Used to play foosball there. We would cross that bridge and hang. I think blue lake down TBE Street further into swamp. First hear swamp music in east texas. West Louisiana and east Texas rich in great !isic.
Bob Levoy
i dj’d there in late 80s
Pat Ryan
does anyone remember the bands besides Gee Gee Shin, who played there back in the 60’s?
jimmy guidry
Does anyone remember who the headliner was that opened the pelican?
Joe
Right city, wrong club.
The rotating stage was at the Circle club across the street from the Texas Pelican.
Hoot Glibson
I played at the Texas Pelican Club in late May or early June of 1972. I can assure you that they had a rotating stage because the band I was in came onfrom stage left as the table turned clockwise, sending the previous act off stage right. We only played one set. If I recall, that night (a Saturday) featured several bands. When our set was done we had to hustle to strike our equipment so that the next act could set up. The big central ACs were pumping in the chill air, so it was blissfully cool on a very hot night. The place was packed, but the crowd was just getting warmed up.
Our band, which had made a fateful (and wrong-headed, IMO) shift to a predominately Top 40 playlist (farewell, Allman Brothers, Edgar Winter’s White Trash, and hello Bread, Climax – anyone recall “Precious and Few”, and Jackson Browne’s “Doctor My Eyes” – a pretty good tune, actually, etc.,) was not what the locals wanted. They wanted swamp boogie, rock’n’roll hoochie-coo, and hard-driving guitar-driven rock. We were damned with “faint praise” and tepid applause.
We never got another gig there, and were put out of our misery when the entire rhythm section took off to greener pastures. Actually it was for snow-strewn rocks and ice because they shuffled off to Alaska.
But I still remember that magnificent neon-accented sign with the giant pelican in cowboy gear.
Steve
Texas Pelican Club did have a rotating stage!
Steve D Dugas
what was the size of the stage?
freddy mclain
I played there on Friday nights on that rotating stage. We always played the first set, and when we came out for the third set there was ALWAYS a fight going on….two men, man and a woman, two women, whatever, but it was always there. They like to crawl out of the swamp on Friday night, drink a lot of beer, and kick someone’s ass. That was their idea of a fun Friday night. I suspect it hasn’t changed there.