With the resurgence of old-school video games cropping up in bars and the Hollywood reboots of your favorite childhood movies and TV shows, it was only a matter of time before the retro-cultural trend focused on a ’00s music club night revival. For Morgan Freed, T.J. Petracca, and Barbara Szabo, the team known as Emo Night LA and the creators of the monthly Taking Back Tuesday night at the Echoplex, this spike of cultural nostalgia has helped their emo-championing party become so huge they’re able to court big name DJs.
For those of you not in the know, Taking Back Tuesday (an homage to Taking Back Sunday) is one of Silver Lake’s newest club nights where adults can unleash their high school angst by screaming out lyrics by the likes of Senses Fail, AFI, and Jimmy Eat World while chugging beer and Soco Amaretto Lime. In the three monthssince its launch, Taking Back Tuesday regularly draws hundreds of people lining up around the block to get in.
Szabo says she tested out the idea of an emo night initially in San Francisco, kicking one off titled “Tell All Your Friends” in the fall of 2012 at Milk Bar in the Haight. “While everyone was excited for it the first night, it kind of died out the second night,” she says. “It just wasn’t the right time.”
Shortly after, Szabo moved down to Los Angeles, and fast-forward to August 2014 when she and Petracca wound up singing “Hands Down” by Dashboard Confessional at a karaoke bar in Palm Springs, sparking the idea to bring this emo thing back to life in Los Angeles. From there they coordinated with Freed, who had connections at a local mainstay, The Short Stop, where they launched Taking Back Tuesday in LA. Their first night in December 2014, the lines were already around the block. Pretty good for a concept ignited by the idea of getting “all of our friends to a bar to have a few drinks and sing along to Saves the Day and Brand New,” as Petracca puts it.
That line got bigger as months passed. The second Taking Back Tuesday had the trio passing out pizzas to appease people who had waited hours for entry. The promoters finally realized that while the intimacy of The Short Stop was something special, the party needed to expand. On the third outing they packed the Echoplex, which offered three times the capacity of The Short Stop.
Taking Back Tuesday has hosted guest DJs from the start. The first night featured Kamtin Mohager of The Chain Gang of 1974. The second night it was Buddy Nielsen of Senses Fail. And last month featured Mark Hoppus from Blink 182 in his DJ debut. Afterwards, Hoppus posted on his Instagram account that DJing was “super fun” and that he wants to “do more rad stuff like that.”
So why is emo such a thing right now? Nielsen guesses it has something to do with the kids who were raised on the genre. “Most of the people who were listening to that music are now in their mid-20s and have some money and like going out for a drink,” he says.
“There are all these 10-year anniversary tours happening right now,” added Petracca. “We were like 15 or 16 and we really fell in love with music. Ten years later we’re all working within the music industry. Barbara and I do social media and digital strategy for bands. Morgan directs music videos. These are the bands that made me want to get involved in music.” And of course some of these bands, like Taking Back Sunday and the Used, are still making great music.
Another factor helping the hype around emo nights: The stigma the genre carried as being a wimpier, whinier younger brother to punk when it was first emerging has faded. “People are now, like, ‘emo was fucking cool. We had a good time listening to it,’” says Freed. “Everybody grew up and can appreciate the music more instead of being embarrassed to go into your car and pull out your Get Up Kids album really quick. Now people are like, ‘Fuck, yeah, remember that?’ I think we just did [Taking Back Tuesday] at the right time where everyone can remember how much fun it was instead of being embarrassed about it.”
Attendee Taylor Thompson can attest to that feeling: “I wasn't a super ‘emo,’” Thompson says. “I loved the music's ability to break my heart and kick it back together rolled up in the glue and broken glass. It’s great to have a place to do that with other people. The only other place I sang like that was in my car, by myself on the way to class.”
Right now the juggernaut known as Taking Back Tuesday doesn’t show any signs of slowing down. In spite of ridiculously long lines, people are flocking here to sing at the top of their lungs, bond with like-minded strangers over heart-ripping lyrics, and party with the noteworthy guest DJs who grace the turntables. The trio who wanted to start a nostalgia-celebrating club night for some friends are doing just that, with thousands of them.
The next Taking Back Tuesday will be March 3 at 9 p.m. at the Echoplex, and according to the trio, there will be a special guest DJ who will “blow everyone’s minds.”