AUSTIN, Texas (CelebrityAccess) Threadgill’s, which has two locations in Austin, Texas, is shutting down its younger facility in a few weeks because of increasing property taxes and insurance payments.
Owner Eddie Wilson says the property is costing him $42,000 a month for the restaurant/275-capacity (300 outdoors) music club. It is a 600 percent increase.
“Meatloaf and chicken fried steak doesn’t have that kind of margin,” Wilson told KXAN News. “I’m mostly concerned with helping my people find jobs and help get them through Thanksgiving.”
This version of Threadgill’s has “only” been around since 1997 but “Threadgill’s World Headquarters” is considered just as iconic as its older sibling, Threadgill’s North Store, which will remain open. World Headquarters sits next to the original location of Armadillo World Headquarters, owned by Wilson in the ’70s. The soon-to-be-closed venue houses much of Armadillo’s memorabilia.
“The jukebox holds 100 albums of artists who played the ‘Dillo and the piano hanging from the ceiling was played by artists as diverse as Count Basie and Commander Cody, Jerry Lee Lewis and Ray Charles, Leon Russell and Captain Beefheart,” Wilson says online.
The Threadgill-slash-Armadillo “family,” a collection of songwriters, has members like Stevie Ray Vaughan, Boz Scaggs and Janis Joplin. Wilson plans to sell off photos, posters and other items to help provide severance pay and health insurance for his employees as they face unemployment during the holiday season.
“We’ve had a lot of folks just, you know, call and say please [can we play a show],” Wilson told KXAN. “And that’s an unusual relationship in the booking world.”
