Mayor of the Tijuana Strip - Socio Crespo
http://www.lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=3476&IssueNum=1...
Club impresario Socio Crespo fostered his own ?60s rock revolution
By FERNANDO ROMERO
TIJUANA ? At one time, American servicemen flooded this city across the border from San Diego every day for spirits, strippers, and serious
debauchery. By 1966, flower power was taking hold. It was live music ? rock, blues, Beatles fare ? bringing young Americans. The bands, most members
sporting Beatles-length hair, were vibrant and loud.
And at the center of it all was Mike?s Bar, the place that would become a legend among Mexican musicians and American youths, their Mecca, their
Whisky A Go Go. Four bands played there 18/7. And when Mike?s Bar opened another Mike?s in the same block on Avenida Revoluci?n, there were eight
bands, doubling the audience as well as the fun.
Carlos Santana, Vanilla Fudge, and Jim Morrison all came to see what the fuss was about. In 1969, Morrison trekked from Los Angeles to Tijuana and
immediately hired one of the biggest, baddest thugs around ? a Baja Secret Service agent named Tecore ? to serve as his bodyguard. The Doors legend
kept a fat bankroll in one hand and a glass of Jim Beam in the other while the imposing Tecore kept onlookers ? including women who gathered by the
dozens ? at bay. The TJs, the Tijuana Five, the Finks, and the Dug Dugs dazzled the American visitors. Singer Ginny Silva, who had an incredibly
adaptable voice ? she could imitate Diana Ross, Aretha Franklin, and Martha Reeves with ease ? was the biggest star of the new Mike?s.
Sitting in front of the bar, his favorite place, Mike?s manager Ra?l ?Socio? Crespo Villardel, a Cuban expatriate, would take it all in. It was
Socio?s vision that made Tijuana what some called the ?Liverpool of Mexico.? He nurtured good musicians ? instinctively handpicking them, forming them
into bands, and paying them well to play in his clubs. They returned the favor by keeping the young American tourists and Mexican visitors coming
back.
?Socio? Crespo, the acknowledged leader of the rock revolution that swept Mexico in the 1960s, died of natural causes at his Tijuana home on March 8.
He was 85. His death left an entire generation of musicians ? many of whom now live in the United States ? grieving. The original Mike?s burned down
in 1968, but the newer venue survives today as a disco catering to American college kids.
?Socio was a very sophisticated man and very worldly,? says Jaime Valle, a successful jazz guitarist and recording artist out of San Diego, who played
lead guitar for the Downbeats, a band that played at Mike?s in the 1960s. ?I believe he had a sixth sense regarding showbiz. He traveled regularly to
Los Angeles and San Francisco to keep himself on the vanguard of what was happening.?
Socio also listened intently to the variety of music styles in vogue at the time, to create a balance in his clubs, says Valle.
?Between 1965 and 1969, most Tijuana groups had the ?Liverpool Sound,?? he says. However, ?the Downbeats played exclusively rhythm and blues, the
music of James Brown, Bobby ?Blue? Bland, the Righteous Brothers, Sam and Dave, et cetera. We were the black sheep of Avenida Revoluci?n. However,
Socio always gave us his unconditional support. He had vision.?
Born in Havana in 1920, Socio Crespo joined a group of tumbling performers at a young age and visited the United States in the 1940s before settling
in Mexico City in the ?50s and later in Tijuana. He was married to Elvia del Valle, who became his inseparable partner ? she ran the coat check and
cigarette stand at new Mike?s for years ? before separating in the ?80s.
Socio presided over an amazing period in Tijuana, one that virtually ended the city?s salacious era while igniting the country?s musical explosion.
Promoters from Mexico City flocked to Mike?s and other venues to sign groups for appearances and record deals.
The streets of Avenida Revoluci?n were like Mardi Gras during the weekends. Inside the clubs, bands tried to duplicate faithfully Jimi Hendrix?s manic
?Purple Haze? or driving ?Fire? or the soulful renditions of Sam and Dave?s ?Hold On, I?m Coming? or Stevie Wonder?s ?I Was Born to Love Her.? The
music floated from club to club along Revoluci?n, becoming a luring cacophony. Young American women strutted in miniskirts and Marge Simpson hairdos,
cabbies sold uppers (Benzedrine), and the promise of good times was ever present.
The two Mike?s bars were beacons in this tempest, offering the best music, the best booths and tables, the best drinks, and even the best bathrooms.
(The overwhelming Pine-Sol smell told you they were clean.) It was Socio?s way of making sure his clientele would return.
Every night, he would survey the place, pondering how to improve his clubs and their offerings. And musicians from all over Mexico would come to
Tijuana almost every week, looking to join Mike?s rotation of groups. When the Walkers, a band from the state of Sonora, was accepted into that
rotation, keyboardist Rudy Cabanillas thought they had reached the pinnacle.
Cabanillas, 59, today owns a marble and tile setting business and lives in Chula Vista, California. ?Back home we would hear Tijuana was the place to
be for a musician,? he says, ?but we would also hear there was a lot of competition among bands, and that if you made it all the way up to Mike?s ?
well, you made it.?
Felipe Maldonado, a keyboardist who moved from Mexico City to Tijuana in the ?60s seeking his big break, says, ?Many of us musicians are very grateful
he gave us the opportunity to play in the most renowned club in Tijuana at the time ? but mainly that Socio gave us his friendship.?
Maldonado, who would front one of the best rock groups of the era in Mexico ? Peace and Love ? says the band had a very successful run at Tijuana?s
Aloha Club at the end of 1968. Sure enough, Socio asked Maldonado to bring the group to the new Mike?s, where he would give it the best nightly slot
and a better salary. Maldonado, however, took Peace and Love to Mexico City, hoping for better exposure.
?Socio showed me his extraordinary smile and wished us all the luck and said that if we made it big and returned to Tijuana, to come and see him
first,? Madonado says.
Socio was that way, say those musicians who worked for him. ?He always treated the musicians like friends,? says Jos? Molina Serrano, another
successful jazz guitarist who played at Mike?s.
But Socio did not neglect to keep them in check when the need arose.
?He had this switch underneath the bar which would turn on a light on stage,? says keyboard player Cabanillas. ?If any of the groups started horsing
around during their set, and more than five minutes went by without music, Socio would turn on that light to remind us to get back to business. When
you played at Mike?s, you behaved professionally,? he says.
Guitarist Valle puts Socio Crespo in a historic perspective: ?Socio was an innovator who knew his business perfectly. His death marks the end of an
era regarding Tijuana?s nightlife. I will miss him.?
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Fernando Romero is a San Diego-based journalist and former Los Angeles Times staffer who grew up in Tijuana and played drums at Mike?s as a young
man.
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