Blues club will open downtown

Someday, Carson City music fans will come downtown and enjoy Cajun/Creole food while listening to a blues band on stage. They can check their e-mail while sipping a cocktail, then later wander out to a gated courtyard and sit under the stars.

At home, this blues fan can log onto an Internet-streaming station and listen to songs produced and recorded at the Sweetwater Building on North Carson Street.

It sounds like a dream, and it is to Floyd Sneed, Sharon and Don Slater and Bobby Joe Holman. But when Daddy Dicks Blues opens for business by Nevada Day, it will be their reality.

Daddy Dicks Blues, 303 N. Carson St., is the newest business to join the downtown redevelopment.

For about three years, the four friends have wanted to open a blues experience downtown. The Slaters sold the former Daddy Dicks Blues at the Carson Mall in April.

Sharon Slater, who will also be the club's cook, said Monday that the 1,200-square-foot mall space was too small for their aspirations.

"We want to be recognized worldwide as a real blues club," she said while sitting in a coffee shop a block down from the future site of the venue. "From our music to the artwork to the food, it will all reflect the blues world."

They are leasing the 2,600-square-foot bottom floor and courtyard of the 1929 brick building on the corner of Proctor and Carson streets from Sperry Van Ness Gold Dust Commercial Associates. The building was renovated in 2003 to include new plumbing. The owners hope to start their site work in September. The contractor will be Shaheen Beauchamp Builders.

Slater, 52, rattled off the business plan from memory. She's been in the food-and-beverage industry for 38 years. She said they hope to turn a profit the first year.

"We want to create a company that we'll franchise out, and that will be all over the western United States," she said. "We also want to give Carson City absolutely the best blues club."

Joe McCarthy, Carson City economic development and redevelopment manager, said the city paid for the club's preliminary designs, which amounted to a few hundred dollars.

"It will be a tremendous addition to downtown," he said. "This is another step in creating things to do in downtown Carson City after 5 p.m."

The partners are looking for shareholders to invest in the business. Slater said they will invest $200,000 to start.

"Downtown is the place to be," she said. "It's like playing with the big kids. And downtown is so beautiful."

The owners plan to operate an 80-track digital recording studio and produce and package recordings by local talent through BMI. The club will have its own label, Web site, monthly TV show and Internet-streaming station.

It will also have its own band, called Old Dog New Trix, which will feature Sneed, the original drummer for Three Dog Night; and Holman on guitar and harmonica.

One thing Slater isn't talking about: who will play the club's opening night. She just smiled slyly. That's their only secret.

n Contact reporter Becky Bosshart at bbosshart@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1212.