Bay Area Open Mic Calendar - Blog

Among the many events on the bay area open mic calendar, we have had an after-hours one in a copy shop (Jungle Copy, now defunct, sadly), a music store (Epiphany in Marin, also gone) and a random street corner (16th & Mission, still going!) but as much sense as it SHOULD make, we have only ONE radio open mic and that one fairly recently started up: the Common Threads show on Pirate Cat Radio, 87.9FM in the city.

I hopped on BART last Friday and went to check it out . . .

I really wasn’t sure what to expect, but it turns out that Pirate Cat Radio Cafe is a friendly little cafe nestled in the vibrant Mission District. About 2/3 of the cafe’s space is given over to a pirate radio station; cafe patrons can watch the broadcast goings-on through sound-proof glass while sipping their cappuccinos. The cafe has organic cookies, muffins and other snacks for sale and, based on the smell, some pretty good coffee. Not being java-inclined, I was really happy to see they had some truly respectable burly black tea available (albeit not loose tea), served in swimming-pool-sized tea cups. I had brought the munchkin along and her good behavior was due not in a small part to a huge chocolate-chip oatmeal cookie that almost eclipsed her face ($2).

The open mic event is the brainchild of Diamond Dave Whitaker, a genuine San Francisco legend. For the purposes of his open mic, the event looks pretty much like any other open mic you’ve seen - there are a couple of SM-57s set up in the window facing the cafe patrons. Most of the performers do their thing here and you wouldn’t know it was a radio show except when some of the spoken word participants are ushered behind the glass to read into a mic in the studio proper.
Dave may be the MC, but Pam (pictured, right) is the coordinator of the show and it is she who holds the almighty list. She starts taking sign-ups around 3:30pm and helps Dave coordinate whether performers will be out front in the cafe or performing in the studio. She tells me that the number of participants vary, but that last week they had 19 performers! Pretty good for a two-hour show. Each performer gets one chance on the mic and the level of talent is damn well respectable, from what I saw. This IS a radio show, albeit a pirate radio show, so during set up times and in between Dave’s monologues there are Public Service announcements in varying degrees of seriousness. Within an hour or so, you can download the show from Pirate Cat Radio’s website.

Nestled in one of the cafe’s cosy little couches and watching the parade of performers take the mic, I really envied the denizens of San Francisco’s mission district.

Common Threads is the name of the show, broadcast on 87.9FM, Pirate Cat Radio in San Francisco at 2781 21st Street from 4 to 6pm every Friday. Diamond Dave is your host, sign-ups happen in person at 3:30pm, ask for Pam.