Mike Ligon might be the best friend a singer-songwriter could have in Colorado.
Not only is Ligon a super- fan of songwriter culture, he’s also in the business of getting songwriters’ music heard. By lots of like-minded people.
Ligon became something of an independent promoter via the creation of HomeVibe Presents in 2006, six years after he started hosting concerts for his favorite artists at his house. But after outgrowing his loft and moving the shows over to his building’s clubhouse — and quickly outgrowing that space — Ligon took the concerts (and their homelike vibes) to area rock clubs in 2007.
Thus the simply named HomeVibe was born.
“I drive past the old clubhouse every day,” said Ligon, “and I think about those magic nights, those kegs of beer and cases of wine and Gregory Alan Isakov playing to about 100 people — and not knowing where it was going to go, but relishing it happening.”
That particular night was HomeVibe’s first-anniversary concert, in May 2007. Ligon is now working out the details for HomeVibe’s fifth-anniversary bash, which will take over the Soiled Dove Underground on June 9 with Interscope Records artist Matt Morris, Denver funksters Bop Skizzum and others.
Ligon has indeed come a long way, but so has Denver’s music scene. And it’s fair to say that one wouldn’t be the same without the other.
Ligon graduated from the house-show scene and brought his shows to bigger, more professional spaces after that first- anniversary concert with Isakov. But Ligon didn’t feel right taking the home all the way out of the concert. And so he started modestly in a place that was anything but homelike.
The first HomeVibe show in a public space featured Isakov and Nathaniel Rateliff at East Colfax Avenue dive institution the Lion’s Lair.
“With a little resistance and a lot of scented candles, we made (the Lair) look good,” Ligon recalled. “If you were to go that night and then go back the next night, you’d think it was a different place. We brought in folding chairs and high-top cocktail tables in the back. It was a different place that one night, and it was great.”
Ligon’s repertoire involves more than seating and scented candles. He’s been known to bring in carloads of vintage lamps, wooden end tables and well-worn rocking chairs. Twinkle lights? Absolutely. The old Persian rug from Ligon’s days in Massachusetts 10 years ago? That, too.
Ask anybody who has been to a HomeVibe Presents show at the Walnut Room, Ligon’s unofficial home since late 2007, and they’ll tell you that it’s more like a living room than a rock concert.
“In the early days, people would see me bringing in all this stuff and they’d ask me if I was moving in,” Ligon saids. “And I told them, ‘Nope, just throwing a rock show.’ “
Ligon also prides himself on communicative preshow correspondence with the musicians and being there to greet the artists when they first walk in the door.
“It’s amazing because it seems so basic, but so many promoters and club owners don’t do that,” Ligon said. “And people are turned off by that. We try and make the experience special.”
Building the brand
But while he’s focused in the past few years on growing his brand — he successfully brought it to Red Rocks, where he co-presented the Journey of Hope Benefit Concert in 2009 with “Three Cups of Tea” author Greg Mortenson — Ligon is now working on maintaining the name’s quality and identity.
He’s at the Walnut Room a few times a month, including Wednesday’s show with Jay Nash, Joey Ryan and Josh Queen. But he’s also developing the Paris Wine Bar as a new venue, and that’s where HomeVibe is presenting Hotels and Highways, Syd and Chris Webb tonight.
“With Paris, they’d love to build an identity for music,” Ligon said. “We’ve had some really successful shows there. It’s a great place to bring them in with no pressure because it feels great, almost full, with 40 people in there. They can come in there and build a following and not worry about filling a 200-seat room.”
And when they can fill a 200-seat room?
“Then we’ll put them at the Walnut Room,” Ligon said.
But with larger shows come more responsibilities. Which raises the question: Does Ligon miss his house-show days?
“I miss the simplicity of them,” he said. “I miss calling my close friends, having them come over, and that’s a show. . . . It used to be, ‘Hey, this Friday I’m having a guy over here, and you guys should come.’ It was a keg of beer and folding chairs, and you were done.”
HomeVibe happenings
Here are three HomeVibe concerts in the coming month — and don’t forget about its fifth-anniversary party at the Soiled Dove Underground on June 9 with Matt Morris, Bop Skizzum and others.
Tonight: Hotels and Highways, Syd, Chris Webb. 7:30 p.m., $5, Paris Wine Bar, 1553 Platte St.
Wednesday: Jay Nash, Joey Ryan, Josh Queen. 8 p.m., $10-$12, Walnut Room, 3131 Walnut St.
April 2: Or, the Whale, Chamberlin, others. 8 p.m., $10-$12, Walnut Room
