This article is about the early 1980s Austin, Texas punk venue Club Foot, which should not be confused with the San Francisco punk venue of the same name and time period.

Club Foot was a large live-music venue in Austin, Texas

Austin, Texas

Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of :Texas and the seat of Travis County. Located in Central Texas on the eastern edge of the American Southwest, it is the fourth-largest city in Texas and the 14th most populous city in the United States. It was the third-fastest-growing large city in...

, in the early 1980s. Located downtown at the corner of 4th and Brazos Streets, it had a reputation as a punk rock venue for its support of local and touring punk bands, but it also booked a wide variety of other types of music.

Location

Club Foot was located in the former 404 Club, a two story warehouse that was partially underground, one block from 4th and Congress Avenue, behind the old Greyhound Bus Station. The club featured a large picture window overlooking the bus staging area, and a bar made from a Lincoln Continental that was cut in half. Today, the Frost Bank building exists on the site of both buildings.

History

Club Foot was originally Rush's, a gay discothèque, conceived and built by David Ladd an entrepreneur and business man that had built and operated several other clubs in other cities before designing, building and operating Rush's. The club was the largest gay bar in Texas. It opened March 17, 1979. The club was a huge success that caused other club operators to play dirty tricks in an effort to damage the club and close it down. The club evolved into a live venue club as the disco era came to an end.

Club Foot published a calendar called "Footprints" that included detailed descriptions of upcoming concerts under the slogan "all the news that’s foot to print." In 1983, Club Foot was the site of the first Austin Chronicle

Austin Chronicle

The Austin Chronicle is an alternative weekly, tabloid-style newspaper published every Thursday in Austin, Texas, United States. The paper is distributed through free news-stands, often at local eateries or coffee houses frequented by its targeted demographic...

 Readers Poll Music Awards, an annual show that has become the kickoff event for the South by Southwest

South by Southwest

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 Music Conference (SXSW) each year.

Notable acts

The headliner for the opening night at Club Foot was The Stranglers

The Stranglers

The Stranglers are an English punk/rock music group.Scoring some 23 UK top 40 singles and 17 UK top 40 albums to date in a career spanning five decades, the Stranglers are the longest-surviving and most "continuously successful" band to have originated in the UK punk scene of the mid to late 1970s...

. Among those playing there during the approximately three years it was open were U2

U2

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, Willie Nelson

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, B. B. King

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and Eric Johnson.