Post #266210 by Basement Kahuna on Sun, Nov 12, 2006 6:06 PM

Personally, (and here goes an earful of BK, love me or hate me)I think it should be a prerequisite for even bothering to be here. I was into tiki as far back as 1991 and saw it as a cool old throwback to much cooler times but the B.O.T. was the first concise piece that brought it all full circle for me. Then I bought every back issue of Tiki News I could round up. That made me seek out other nuts who were building home tiki bars and collecting any tidbits from old sources they could find and I found TC. There's a huge sense right now going around a behind a lot of the green doors that the clowns have taken over the circus, and it's just not as intimate or fun as it used to be, because half of the people don't even have a clue where all of this came from, and really could care less. It's a great party, but with any great party soon there are a lot of crashers. The history, culture, and background run deep and fascinating. A lot of the great old places are still closing. A lot of adulterated, mish-mash corporate crap is calling itself tiki, and people are smiling and nodding, because they don't have a clue what tiki was or is; only what they piece together from who-knows-what. We're still losing the pure old tiki style at an alarming rate, and the byproducts are bona-fide crapola. Trader Vic's Chicago gone?? We need an old style tiki tent revival around this joint. Period. Either that or a class field trip.