MURAL BY ERIKANAWABI,PHOTO BYDANIELCOSTON. COMPOSITE FROM PHOTOS BYMEGANO’CONNELL
It’s Friday night, and the crowd at the Cradle
is in a good mood. Hooverville, a Triangle
bluegrass/alt country band, is on stage singing
deliciously achy tunes about murder, whiskey
and ghosts, the vocalists sometimes leaning in
to harmonize around a single microphone in
classic country style. They grin, and the people in
front of the stage whoop and holler back. Singer
John Bemis ’ 95 introduces the band and gestures to
the fiddler sitting in.
“And this is our good friend Jason Cade [’ 97]
from New York City.”
“New York City?” the crowd yells back. Every-
body laughs.
Since 1969 — with a few gaps and in various
locations around Chapel Hill and Carrboro — Cat’s
Cradle has nurtured local bands and introduced local
audiences to national and international acts they might
not otherwise have heard live. Perennially lauded as the
best music club in the area, the Cradle helped put
Chapel Hill on several recent Rolling Stone lists of the
top 10 “Campus Scenes that Rock.” Its healthy 600-
plus capacity, its intimate, lovably seedy atmosphere and
its reputation for fair dealing make it popular among
artists accustomed to playing to much larger audiences.
“If you’re buzz-worthy,” The Washington Post wrote
a couple years ago,“you’ve probably played here —
or you will.”
