The Regional Connector light rail line, which will run through Downtown and connect the Gold, Blue, and Expo Lines, is unfortunately going to take out a few structures on the way. One of those doomed buildings is the home of Señor Fish in Little Tokyo, which once housed not one but two legendary artist hangouts in its day. Metro tried to offload the unreinforced brick structure for $1 in 2012, but there was no interest (a buyer would've had to move the building, obviously). And now, reports KPCC, the demo's underway. What was so great about this taco place that everyone's so sad to see it go?
Before dishing out fish tacos, the Señor Fish building housed punk haven the Atomic Cafe and, later, the "Chicano cultural incubator" Troy Cafe. On a random night at the Atomic, "you could see the likes of Blondie, The Go-Go's, Devo, X, Warhol, David Byrne, Bowie sitting down having a bowl of noodles in the company of old Japanese men with full body tattoos," cafe overseer Nancy Sekizawa recalled. The Troy, opened by musician Beck's mom, Bibbe Hansen, and ACSO collective artist Sean Carillo, was a magnet for groups active in East LA's exploding musical scene, including Cholita and Quetzal.
In February of last year, Sekizawa threw a huge going-away party in the old building, which she DJed, naturally. As evidenced by the video below, the building is officially no more. Metro says it's "well aware" of the building's important place in LA's cultural history and plans to save as many as 1,000 bricks from the razed building to be used for the new Regional Connector station.
· Atomic Cafe: Little Tokyo music landmark falls to wrecking ball [KPCC]
· Goodbye To Little Tokyo's Legendary Punk/Chicano Hangout [Curbed LA]
· Metro Selling Little Tokyo's Former Punk Hangout For a Buck [Curbed LA]
Loading comments...