Live Rock for All Ages

Fighting the biting cold, a group is prematurely gathered outside a nondescript storefront. Some carry cameras. Some stand beside amplifiers. Some just talk. But all wait to get through the blacked-out doors.

The scene is a common one outside of Swayze's. Tonight the music venue has a full bill. Six bands in all. Not all will play for long, but they all get a chance to grace the stage.

And that's why the Swayze's Venue is here to begin with. Nine years ago Lee Satterfield and his friends were tired of looking for places for their bands to play and practice. Almost out of necessity, a new music venue was born.

“I was in a band and doing a lot of shows at VFWs and American Legions, places like that,” Satterfield said, as opening acts tuned guitars and tested the acoustics behind him. “You could only book places toward the south side of Atlanta and in hick suburbs. It got to a point where I knew so many touring bands that it became a hassle to book places.”

Satterfield, who began promoting and booking bands when he was 14, says Swayze's basically became bigger than it should have been. After finding a place that was large enough, and inexpensive, to fit their own needs, the demand by both local and touring bands to book the space eventually was so high that turning the space into a full-time operation became an economically viable option.

“Our original location was on Powder Springs Road,” Satterfield said. “We had basically had to move because we were taking up all the parking at the shopping center and disturbing the restaurant next to us.”

Now the venue sits in between a pawn shop and dog groomer in what was once a bridal dress shop off Bells Ferry Road. It might not look like much from the outside, but the venue serves a vital role for the music community in the greater East Cobb and Marietta areas.

For one, Swayze's is an all-age establishment. A normal night sees over 100 patrons, mostly in their teen years, fill the venue's open layout. Refreshments are served in the front, dollar drinks and such, but no alcohol. Smoking is strictly prohibited inside the building and many of the opening acts are teens from the area.

The venue has actually become such a draw for teens that a group of regulars has gotten a very informal moniker.

“I used to come here as a Swayze's kid when I was 15,” said Grayson Blanchette, Swayze's other paid employee. “Just from knowing Lee he asked me if I wanted to intern and I've been here four and a half or five years.”

And there Swayze's shows another side. Satterfield has help from friends to run the venue, but with only himself and Blanchette as official staff, he brings on interns as well. As long as they have an interest in the business and are at least 18 years of age, Satterfield may have on as many as four interns at a time.

“If you're going to work up here you're going to be involved in the scene,” Blanchette explained. “Either you're going to be in school for music or in a band, so that you have a realistic perspective on the music business.”

So Swayze's is both a safe venue for teenagers to enjoy music and a place to for them to learn more about the business. But Satterfield has expanded Swayze's even further. Since 2010, Satterfield has hoster at least one benefit show per month, and he plans to up that number to two per month this year. Satterfield hopes that showing the teens the side of giving back will rub off on their impressionable minds. Tonight, half the $10 door will go to Homeward Bound Pet Rescue of Gilmer County, a no-kill animal shelter in Ellijay.

“We were actually contacted and asked to come out for a benefit for our shelter,” said Amy Goode, who works for Homeward Bound and brought several dogs with her this evening to display at the benefit. “The furthest we usually travel right now is Kennesaw but we'll go anywhere if it benefits the animals like this.”

Swayze's has a lot going for it. But above all it's a gathering place. A place where bands are able to play and people are meant to mingle.

“Atlanta is such a tough area already that people didn't think we'd make it in the suburbs,” Satterfield said. “But we're the original. Others have come and gone but we've stayed this whole time.”