ANAHEIM, Calif. — After 30 years, the iconic Orange County punk rock venue Chain Reaction is closing its doors.
With the final shows set for Dec. 18 and 19.
The news was announced on the venue’s Instagram page in early December with a statement that read in part: “This call wasn’t made quickly. We wrestled with it and have ultimately made the decision to close our doors.”
There was no word on why the venue was closing, and Spectrum News reached out to the venue’s owners but has not received a response.
On Dec. 17, Stick to Your Guns played one of the last shows at Chain Reaction.
“The fact that we get to play our last night here at Chain with these bands, with these people I grew up wishing I could be is absolutely amazing,” said Jesse Barnett, the lead singer of Chain Reaction.
Barnett and Andrew Rose, the bassist for Stick to Your Guns, grew up in Orange County.
Rose said the first show he ever played was at Chain Reaction when he was 14 years old.
“I think for so many kids in this county and cities it is where we learned about punk and hardcore and metalcore music,” Rose said. “It is just like home, it is home for so many people and it is very sad to see it go for sure.”
Nate Jackson is a punk rock historian and the author of “Tearing Down the Orange Curtain,” a book on Orange County’s punk and ska music scene.
He said Stick to Your Guns is not the only band that got its start at Chain Reaction. Bands such as Atreyu, Thrice and Throwdown also got their start there.
“It was also a place where you could get your band together from high school and get fans to come to your shows, get that first taste of what it was like,” Jackson said.
The walls of Chain Reaction are lined with memories and T-shirts of all the bands that played there.
He said while it will be sad to see the venue go, the one thing about punk rock is, “it is always going to be here because the spirit of it is alive and exists in youth culture in all of these different types of ways.”
(Spectrum News/Cody Taylor)
Stick to Your Guns is sad to say goodbye to a music venue that helped shape them.
“Although this is a very sad night, and although I am very sad, it is a beautiful thing that we are all still here because I know we will just make another Chain Reaction,” Barnett said.
‘ The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties ’
‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source spectrumnews1.com ’
