Down The Rabbit Hole

As a Boston resident without a car, it’s not often that I make a trip to central Massachusetts. However, a show announcement from Rochester, NY singer/songwriter Lauren O’Connell was more than a good excuse to make the trip. Advertising O’Connell as a “YouTube sensation,” this event seemed like the perfect opportunity to support an independent artist taking a fresh approach to the idea of promotion in the music industry.

A friend and I left Boston around six o’clock on Saturday night, and after an hour drive, we got off Route 2 in Fitchburg. Thanks to poor internet directions, we took a wrong turn shortly after the exit and drove past a cemetery on a hill and, eerily, a children’s playground shortly after, on the other side of the road. We pulled into a driveway to turn around and try to find Main Street---the driveway of a home which happened to have a black cat on its porch, a cat which seemed none too thrilled to see us.

After driving past a Gothic influenced church and the surprisingly uninhabited campus of Fitchburg State College, we finally found Main Street and parked the car, knowing we must be close to the venue. It was more than a bit unsettling to take in this unfamiliar downtown area. At seven o’clock on a Saturday night, less than a mile from a college campus, the streets were empty of pedestrians. Four out of five businesses were closed, including a pub and a pizza shop. Oddly, out of the few that were open, not one but two were barber shops, and one was a nail salon.

By now, you may think I’m setting up the premise for an episode of the Twilight Zone. Or, alternately, you may be thinking I’m out of touch with the economy’s devastating effect on businesses outside of major cities like Boston. Either way, what happened next is bound to surprise you.

After a string of more closed businesses, an inviting wooden sign let us know that we had found what we were looking for. Aptly named, “The Rabbit Hole” seemed so out of place on this desolate street that finding it here felt very much like slipping into Wonderland.

This independently owned bookstore is immediately refreshing, though unexpected. Just steps after walking in, a rack of books lures customers in with hand-written notes in front of each title, each containing a recommendation and brief synopsis of the given book. All kinds of posters adorn the walls, celebrating past and present pop-culture in all media formats.

The kind of place where you could spend hours rummaging through books, vinyl, CD’s and cassettes, The Rabbit Hole’s atmosphere is a reminder of how much we, as consumers, can lose in the age of Amazon.com and iTunes. How a place like this can stay in business is a complete mystery, especially less than half a mile down the street from a pub which is closed on a Saturday night.

Going upstairs, the surreal atmosphere of the bookstore became a bit overwhelming. The upstairs, on a typical day, would have seemed strange enough. Lit like an elementary school classroom, this room is filled with racks of cassettes and vinyl, compact discs and more books. Between the patterns on the window curtains and the Reefer Madness and Wizard of Oz posters on the wall, the only reminder that you haven’t slipped into the 1970’s is a movie poster for The Lost Boys.

That is, on a typical day. This was not a typical day, this was the night of a live music event. As such, what presented itself was a sight rarely seen in my generation. Around two dozen teens and twenty-somethings sat cross-legged on the floor, a few of them on disembodied couch cushions. All sat at attention, gazing intently at and listening to a young girl singing and playing an acoustic guitar with no amplification. As if this wasn’t enough of a culture shock (this, from my apathetic, ADD-ridden generation,) the audience began passing around a large jar for donations to the bookstore, a jar nearly everyone opened their wallets to contribute to.

After the first act, Lauren O’Connell played a short, intimate acoustic set. She seemed as taken aback by the store’s atmosphere as I was, but nonetheless put on quite the performance. Taking time between each song to engage the audience with her own brand of mildly awkward yet extremely charming banter, Lauren played a set comprised mostly of songs from her 2009 album The Shakes, and closed with stand-out track "1988." Listen to the live performance below, or check http://www.myspace.com/irishloc for the studio version.



While I walked into The Rabbit Hole with the sole intention of seeing an artist I admire, I left with a new appreciation for this kind of independent store. A place like this is a veritable oasis in the digital age---a place where you can hold an album in your hands and remember that music can be a tangible work of art and not just a stream of kilobytes. A place where you can sit in front of a musician and look them in the eye, rather than staring up at them on the pedestal that a stage can become.

http://www.therabbitholeusa.com