Fans of entertainment venue Quarters won’t have to worry about running into their kid sisters on Friday nights anymore.
To draw a more mature crowd, Quarters, 4530 S. Sherwood Forest Blvd., is hosting a “Sweet Southern Heat” music series on Friday nights through August with an 18 and up age restriction. The goal of the music series is to shift the demographic of Quarters, which also offers laser tag, billiards, bowling and an arcade, to a more adult centric group of attendees. The music series was named after the opening band, Sweet Southern Heat.
To bring new talent into the local spotlight, Quarters head of sales and marketing Kendrick Alford and Quarters entertainment liaison Toderick Lee set out to find bands that have not yet been discovered by the public.
“We wanted to give them the platform to show Baton Rouge what they have,” Alford said.
Part of the reason Quarters is hosting these new bands is to create something new that the Baton Rouge community would not normally see at local music events.
“We sought out bands that we saw were doing things new. If you go out to some shows and see bands that perform all the time, you start to see the same songs and the same covers. We wanted to open up the catalogue of music by finding new bands that have not gotten their name out,” Lee said.
In addition to new musicians from the area coming out, there will also be trunk shows and pop-up stands for local businesses, such as record and
clothing stores. A wine tasting will also be offered to those who are interested, with other drink specials going on from Happy Hour starting at 8:30 p.m. through 2 a.m..
The drink specials on Fridays are $3 Miller High Life pints and $3 shots of Fireball. Lee said that part of the music series is to give adults something to do that is out of the ordinary.
“We have learned that the more layers you add to an event will bring more and more people out,” Alford said. “Through having these stores present, we can show people what local boutiques and businesses have to offer.”
When the concert series kicked off with Sweet Southern Heat, a crowd of 200 people came to the show. Quarters hopes to draw a similar crowd each Friday night.
This Friday night, The Easy Band will play with doors opening at 9 p.m..
The Sweet Southern Heat concert series will be running every Friday until August 28.