The Depot
A long gone landmark to Tampa Rock and Roll

No website dedicated to the Outlaws can be complete without a tribute to the "Depot"....
a now gone historic North Tampa watering hole once located on Nebraska Avenue near Bearss. (or Bare-ass as some drunk folks called it) that had the best bands of the time...sort of "home base" for folks like the Outlaws and Fat Chance (later Tight Shoes and some on to the Henry Paul Band).

There was, during the mid 1970's a strip of three bars located in a nice neat row ...Losers (later known as PAC or Performing Arts Center) , Shenanigans and the Depot.

Shenanigan's was like a fisherman at a hunting convention--most of the bands playing there at the time were "glitter rock" (hair bands)...Losers had a mix of musical styles, some bands good (Outlaws, Mama's Pride) and some not so hot...and then there was the Depot.

It didn't matter WHO was playing at the Depot--if you stunk, it wasn't YOU.  On occasion a patron might wander back and forth between Losers and the Depot, if both had good bands, but it was darn rare to see Depot patrons wander into Shenanigans unless by mistake.  Not too far away on Florida Ave was another venue the Outlaws played from time to time called the Whippin' Post..but none of them had the same atmosphere as the Depot.  God knows why, the Depot wasn't a fancy place--it wasn't even a BIG place...but there was no place like it.

It was basically a two story wood structure, very rustic, with pool tables and fools upstairs (fools being those who didn't want to watch the band) and the bar, tables and stage downstairs, along with a tiny kitchen.  I think the entire capacity of the place according to the Fire Marshall was about 380 but seems like everyone who ever went to USF in the early to mid seventies swears they were in there....they probably were.

USF used to have a Friday afternoon 3-5 shindig in the "Empty Keg" portion of the student union building called "Slappy Hour"....bands playing at local venues like the Depot, Losers (PAC) or the Whippin' Post frequently appeared there for nothing or next to nothing to build their crowd for the real venue later in the evening.  Thus if you saw a good band at Slappy Hour, you knew where to see them later on.

On nights when the Outlaws played at the, especially by 1974, there would be people lined up trying to get in. If you didn't "know someone" you might spend a lot of time standing on the porch (a wood planked area with some log supports) outside until enough people left that the doorman would let more in.  I know of one instance where a well known Florida disc jockey named Mike Lyons from WDIZ in Orlando drove over to see the legendary Depot (he'd seen the band many times at Winter Park's "Back Door") and was found freezing his butt off on the porch cuz the doorman didn't know who he was or care.  We rectified that situation upon finding him out there shivering in the cold. Good thing too cuz he later became the Program Director of the newly rock formatted 98 Rock in the Tampa Bay area, a station which gave the Outlaws a great deal of airplay. (98 Rock is now a sucky station that plays garbage music and Lyons is a concert promotor in the Minneapolis/St Paul area)

It's a darn shame none of us thought to take photos of the BAR--but I'm sure someone out there has some...in fact, someone in the guestbook even suggested a Depot Reunion...which I'd like to see myself--see if anyone is now alive and sober enough to remember they WERE at the Depot ....

Anyone of the old Depot regulars brave enough to send in pics of what they looked like back in those days, or pics of the bar, or of bands who PLAYED at the bar....if I get some, I'll make a special "Depot" section in the photo album...scattered about this website are photos of the Outlaws taken at the Depot so I won't repeat those here.

Submit your photos by email (don't forget a description...) by clicking here