By Tracy Record
West Seattle Blog editor

A distinctive label describes the event Skylark Café and Club (WSB sponsor) will host tomorrow night to mark its 4th anniversary: Not a party, not a bash … but a prom.

“After four years, we’re graduating … we’re seniors now!” laughs Skylark proprietor Jessie Summa-Kusiak.

Four is a special number for another reason. That’s how many Skylark staffers have been with the music club/restaurant/bar since Day 1 – including the bar manager and kitchen manager, and bartender Cheryl, who is the model in many of Skylark’s ads.

Why the longevity? Here’s one unexpected reason …

…The staff gets to play their music on the sound system during non-band hours. That’s near and dear to Jessie’s heart – she recalls a long-ago restaurant job where there was a “five-CD changer, and they only had five CD’s. Gypsy Kings, Neil Diamond, Paul Anka, Frank Sinatra ‘Duets’ …” over, and over, and over, again. “Nobody ever changed it. It was terrible, and that can have an effect on your mood!” Of course, play-your-music can also have its moments – “like a bizarre transition from Scissor Sisters at lunch to Journey happy hour” – but as opposed to “You’re Havin’ My Baby” every few hours, most people wouldn’t mind.

As a restaurant (see the menus here), Skylark has gained increasing fame around West Seattle for signature features like brunch, which was the meal of the moment when we sat down with Jessie for an anniversary interview last Sunday.

But a restaurant wasn’t even in their original plans – it just happened to be part of the package when they happened onto what was then Madison’s Cafe, listed for sale on craigslist, advertised as “turnkey” but nothing of the sort (though it already had a stage, which was a major deal-sealing factor)

“I never had a dream to run a restaurant,” Jessie recalls. “We looked at a lot of different places …” and they weren’t all in West Seattle. “I came into this knowing how to book bands. Now I know how to write a marketing plan … bigger-picture things like the restaurant, and cost percentage, not just show nights, but also for lunch …”

The club, however, is the headliner in the dream she had long had. She is a musician herself (as well as a former “middle manager at Amazon.”) “The most gratifying thing so far [in the first 4 years] is that people thought West Seattle couldn’t have an original live music venue in the same sense as the High Dive in Ballard, and that we couldn’t have a community like that because people (in West Seattle) were ‘old fogies’ and nobody wanted to see live music ….”

Though that general perception turned out to be way wrong, Jessie says her patrons did turn out generally “to be older than I projected – I thought (it would be) 21 to 41, and it’s more like 31 to 51, which is awesome because … the people who are actually in their 20s see less live music; they want to go to hip-hop night and dance. It’s the people who are the ‘old fogies'” – a term she uses fondly you should know – “who have been in bands for (a long time), they’re the ones who went out and saw live music in the ’80s and ’90s when it exploded here, and are still going out – and they have money to buy a round of drinks for everybody!”

As she describes it, coming to Skylark to see live music is “risk-free” since there’s usually no cover. “Younger bands can advertise it as a free show and maybe get more of their friends to come out … It’s come to the point now that we don’t have a cover, and it’s risk-free to come see live music.”

Not risk-free for the proprietor, of course, and she smiles with this note: “Now it’s gotten to the point (where) people are taking (us) for granted – jumped from, ‘it’ll never work’ to ‘oh well, of course there’s Skylark’ … But we don’t say we never charge a cover. We have benefit shows, for example.”

So, here she is, four years later, alive and kicking. Any tough times along the way?

“Yeah, every week!” More laughter … running your own business is no picnic, as any entrepreneur knows. But when you hit the high notes, you hit the high notes. We reminisce about one memorable non-music event at Skylark – the biggest big-screen election-night viewing party in West Seattle the night of the presidential election.

(November 4, 2008 WSB photo, Election Night at Skylark)
Other favorite memories from the first four years? “All the Halloween parties” – it’s a Skylark tradition to host “Come As You Aren’t,” where bands perform as other bands – musical masquerade, if you will.

What’s ahead? Jessie’s “really excited” about new neighbors moving into their small historic building at the north end of Delridge – as reported here last week, PB&J Textiles (also a WSB sponsor) is taking over one of the building’s empty spaces.

But in the meantime, more music, more food. What does Jessie herself like on the menu? we ask. “Vegan burger with fried egg on top” comes to mind first. What’s the best-kept secret on the menu? “The meat loaf – it’s wrapped with bacon … People think of us as a sandwich place (so many haven’t tried it).” Best sellers? “The ham benedict … chicken fried steak does well.”

(Then there are the renowned tater tots, mentioned by us in the 2007 WSB discussion “West Seattle Dishes to Die For,” which subsequently led to the Skylark menu annotating the tater tots ‘As seen on West Seattle Blog’.)

(At the May 20 Taste of West Seattle, from left, Skylark’s Roger, Jessie & Charlie)
They also showcased Skylark food at the recent Taste of West Seattle, participating in that West Seattle Helpline benefit (which WSB co-sponsored) for the first time. “That was a big deal! Really fun – it wasn’t our (regular) demographic … there were people who had never heard of Skylark,” but vowed to come give them a try.

What’s new in the past year? Sound engineer Charlie mentions a new mixing board: “It records, so anybody who plays here can take a multitrack disc of their band (home) and go mix it. It’s great for new bands that can’t afford studio time. They take it home, mix the tracks … We just charge them $15, which covers the cost of the materials, and the mixer will pay for itself in two years.”

That’s just one way Skylark does its best to help indie bands, which comprise most of their bookings, since Skylark isn’t a big enough venue for everyone – “We hold 85 people, you might not make gas money here [if you come from far away], and we don’t have a built-in clientele, so it’s ‘bring your own crowd’.” Even at that, sometimes, Jessie adds, bands from a distance want to play Skylark anyway, because of its reputation.

While indie rock is the mainstay, “We actually have had a couple hip-hop shows lately,” Jessie notes. “We eased into it … put together some bills with some hip-hop on them … then booked a last-minute all-hip-hop show [recently] and about 50 people turned out – that worked!”

What else is ahead? A summer menu debuts soon. They’re doing some live music on Tuesdays, mostly singer-songwriters, “mellower” music in any event – but that’ll be at 9, after the “Spin Your Wax” open-turntables time. They’re working on the basement to make a better dressing room for performers.

But in the short run – there’s The Prom. It starts at 8 tomorrow (Saturday) night, but you of course are welcome to come earlier for dinner, drinks, lunch, brunch … Here’s their latest online update, “Here’s How Our Prom Will Be Different.”

When we talked with Jessie, she hadn’t quite figured out her prom dress – she was “plotting a trip” to a costume-rental store. (We could probably call her now and ask, but you might as well be surprised.) Then again, she mulled, “I might just go as Cyndi Lauper.” The ’80s theme – when she was in high school – will run through Prom Night, including the 50 black-felt wrist corsages she planned to offer. “So terrible, it’s great!” And there’ll be Skylark buttons (“we’ve rented the button-making machine!”)

8 pm Saturday night, no cover for Skylark’s Rock ‘n’ Roll Prom/4th Anniversary Party, with DJ Create and M. Bison, Zack Stokes Knows Scholarly Gentlemen, and Danielli, 3803 Delridge Way SW, skylarkcafe.com