Austin is known as “the Live Music Capital of the World,” where top acts play country, rock, jazz, and blues, in Austin’s lively entertainment district and Stubb’s Restaurant has always been at the heart of it.
Stubb opened the weekly jam sessions at his original restaurant in Lubbock by inviting musicians over for Sunday dinner. Joe Ely, Terry Allen, Jimmie Dale Gilmore, Jessie “Guitar” Taylor, and other up-and-comers expected barbecue, but Stubb would feed them a sit-down meal of turkey, dressing, collards, and cornmeal dumplings. After their food settled, they’d pull out their instruments and jam late into the night.
Before long, big-name performers like Willie Nelson, B.B. King, Linda Ronstadt, and George Thorogood dropped by when they were in town—or anywhere near Lubbock. Grammy winner Tom T. Hall even wrote a song about Stubb’s Bar-B-Que—“The Great East Broadway Onion Championship of 1978”—about an early morning pool game between Hall and Ely, where they used an onion instead of a cue ball. Blues guitarist Stevie Ray Vaughan came in regularly, and learned to play Tin Pan Alley by listening to James Reed’s version on Stubb’s jukebox.
Sometimes Stubb himself would take the microphone to sing solo, or accompany the musicians. Many famous musicians still speak fondly of his renowned version of “Summertime”. People came from all over for the taste of Stubb’s barbecue, the music that accompanied it, and the all-around easygoin’ atmosphere that became Stubb’s trademark.
The restaurant has since moved from its original locale in Lubbock, but musicians both local and worldwide still stop in for Stubb’s legendary mesquite smoked barbecue and hit the stage for performances that stretch late into the night.
