Anyone who’s ever spent a long night dancing and cheering under the bright stage lights of the Catalyst owes a little debt to Randall Philip Kane.
Anyone who’s ever spent a long night dancing and cheering under the bright stage lights of the Catalyst owes a little debt to Randall Philip Kane. The founder and former owner of the iconic downtown nightclub, Kane died of heart complications on Monday morning at the age of 85. Most remember him as a bike riding, rainbow suspenders wearing local artist and businessman, and many credit him with helping to turn Santa Cruz into a routine stop for major musical acts.
“The man was an icon, what can you say?” says Gary Tighe, chief concert booker for the Catalyst and an employee of more than 30 years. “For years and years I would meet with him two or three times a week and every single time he’d have a new story to tell me. I would laugh every time I saw him.”
Kane came to Santa Cruz by way of Minnesota, Ohio and the Pacific Theater of WWII, where he served as a Military Police Officer. A graduate of Ohio State University and a former dean of the San Francisco Art Institute, he had a great appreciation for education, though some argue that his wisdom was more in street smarts. After purchasing an old Pacific Avenue bowling alley and replacing the lanes and pins with a stage and a bar, Kane opened what is now the Catalyst Nightclub on St. Patrick’s Day 1976. Since then, huge acts like Neil Young, Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Snoop Dogg have graced the stage, many times as last minute “secret shows” that were spread by word of mouth.
“The main thing with him was if you were trying to do something that might make a lot of money but was something that, artistically, he didn’t like, you couldn’t do it. He stuck to those principles,” says Tighe. “I remember talking to him just a week ago and he said, ‘I’m getting old,’ and, you know, it just seemed like it might be his time. He was like a father to me and I’ll miss him. So will a lot of people.”
