“This song is called, ‘My Face Hurts From Making Out So Much Last Summer,’” says Sexual Tension’s lead singer, White Chocolate. The band launches into a sound build-up, shredding their knuckles on ridged strings and metal snare rims. Chocolate punctuates the song with yelps, devious moans and shrill screams, as he throws himself into the sidewall. He rolls over the rubber tires nailed to the foot of the stage and falls face down onto the club floor.
The observing crew blissfully joins his show of decadent destruction. One man pounds White Chocolate in the back, while others fake a kick to his ribs. Two kids kick his shoes, as a girl ruffles his sweaty hair. He jumps back on the stage, as the band’s roughly hewn set of songs finishes with all the sexually tense in a circle on their knees facing each other. They lean back hard into their heels, arching their backs, with bass, guitar and microphone in hand, assailing each tool as if it were their own.
The equipment is switched, and Sexual Tension’s guitarist gets back up to lead the next act, We’ve Got Your Thunder Balls, an AC/DC cover band. The members play two full songs and a fragment of a third before giving up. They laugh as the guitarist mispicks and restarts the familiar introduction to “Back In Black.”
Along the wall, a boy in the audience is playing with his gray-and-black striped scarf, wrapping it around the girl next to him. She giggles, pulling the scarf completely over her mouth.

Photo by Erin Galletta
The duct-taped windows and eclectic furnishings are just part of the atmosphere of the Mantis for Ludwig and his 7-year-old daughter, Sarah.

The Weekends: Do-It-Yourself Damage [theme gf. entered]
This is a story about a place called the Mantis. Sam Ludwig, the man who conceived the North Water punk club back in 1989, takes full responsibility for what derision has misruled the punk shows here. Over time, the smaller, devout crowds who have laid claim to some legacy here have changed faces, but not much changed attitudes. As long as there's someone to taunt, something to throw or some words to scream, they'll be there.
For this particular Saturday night, the Mantis is throwing a birthday party. The college crowd and near-retired musicians alike are dragging their equipment down the brick sidewalk leading into the Mantis. It’s 9:30 p.m.
They prep for the stage set-up, hauling heavy bass drums, armfuls of plug-in cords, pedals and nylon guitar cases. Black leather jackets, Converse low tops, and dirty sweaters are almost a uniform for the loyal Mantis goers.
Thrift store items, like t-shirts with labor logos, are prominent. Sometimes the shirt is peeling with an outmoded glitter iron-on, like the Rick Springfield plastic stretched over the swelling gut of a young man inside. It’s not unusual to spot someone in a pair of jeans that barely hold their shape together via safety pins and hand-stitched patches.
Often times, the bands and fans are one in the same, and neither group much cares for cleanliness. They dance. They play music. They transfer equipment from van to stage and back again, intermittently running across the street to Glory Days bar for a shot and a beer. They tumble onto the floor. They sweat. This congregation is no advertisement for a Delia’s catalog.
Which is just as well—the Mantis does no advertising either. Word of mouth gets the crowds to show, courtesy of friends, fans and the bands themselves. Bands also make and distribute their own fliers – fliers that hang in the front cubbyhole of the Mantis or at other small businesses like Video 101, Europe Gyro, WordSmiths printing center, CD/Game Exchange.
The small birthday party tonight draws 30—a chilly April night that has people shivering as they enter the aluminum door. Tracy Boyle, Sam’s girlfriend of 10 years, is collecting a $5 donation at the door, while chatting with some friends huddled around a kerosene heater.
As the bands drop their equipment on stage, the Ken doll tied in the rafters above swings in a noose like a metronome.
Playhouse By Day, Punk House By Night
Cruising down North Water Street on a rainy afternoon, it’s easy to mistake the Mantis Gallery as a misanthropic art house filled with voodoo nick-knacks and oddly shaped bongos—a home to tree-huggers and Nader voters.
And, while this impression might not be too far off in describing the right side of the building, it’s the unmarked left side of 257 Water St. that harbors the covert punk gatherings that make up one half of this inventive art space.
On the left side, the toilet has crusted into condemnation. There is barely a place to sit, unless you count the recycled bench seats from vans, rusted patio furniture and wobbly kitchen chairs. The broken windows covered in places by duct-taped tarps leak in frigid air and on a busy night, leak out cigarette smoke by the ton. There is no bar, not a single Miss America in hiding and no complimentary popcorn. And for these reasons, the Mantis Gallery continues to draw devoted punk crowds from New York City to Akron to watch underground bands destroy the stage.
“There’s a whole plethora of shit that goes on here,” says Sam Ludwig, opening the door to his rented space with a can of Black Label beer in hand. “You wouldn’t believe the things I see. It’s my sin bin.”

Photo by Mike Rich

An out-of-town band hypnotizes the crowd.

 

Photo by Mike Rich
Mike Neesen, right, pumps his fist to Kill the Hippies, a Kent band that plays frequently at the Mantis. Neesen, a former drummer for the band, says he has been going to the Mantis since he was 15.

“One day, I was fooling around with a microphone and some sounds,” Scotch says, “ and these two little girls came up here saying, ‘Um, we have play practice. Could you turn it down? You sound really good, though.’”
When asked if he has his own Mantis bathroom story to tell, Scotch pulls out a black T-shirt he received from Big Funs Underground T-Shirts. The shirt has a hand-sketched picture of a white toilet lid covered in cockroaches and flies. It reads: “Mantis – restroom is closed, cause of you.”

 

Mike Rich
Joe Dennis of the Kent band Party of Helicopters ignites a fiery Mantis crowd.

The icy air is blowing in as he moves his space heater to back of the club near the rows of Schwinn bicycles—out-of-town bands ride the bikes through Kent to stretch their legs after a long road trip. He runs a hand through his silver-gray hair and eases into a wooden captain’s chair on the Mantis stage. Behind him, tall cardboard theatre backdrops lean on the wall. They are painted in primary colors with crooked cityscapes, happy stick figures and bumpy cars.
“During the day, we do children’s theater,” he says, gesturing behind him at the artwork. “The kids hang curtains, do their own painting. I let them build stuff for their plays. A lot of them are home-schooled, so they have that freedom.”
Sam is fiercely proud of that dichotomy—the Mantis is playhouse by day, punk house by night. He fathers a six-year old daughter with his girlfriend, Tracy Boyle, while singing and writing lyrics for his punk project Lester—the Mantis’ house band. Ironically, his band mate, Jeff Ingram, runs the Mantis’ right side gallery, proving that even within the band, diverse interests are embraced here, even if they may directly conflict with one another.
Case in point: Halim El-Dabh’s 81st birthday party was in full swing on a Monday night in February. Crowded with friends and kindred spirits, the gallery room was warm with people grazing on cheeses, drinking homemade wine and playing free-form rhythms on percussive instruments late into the night. El-Dabh, a Kent ethnomusicology professor and world-renowned composer, clapped over his head and grabbed the hands of free ladies willing to dance. The Mantis’ music space sat empty.
Weeks later on an April Saturday, the Sexual Tension birthday party happens. The AC/DC tribute band thrashed around the foot-high stage of the music space. Rows of people—teens to 40-somethings—nodded their heads and pushed each other for sport. And how would Halim El-Dabh’s assembly feel about a band named Kill The Hippies? The gallery was dark and quiet.
Love Thy Neighbor
On the opposite side of the road, literally and figuratively, Panini’s Bar & Grill and Glory Days face the Mantis. The self-described ‘fine drinking establishment’ atmosphere of Glory Days and the sporty sheen of Panini’s both draw the Kent sector that enjoys bump-and-grind karaoke, liquored-up pool shoots, digital solitaire and big-screen sporting events.
It’s easy to see why these two bars don’t exchange much flow with the Mantis, an all-ages, non-profit venue that keeps the meat-market mania to a minimum. The natural foil of interests is clearly distinguished as two men in body-hugging sweaters enter Panini’s front door, pointing at the punks that play with their bootlaces on the Mantis porch.
“I get to watch it every night,” says Mike Pfahl, Glory Days’ doorman, gesturing across the street. “The bands they have, the people … it’s really not my scene.”
Pfahl bemoaned the fact that the Mantis falls under much less scrutiny by the police than he and his Panini neighbors are used to. Having never been to a show there, Pfahl admitted he had no real idea of what takes place inside the music space (“They don’t have a bar over there?” he asked), but wonders what draws the crowds.
“That’s for Chief Peach and the other police to decide,” he says. “All I know is Jimmy (manager of Panini’s) gets called for noise ordinances all the time. But, I can hear their bands every Saturday night.”
Next door is Sorboro’s Italian Kitchen, a pizza place that sees its share of Mantis patrons coming in to use the bathroom. Because of its filthy state, the now-condemned Mantis bathroom is a running joke with Mantis regulars—and the Sorboro’s staff.
“It’s legendary,” staff member Dan Prokes says of the Mantis facilities. “It’s not just girls either. The amount of people we get in here on a weekend is ridiculous. Four or five kids at a time will come in to use our bathroom.”
But, Dan says that Sorboro’s doesn’t necessarily mind the traffic. It usually translates into more sales of pizza and Coke.
“We’ll have a bunch of punk rock kids sitting in our lobby between 10 and 11 (p.m.), waiting for their food.”
Upstairs from the Mantis lives Scott Davidson, better known as “Scotch,” the 23-year-old drummer for Sexual Tension and a delivery driver for Europe Gyro. The apartment used to belong to Sam Ludwig for nearly 15 years before Scotch moved in October 2001.

“One day, I was fooling around with a microphone and some sounds,” Scotch says, “ and these two little girls came up here saying, ‘Um, we have play practice. Could you turn it down? You sound really good, though.’”
When asked if he has his own Mantis bathroom story to tell, Scotch pulls out a black T-shirt he received from Big Funs Underground T-Shirts. The shirt has a hand-sketched picture of a white toilet lid covered in cockroaches and flies. It reads: “Mantis – restroom is closed, cause of you.”

 

 

Kent Used To Be Cool
Sam Ludwig confesses what drew him here in the 70s—an explosion of art, film and music.
“I was a drummer before I started singing,” Sam says. “Then I stumbled upon Devo and thought, ‘I’m going to Kent!’”
Sam came to Kent State, in his estimation, during a time of creative fire, each art an impetus for inspiration. He reminisces about the mass of metals majors, radio DJs, painters and independent film directors.
“We used to go out to the bars, and on Main Street downtown, we’d see all these people walking around with cameras,” he says. “They’d just be filming movies everywhere. Believe it or not, Kent used to be cool.”
Throughout the mid-80s, Lester band member Jimmy Image began filming the bands that appeared at 257 Water St. When Sam officially founded the Mantis in 1989, he began booking unknown acts that made their mark on underground and mainstream music scenes alike. Some bands eventually dominated college and corporate radio airwaves, like Blink-182. Others dug out little-known routes on the punk map, like the Queers, Pink Lincolns, Casualties, Dink and the Menstrual Tramps.
“Yeah, we’ve got lots of footage of all kinds of bands that have passed through here,” Sam says. “Different styles, genres, whatever. We used to have a band play here called the Burning Lesbians. It was an all-guy band, of course.”
Sam says his reasons for keeping the Mantis alive are complex. Staying involved with the club, he means to keep a certain originality and distinctness intertwined with music performances – originality he draws from the memories he made as a young man. He also mourns the loss of up-and-coming music that used to dominate the downtown Kent scene—a loss he is determined to curb. By charging low cover prices—donations that keep the club afloat—he hopes to keep the crowds coming back to see local and national music acts.
“You don’t see many places like this,” he says. “Back in ’89, we used to charge a $2 cover charge to see the bands and that amount stayed until ’94 or ’95. Then it climbed to $3 for a while, and we finally had to start charging $5 this year because of the price of electricity and just the general costs to keep this place running.”
“We get bands in here from New Jersey, New York, and we want to pay them,” Sam says. “But, I’ve got rent, too.”
He is switching off the lights, and pulling the door shut behind him, explaining that he’s on his way over to pick up his daughter from school. For his day job, he re-paints old mansions in Hudson. He is dropping some painting tools into the trunk of his sky blue El Camino. His other car is a ’72 hearse.
“I’m not a rich man, by any means,” says Sam, juggling his car keys. “I live day to day. But, you picks what you choose, know what I mean?”