Former Elbo Room owner and concert promoter holds massive garage sale
SAN FRANCISCO -- Former Elbo Room co-owner and longtime Bay Area show promoter Matt Shapiro is hosting a huge sale of music memorabilia including records, CDs, t-shirts and books at Bender's in San Francisco Saturday.
In addition to bartending and booking shows at both the San Francisco and Oakland locations of the Elbo Room for 20 years, Shapiro also worked extensively at the Covered Wagon (later Annie's Social Club) and other venues as a bartender, DJ and promoter. Late last March, he and his partner found a buyer for the Elbo Room in Oakland that will hopefully preserve the location as a music venue.
His work experience has led to him amassing a sizeable collection of music -- mostly records, but also thousands of CDs and cassettes -- as well as music-related items including shirts, posters and flyers.
After living in SF for almost 30 years, he is looking to scale down his collection before relocating to Leipzig in Germany this September, leading to Shapiro hosting "Matt's Obsequious Ephemera Sale" at Benders this Saturday afternoon.
While his work largely focused on punk and metal shows (Shapiro also ran venerable underground metal promotion Lucifer's Hammer), he regularly hosted industrial, dark wave and electronic dance club nights. The materials for sale will include rare, valuable vinyl records and books as well as hundreds of $3 CDs and vintage band t-shirts being sold for far less than one would pay on eBay or in a used clothing store. The sale will also serve as an early going away party for Shapiro, who has been a fixture on the Bay Area music scene for decades.
Matt's Obsequious Ephemera Sale
Saturday, August 5, 3 p.m. Free (21 and over)
Bender's