By SUSAN LIN
Visitors to Ground Zero between 2 and 7 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday, however, won't find a regular bar scene. For one thing, nearly all of the band members on stage, bartenders and nearly all the patrons are 15 to 20 years old. Second, they are drinking bottled water, not beer.
"They're all ladies and gentlemen," Langley said. She started Ground Zero's All-Age Shows, as they are known, in 1997, right when she opened the bar. "It gives the kids a place to go and socialize so they don't have to be on street corners. It also gives them an idea of how to earn some money," she said.
The idea for the All-Age Shows came from Langley's son, Eric Weiss, 28.
As a teenager, Weiss was part of a band. and that band, and his friends' bands would regularly practice in the basement of Langley's house, which became a local hangout of sorts. "They were always allowed to play there," Langley said. Ground Zero's All-Age Shows are the same concept, only on a grander scale.
In a typical All-Age Show, five or six punk, metal or ska rock bands -- such as Decent At Best, Unstable or Nag Rok, all three of which will be there on Sunday, Jan. 14 -- will take the stage for about an hour each. The musicians are mostly local high-school kids, although, Langley said, past bands have come from Maine and even California.
This Sunday's bands were booked by 15-year-old Chris Arrigo of Bellmore, lead guitarist for Decent At Best. "Most of the bands, we know from school. And Unstable and Nag Rok, we played with [at gigs] before," said Arrigo, who is promoting his first show at Ground Zero.
Standing behind the bar for Saturday shows is Cathy, who has pink and black hair, as well as a ring in her lip. "She relates very well to the punks and hardcore people," Langley noted. Cathy sells water, potato chips, peanuts, as well as band paraphernalia: CDs, t-shirts, bumper stickers. While Cathy handles the bar, Langley stands at the door, or walks the floor. On Sundays, Langley finds whoever's available to tend bar.
"I'm always here, I don't leave the kids alone. That's probably why they're so good -- because they know I'll kill them. That's probably why I don't have the problems," Langley said. She emphatically states that she does not tolerate drug use or underage drinking on the premises. Smoking, however, is okay.
Despite Langley's efforts to keep a clean house, the All-Age Shows seem to have sparked the ire of a few residents nearby. "I'm told that the Town of Hempstead Department of Buildings has a petition from some neighbors who don't care for how these kids looked. It's been there for over a year, and no other petitions have come in. That's nothing for a business to have against them," Langley said.
And from her persepctive, those who come to and stage the All-Age shows are quite grown up. "These kids are like adults," Langley said. When the region was covered with over a foot of snow a couple weekends back, "the [promoters] even had the respectability to call me and say, 'We can't come.'"
Before launching Ground Zero, Langley, 46, had co-owned a bar in Hicksville called S.B's. It's was a neighborhood bar that opened at ... 8 a.m. "Retired people drink at that hour," she said.
After ten years there, Langley felt she needed a change. She convinced her two partners to buy her out, she said, and then used the money to open up her own place, Ground Zero. "I was serving 50- to 90-year-old people" in Hicksville. "Now I'm serving 15-to-19-year-old people. It's much more refreshing."
For the first three months, Langley's son booked the bands for the All-Age Shows. Two-and-a-half years later, "the kid shows are even more popular than my regular over-21 shows," Langley said.
