Rockin' a Hard Place

John Jeter was a burnt-out journalist living in Florida when his younger brother, who once saved Jeter's life by donating one of his kidneys, telephoned with life-altering news: he found the perfect spot in Greenville, South Carolina, for the concert hall they always dreamed of opening a nearly abandoned cotton mill fluttering with pigeons . . . and potential. Rockin' a Hard Place is the story of The Handlebar, an intimate "listening room" that has presented thousands of artists John Mayer, Joan Baez, Zac Brown, and Sugarland among them and hosted a quarter-million fans since its opening in 1994. A promoter's memoir, this is the story of a na ve plunge into an industry that Hunter S. Thompson once called a "cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free."

With a wry and irreverent voice, Jeter describes the concert business from the bottom of its food chain, where one band's backstage demand includes "one hamster dressed like Indiana Jones,