Collegiate Times

Beer spills, crossed arms and permanent markers.

The band, Chronicles of the Land Squid, is crescendoing on the Saturday night before Easter in Blacksburg. A sea of strong yellow and purple lights washes over the fans gathered at the Lantern as they raise their hands heavenwards in excitement. To the left of the stage, a patron is yo-yoing, the silver discs weaving in and out of the snares constructed by its own string, but to the right of the stage stands Dave Caldwell, his arms are crossed, face cold and expressionless. He almost looks bored or uncomfortable.

Caldwell is one of the bouncers on duty that night at the Lantern. His official job title is "security," and he and four or five other members of security are working their various posts tonight either upstairs, somewhere behind the bar, or on the floor.

Watching him slowly prowl through the crowd looking for any infractions, it's hard to imagine that this is the same easygoing and jovial person I had spoken to earlier in the night. Tonight is his ninth night on the job.

"I'm not that green," he excitedly said earlier in the night, "but I'm pretty green. I love it. I don't mind the job at all. It's not a bad job. I'm a night person. I'm up usually anyways, and it seems like I do some good down here."

It is a job he has come to enjoy from the little extra perk of seeing live music night after night to the type of generally laid back patronage that frequents the bar. He feels this is a circumstance unfamiliar to many other local bars.

"I know a bouncer," Caldwell said, "at Sharkey's and a guy at the Gobbler, and they all hate their jobs, and it's like, 'Why?' It's just straight bars are different than this. We have shows and more people come here for shows than just to get drunk."

Caldwell is clad in jeans and a black Los Lobos T-shirt with a white font spelling out the band's name. It is part of the Lantern's security uniform, or lack thereof. This attire, however, offers the bouncers a certain advantage when dealing with a customer that might require some assistance from the premises.

"We sneak up on a motherfucker," said Roy McCoy, a fellow bouncer. "Before you know it, you got a grip of hands on you, and you're going toward the door."

McCoy and James Wiley are the first two bouncers I meet when I arrive at the Lantern at around 9 p.m. There is no one outside but the two of them, sitting at the entrance of the Lantern, and only a table with a box of cash, wristbands and a piece of paper to monitor how many overs and unders are in the club at any one time separates them. They pass the time chain-smoking and finding whatever it is they can to talk about before the rush comes.

McCoy is wearing a green hoodie with a charcoal Dickie's jacket over it. A former army man, his hair is slicked back, and a few tattoos are revealed sometimes when he moves. I think that I spot a cloud with a cross in it on one of his hands that might be part of a larger tattoo; on his neck is the face of Christ.

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