Saying Goodbye to Chain Reaction: Fans & Musicians Reminisce on the Impact of a Vital OC Music Venue
- Laila Freeman
- Jan 2
- 10 min read
Chain Reaction enthusiasts share memories of the punk and rock club and question what this means for future generations.
Beloved music venue Chain Reaction, arguably the liveliest element of Anaheim’s sleepy West Lincoln Avenue, announced its closing on Dec. 9 after almost 30 years. It was able to hold on for another five years after almost shutting down in 2020.
Big artists from Orange County graced the stage during the early phases such as No Doubt, Avenged Sevenfold, Thrice and more. Other notable acts left their mark at Chain, or maybe a T-shirt to add to the infamous collection hung on the walls, like Turnstile, Paramore and Stick to Your Guns.
Chain Reaction’s Instagram post from Dec. 9 stated, “This call wasn’t made quickly. We wrestled with it and have ultimately made the decision to close our doors.”
On Dec. 19, Chain Reaction hosted the Rancho Santa Margarita-based rock band, Movements, the final act to grace its stage. In an Instagram post, the band announced its final performance at the venue and said, “This is for Orange County. Chain Forever.”
Chain Reaction was one of the final venues in the area that was all-ages with free parking and no barrier between the general admission space and the stage, creating the intimate and in-your-face atmosphere it’s known for. In a time when your favorite artist’s stadium show could cost you anywhere from a couple hundred to a couple thousand dollars, Chain Reaction maintained its affordability for all.
Many O.C. residents have attended countless shows at the venue since before they could drive, remembering being dropped off by a parent, which is the case for Tustin native John Kincannon.
“There were not many places to go to see such an intimate experience with bands that you like,” Kincannon said. “You're there, you could touch it. Smell it. You can touch them. You can feel the spray of their spit, and it was always fun. Always. Even when I broke my nose, it was fun. Maybe not that fun at that time, that hurt a lot.”
Tim Hill founded Chain in 1996, converting an old bar that was red-tagged by the city of Anaheim into an all-ages music venue. According to public records, the building was originally built in 1961.
A Chain Reaction of Confusion
The announcement of the closure has led to an outcry on social media of both love and sorrow for the venue, and circling theories on the reason for closing.
The city of Anaheim’s official Instagram posted a tribute to Chain, stating, “We join many in sadness in hearing about the planned closure of Chain Reaction …. The small 250-person club at Euclid Street and Lincoln Avenue has been one of the few venues for teens to come and watch up-and-coming bands and is a legendary spot for underground punk pop, alt-rock and emo bands.”
The post cited “internal business reasons” as reason for the closure, which led to several comments blaming the city for the closure. The post ended with, “Whatever the future holds, we celebrate Chain Reaction as part of Anaheim’s celebrated music history.”
What will become of the venue once known as “The CBGB of The Left Coast?”
Anaheim’s chief communications officer Mike Lyster shares in the O.C. music scene’s grief and noted that there has been a lot of confusion about the city’s role in this closure.
“What we know is what everyone else knows,” Lyster said. “We don’t know of any imminent plans.”
He said the future of the site rests with whoever owns the building, and that many believe the city holds all the power in determining what business goes where, which is not the case here.
Lyster is proud of Chain Reaction, seeing it as an incredible part of Anaheim’s music history, especially because it was all-ages. He is also glad Anaheim still has the Doll Hut, where upcoming bands still have the opportunity to perform for local audiences.
Reminiscing 1652
The space was truly a saving grace for longtime employee Gene Ramirez. He’s worked there off and on for about 10 years, always finding his way back in between tours. Always filling in where needed, he’s been lighting designer (LD), security guard and has worked the bar and box office.
He frequented the venue and became friends with the previous LD who offered him a job, and then a place to stay.
“At the time I didn't have a job – I worked at the Farmer's Market, but you know, it's like super part-time, and so I worked at Chain and then I was still homeless, and she’s like, ‘Do you wanna just live at my house?’” Ramirez said. “And I was like, ‘sure,’ and so I lived in a basement and that place saved me from so much. I didn't have anywhere to be and I was homeless and I didn't have any money, and all of those three things got solved in one giant swoop. And it was awesome because I was like, ‘OK, I have something to do,’ and I'm still trying to figure out how to make art and take photos and write music and do all these things. And this is a place where I can come and get inspired and be a part of the backend stuff of things or go to shows and just enjoy the art. Over the years it's been kind of like a teetering thing where I'm trying to figure out how to keep surviving. And Chain has always just been in the background like, ‘Hey, if you need support, we’re here.’”
One of Ramirez’s best friends is professional musician, David Baqi, who continues to embody the alternative essence of Chain Reaction with red streaks dyed into his long black hair and his commitment to music.
Baqi has performed at Chain shows with the bands Being as an Ocean, Takers Leavers, Eye the Realist and Secrets, but he started out in the audience.
His first time at the venue was to watch a friend’s band perform when he was 14 years old. He still remembers his first impression of the space:
“This is fucking cool,” Baqi said. “This is exactly where I want to be.”
When he started to take music seriously himself, performing at Chain became the goal. To a younger Baqi, it was the “mecca of music.”
He achieved his goal at 18, filling in for The Violent Gentlemen. His first time there before the doors opened was “surreal.”
He remembers thinking, “This is it. I made it. This is Chain.” He spent about 30 minutes taking it all in, looking at all the T-shirts of the bands that came before him, awestruck seeing names like Paramore and Fall Out Boy.
Chain Reaction was his “safe space.”
“You could take your backpack off and breathe a deep sigh like, ‘hell yeah,’ ” Baqi said.
He went on to say that the conversations he’d have with fellow Chain-goers, both as an attendee and as an artist mingling in the green room, were integral to his development as a human being.
Chain was his “therapist’s office, doctor’s office, best friend’s house, home away from home, it was the place.”
The Scene That Made the Storyteller
Stephanie Mendez is an Emmy-winning journalist and producer, with several bylines showcasing punk rock and alternative music. Her DIY attitude and love for the scene was nurtured by Chain Reaction since she was 15 years old.
Her early music journalism included covering the packed Dirty Rotten Imbeciles (D.R.I.) show in 2010 for Big Wheel Magazine. She remembers that show at Chain being especially “explosive” and “crazy fun.”
“They obviously didn't have windows or anything like that,” Mendez said. “You could feel the humidity. People's glasses were fogging up from how humid it was in there, from how packed it was. And I just remember, you can't really tell in the pictures, but when D.R.I. played, like that pit was crazy. It was like all the sardines that you see in that photo. They were slamming and pushing.”
Mendez stated that Chain’s closure has “an element of tragedy to it, especially because this era right now for kids or teenagers who are coming up in the punk scene or metal core or emo or whatever sub genre of rock that they're into, I think it's unfortunate that in an era where it's so digital – everything is on TikTok and social media – and I think that physical social aspect of being in the scene is fleeting, right? It's constantly diminishing. I think it's sad that yet another venue is closing its doors and preventing this very hyper digital, hyper tech demographic and generation from being able to experience what we experienced as teenagers.”
Some of the first bands she saw perform there include Clit 45, The Havoc and The Voidz. As a scene kid growing up in Santa Ana, she also had musical friends whom she’d watch perform at Chain like Media Blitz, an O.C.-based hardcore band.
“I remember with Chain Reaction, from the moment I walked in, I remember thinking, ‘Whoa, like, this place is so cool,’ ” Mendez said. “There was graffiti on the walls, some of their doors were literally littered in stickers. You couldn't even see the glass, you couldn't even see what was behind it. And then when you would walk inside, there was, I remember there being like a green color on some of the walls, bright colors, but they had on this big wall next to the stage, T-shirts of all the bands that had played there.”
Mendez thought the iconic T-shirt wall was so cool. She enjoyed scanning the wall with her friends to spot the bands they recognized. To her, Chain embodied the punk aesthetic.
She often found out about upcoming shows via MySpace bulletins and even local bands’ flyers posted at the music store, Vinyl Solution in Huntington Beach.
“Chain Reaction also used to release this monthly flyer of all the shows happening at their venue,” Mendez said. “So whenever we'd go to the record stores, we would make sure to pick one up, pick up a flyer with the calendar of bands and shows and things happening so that we would know, ‘this band is playing on the 21st or whatever.’ And so we would keep track of things that way and obviously in high school – all of my friends – we were the punk rockers at school. So friends would sometimes through word of mouth be like, ‘Oh, did you hear that this band is playing there this weekend?’ We would kind of make it like a mass exodus of punks migrating to Chain Reaction to catch a show on a certain weekend.”
Back When You Could Just Walk In
An element of the venue Kincannon mourns is the ability to easily buy a ticket at the door.
“I used to go to Chain and I didn't even know who was playing,” Kincannon said. “I'd walk up and be like, ‘Can I get a ticket?’ And they'd be like, ‘OK, who are you here to support?’ And I’d be like, ‘I don't know, what's the band with the least amount of fans?’”
He saw a lot of metal bands there like his buddy’s band, 13 Killings, as well as Horse the Band who played Nintendocore tunes. He also watched Taking Back Sunday, Brand New, Thrice and more.
A standout memory for him is attending a band’s CD release party at Chain. A giant birthday cake was brought onto the stage. In the middle of one of the songs, band members dumped it onto the mosh pit.
“It turned into this huge aggressive food fight,” Kincannon said. “And then we were all trying to mosh, but the ground was covered in cake and icing, and it was slippery and everyone kept falling down. And the smell, it was like, you know, hot, sweaty birthday cake. I'll never forget that. That was wild.”
When Kincannon was in college and 13 Killings became I, of Helix, he attended the band’s packed show. He was in the very front, the pit swirling behind him, thinking of how to exit since he needed to leave. Then the idea struck and he didn’t hesitate.
“I'm looking around like, ‘Man, what's the fastest way out of here?’” Kincannon said. “So I climb up on stage while my buddy's singing and stage dive onto the crowd. And the security guard comes and grabs me and drags me quickly right to the front door. And I was like, ‘that was the fastest way out.’ It worked great.”
To an outsider, Chain may not look like anything special, tucked into the corner of a small shopping center, but to Kincannon and his friends, it was a place he could go and get rowdy without fear of judgment.
When he first heard the news of its closure, he was shocked.
“I'm sad. I feel sad. I feel like I'm losing a part of my childhood,” Kincannon said.
Hope for the O.C. Scene
Part of Chain’s novelty to Kincannon was bands selling $10 CDs and $5 T-shirts made in garages to buy studio time and get their name out there. He’d like for there to be a venue with the same essence in a time of expensive tickets. Some, like Lyster, have pointed to Doll Hut in Anaheim as an alternative, although it is a 21 and older venue.
Mendez is hoping for some sort of “silver lining” to come from Chain’s closure.
“Hopefully this closure inspires somebody out there in the Orange County music scene to open up a new venue or to go the DIY route and figure out how to facilitate a new place where teenagers and music lovers in general can go enjoy shows, can go enjoy live bands, live music,” Mendez said. “So I just hope that somebody takes the opportunity and inspiration from something like this happening.”
Baqi carries his memories with him today as Chain was about the heart and mind, rather than just a physical place. While he’s sad to see it go, he believes Chain fans need to put a bow on it and look back on its legacy fondly. Chain was a support system for him, a movement, and he hopes the closure awakens the local scene to carry on.
