When last call rang out and The Complex closed its doors for the final time on June 22, the curtain came down on one of the great chapters in St. Louis LGBT nightlife. For owner Howard Meyer, it was a heavy sense of history that befell the business owner and community leader as he prepared to take his leave.
A gay bar has continually operated at 3511 Chouteau since Dennis Briden (owner of The Upside) opened The Warehouse in 1986. The bar was industrial in feel and offered happy hour, country western nights and eventually, a restaurant.
“Through an extremely complicated arrangement, I purchased it from Dennis—let’s just leave it at that,” quipped Meyer, who at the time was well known through his work in Hotel/Restaurant Management and later, Real Estate and Insurance with The HM Group in Clayton.
Meyer remembered well the draw that City Lights in Lafayette Square enjoyed and wanted to replicate it at The Warehouse with its ample space and more importantly, new kitchen. He envisioned a thriving restaurant and happy hour bar and then from 10 p.m. til close, a dance club.
The rehab started in spring 1989, but producers of the movie White Palace, which was being filmed up the street, came in and wanted to rent the space. Meyer was ahead of schedule and the price was right, so he jumped at the chance.
“It ended up that Susan Sarandon and James Spader were my first two customers, technically,” he recalled. “So they signed dollar bills which I still have hidden upstairs saying welcome and good luck and all that good stuff.”
Angles opened in a whirlwind on December 21, 1989. A host of well wishers came in to help decorate for the Holidays and before he knew it, Meyer was taking New Year’s Eve reservations. The restaurant seated 84 people and between 8 p.m. and midnight 234 people were served.
Very quickly, Meyer’s vision became a reality. Angles had the hottest happy hour in town and a wildly successful restaurant. His Sunday Tea-Dances were the place to be seen and at night the dance floor was pumping with patrons. In late 1992 he even turned the basement into Mom’s – a small leather bar – and repurposed the old stainless steel bar from Twist Nightclub as counter tops and wall coverings.
But by the mid 1990s, a combination of events would take its toll on business. Many patrons fell victim to the AIDS crisis or started partnering off and not going out as much. Still others took jobs out of state when several major corporations moved out of town. Similarly, the restaurant was not the draw it once was.
“My restaurant business began to decline because gay couples or gay friends didn’t feel they had to come here or Clementines to eat,” Meyer explained. “They could go anywhere and feel comfortable and not be harassed.”
COMPLEX
Realizing he needed to do something drastic to turn things around, Meyer brought in Tom White as general manager in 1995. White had done incredible things with visual display throughout St. Louis Center and the end result was a gutting of the entire bar which soon emerged as the ultra-modern Complex Nightclub.
“Angles had six-good-years and by that time the nightclub, once moved, got a lot more popular,” said Meyer of the expansion and rehab. “We were extremely popular for many years because there was no big nightclub in town except for Faces.”
But Meyer was not just a bar owner. Heavily involved in city, state and federal politics, he served as an openly gay 6th Ward Democratic Committee member and hosted countless fundraisers starring Governors, Senators and Presidential Candidates. Indeed, Meyer had his finger on the pulse of local
politics. What’s more, there were few LGBT non-profits whose Board he did not sit on throughout the 1990s and 2000s.
“I have helped with acceptance of the LGBT community of St. Louis to the point where I’m not really needed as an LGBT officer for the Mayor and I’m very proud of that,” said Meyer, who has served as Mayor Francis Slay’s LGBT Liaison since his first term as well as the former HIV/AIDS liaison to the Mayor who helped to control 25-percent of The City Health Department’s budget.
Three generations of LGBTers have partied the night away at 3511 Chouteau, most recently Siren and The GlitterBomb crowd who moved in when Faces shuttered in 2006. It proved a boost in the arm for the aging nightclub.
“They’re my biggest night,” Meyer smiled. “They’re [GlitterBomb] very creative and they spend a lot of time processing it.”
Meyer dismisses community speculation that drug activity had driven the Complex crowd away—admitting that one particular summer undercover dealers had pushed cocaine heavily, but once discovered, were run out.
“Drug culture has changed a lot,” said Meyer. “They take their pills at home and then come to the clubs and drink water.”
In fact, the decision to close The Complex after 22-years was a long time coming. While 4-years of recession has taken its toll, the Internet proved a powerful blow—many LGBTers now hook up online instead of hitting the bars and when they do meet, prefer someplace more quiet.
“But a big part is my physical health—I can’t be here and I need to be,” Meyer said. “The other part is financial—our sales are 50-percent of what they used to be. But mainly because I don’t have the energy, the time or the money to tear this all out again and invest another $80-100 thousand dollars. So I just made a decision—sell.”
At almost 58, Howard Meyer is winding down from public life. But love him or hate him, his impact on the St. Louis LGBT community from where we’ve played to how we live is undeniable. I asked him what went through his mind as he closed the door on this chapter of his life:
“I guess, really, to some degree, my own demise,” he said after a steady pause. “I helped a lot of people and I’m very proud of that. And it took the behind the scenes help from a lot of people, but we pulled it off. We brought this town totally into the 21-century.”
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